Luna Abyss

[h1]Flawed But Decent Platforming Shooter[/h1] One of the surprised discoveries during Steam June Nextfest 2023. Luna Abyss is a stylish, narrative-focused shooter. The beginning can be rather slow and monotonous due to the "incomplete protagonist." It'll take some time to acquire all the essentials. Once everything is in place, the game delivers quite a satisfying bullet-hell gunplay and interesting platforming. As for the elephant in the room, yes, this game is DEI-coded in dialogues, but at least it gives you options instead of shoving the agenda down your throat. [h2]Things I Like About Luna Abyss:[/h2] [list] [*][b]Striking Art Style:[/b] Immediately the most eye-catching part of the game. The bleak color scheme and the brutally industrialized design of the megastructures deliver an unyielding sense of ruthlessness. The sharp angles and the blocky geometry reinforce such idea. The vast and limitless reach of the levels is devoid of any emotion or warmth, like a grey goliath who belittles your very existence. [*][b]Fun Platforming:[/b] Similar to combat, the platforming sections in the early game can be underwhelming. However, once the essentials are in your hand (kinda like unlocking gating abilities in metroidvania), platforming immediately opens up to a whole new level. The game likes to design the platforming puzzles in an intimidating way—deceivingly unreachable at a glance and often with bottomless pits in between. You need not worry, though. Dash and Double Jump can cover a lot of ground, and you can chain these abilities easily together with little to no cool-down. These two designs easily make traversing those platforms very satisfying. Additionally, each section also hides some treasures. There are special symbols hinting at their general location. How you reach those places with the abilities you have is a nice layer of thinking on top of the usual platforming. [*][b]Interesting Combat:[/b] Like platforming, the intensity of the combat only shows its true color when you obtain enough firearms and gating abilities. The lock-on is an interesting design. The game aims for you so you can focus on dodging bullets. Dashing doesn't have i-frame, making the combat more about positioning. It may trivialize the early fights, but it is a really handy feature when the enemies start throwing a ridiculous amount of particles in your face. The rock-paper-scissors nature of gunplay and the overheat system add some small but impactful flavor to the combat instead of letting the players mindlessly gun around. Healing through execution, clunky as it is, is also another satisfying layer of thinking in target priority during combat. [/list] [h2]Things I Dislike About Luna Abyss:[/h2] [list] [*][b]Unstoppable Momentum:[/b] One thing I feel iffy about the platforming is that the momentum you create through abilities can be hard to control. I am not with exact terminology for this mechanic, so I can only write in experience. Usually in this type of game you can easily negate the forward momentum by pressing the opposite directional input, stopping yourself from moving or sliding. Luna Abyss sort of doesn't work like this. The momentum created by dashing is really strong. If you misjudge the distance between platforms, especially on those that either are short or disappear in seconds, you are very likely to overshoot your jump and slide off the platforms. It leaves a bitter taste in the otherwise great platforming. [*][b]Guns:[/b] It's like one of those funny gun showcasing videos when the modder "forgets" to give the gun animation, so the result is a very cursed recoilless shootout. All four of the guns in Luna Abyss are exactly that way. They don't have recoil animation to showcase the impact of each shot. They feel weightless in your hand, like four different static PNGs with lasers coming out of the barrels on their own instead of being projected. Moreover, the upgrades for them are also very lackluster. All of them are just simple damage boost and cool-down reduction. [*][b]Other Complaints:[/b] [olist] [*]The tone of the story is too whimsical. I am not against a joke or two here and there, but when the game delivers such a strong atmosphere through aesthetics alone, it really pulls you out of immersion. [*]This might just be me. I believe the voice-acting would fit better if the NPCs were stripped off their humanoid parts. Urien and Ellie are good examples of this. [*]The brightness in the game is pretty unpredictable. The environment can be too dark to even see where you are supposed to go, while the enemies' projectiles can be too blinding to the point of headache-inducing. [/olist] [/list] [b]中文小簡評[/b] 2023六月新品節發現的佳作之一，《月神深淵》是一款有著獨特風格的第一人稱射擊遊戲，美術獨到非常吸引眼球，遊戲初期可能因為女主「半殘」的性質節奏偏慢且單調，需要等到你收集完一定技能後才會真正開始體驗刺激的子彈地獄及有趣的跳台解謎，屬於慢熱型的遊戲。本作在對話中有較不明顯的DEI設計，對這塊敏感的人可以直接迴避，我個人是覺得還好，畢竟遊戲有提供你選項而非將觀念硬塞你臉。 [b]喜歡的點[/b] [list] [*]畫風極具特色，陰鬱的色彩搭配冷峻無情的工業化巨型建築，成功營造出一股毫不妥協的殘酷，稜角銳利分明、方正幾何建物、無限延伸的深淵，無疑是在傳達這個世界對你的漠視。 [*]與戰鬥雷同，前期可能因技能解鎖不足而顯得單調且綁手綁腳，但是拿到技能後跳台的樂趣瞬間提升一個檔次。遊戲特別喜歡設計一些看似遙不可及的跳台搭配無底深淵(懼高症請小心)來嚇你，但你不必擔心，衝刺、二段跳等技能的移動距離非常長，冷卻低的特性搭配簡單的重製讓你能輕鬆連續使用，操作感十足，華麗地成功征服任何跳台挑戰。 [*]每個關卡也藏有一些隱藏寶物，石牆上會有特殊符號標記它們大致的位置，如何運用手中有的技能到達那些地方也是遊戲跳台挑戰的一大樂趣之一。 [*]戰鬥方面也是前期枯燥、中後期開始有所起伏。槍枝鎖定目標的功能挺有趣的，初期戰鬥可能覺得過於簡單，當你畫面都是滿滿的粒子特效時，這功能就顯得非常實用，讓你能更專注在躲避海量的子彈，衝刺也沒有無敵禎，因此戰鬥節奏更講究活用技能走位。 [*]槍枝與敵人特殊技能相剋的性質、無儲備彈藥僅靠過熱系統、和處決回復生命等特色都為戰鬥增添十足趣味性，並非讓你隨便亂射就好，而是需要你即時選敵和快速應對。 [/list] [b]不喜歡的點[/b] [list] [*]跳台時主角產生的動能無法即時抵銷，這點我專業知識不足所以不太好說明白，簡單來說就是衝刺或二段跳產生的動能非常大，如果你沒有算好自己與跳台間的距離，很容易跳過頭無法停下來，亦或是以為站定落點結果角色因動能過剩而繼續向前滑，讓原本不錯的跳台體驗稍稍打了折扣。 [*]槍枝本身用起來挺糟的，沒有用後座力來展現每一發子彈的威力，用起來也覺得毫無重份量可言，就好像子彈從靜態貼圖跑出來的感覺，升級也只有簡單傷害提升與冷卻縮短，沒有有趣的分支。 [*]故事敘事手法過於詼諧，以至於遊戲光看美術樹立起來的莊嚴感蕩然無存。 [*]關卡有時暗到無法看清下一步改往哪走，敵人子彈卻又亮到看久了會讓人頭痛的地步。 [/list] [quote=author]If you like what I write, please consider a follow to [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/45738167/]my curator[/url] page, thanks! 如果你喜歡我寫的東西，可以追蹤[url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/45738167/]我的鑑賞家[/url]喔！[/quote]

[h1]The game was okay but nothing amazing.[/h1] https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3772465500 Luna Abyss art style and visuals were very redundant and almost every areas looked the same, I hope you like black, grey and red colours... The game was so dark on OLED I couldn't see ♥♥♥♥ 80% of the time and was forced to change brightness regularly (yes my monitor is perfectly calibrated). Personally I am not sure what were they thinking with a hard lock-on system in a FPS game? It removes any form of skill expression and turn the combat into a boring slog of lock-on spam garbage. The bullet hell elements didn't really felt good, engaging or well done, it was there but it never felt really challenging except maybe for the final boss, if you expect the level of insanity of Returnal then you will be disappointed. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3771833897 The voice acting was really bad and the overall tone of the dialogues and story felt very pretentious and nonsensical. I finished the game and I ended being disappointed by the game as a whole, another overhyped game on Steam I guess. The developers clearly took inspiration from Destiny 2, some parts felt like doing a Destiny 2 dungeon but with worse quality (puzzles or platforming are a lot worse). Near the end there was an area which felt straight ripped off from The Whisper of the Worm in Destiny. I can also mention the secrets hidden with markings like how you would find the entrance of a lost sector in Destiny and certain areas looked like Nessus in D2. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3771834158 Overall not a bad game but far from being great. Would recommend buying on a heavy discount only. [h1]Rating 6/10.[/h1]

Pretty good game. Good story. Great voice acting. Really appeals to that primal urge to explore alien megastructures and kill gods. Excellent art style. And I really respect the choice developers made not to fill every single large room with enemies, just because they could. Good pacing, the really really just lets you explore from time to time. And then publisher fired the whole developer team less than a month after release. So there's that...

This is a good game that is almost a great game held back by tonal inconsistencies, pacing issues, and an insufferable protagonist. The good: - The aesthetics are ON POINT. Shoutout to Harry Corr as art director. Along with the environments, it was worth it for me to purchase the game just to have access to the art. The environments actually reminded me a lot of Portal 2 with how they utilize skyboxes/matte paintings to convey a sense of scale. So much of my playthrough was just looking out and taking screenshots. - Combat is surprisingly engaging. It takes a minute to get going, but once you have multiple weapons and a particular combat ability unlocked, the combat encounters require some interesting on-the-fly decision making. - Fun platforming with weird little segments of unique traversal mechanics breaking up the combat. - Andres Williams's voice performance as Mani was delectable. - Laser sliding sound. If you know, you know. The bad: - The main character. Fawkes. Fawkes has the emotional intelligence of a 10 year old. Fawkes is missing a prefrontal cortex. Fawkes is the ONLY one (player included) that doesn't see the "twist" coming from ten miles away. I am baffled by how badly written Fawkes is because the REST of the game has competent, even GOOD writing. I cannot convey how much of a turnoff Fawkes is as a character, let alone the MAIN protagonist. I cannot, as a rational being, believe that Fawkes was written by the same writer(s) as the rest of the game. - The game has a strange flow to it. It takes a while to get into the gameplay "loop", but it never really settles there. The game is constantly introducing the player to multiple areas which feel like they should function as a hub world, but none of them ever do. - The game is split into different "chapters" that are bookended by a return to your oddly nice jail cell (going for $5.2m in NYC). This section of the game is entirely unnecessary, functioning essentially as a loading screen that allows you to read lore you collect (which you could read at any point, mind you) and that you have to choose THREE TIMES to continue the game. This is how it goes: [i] What do you want to do? Read, talk to the head in the wall, or sleep? Alright, let's talk to the head in the wall. The head in the wall is telling you to sleep. Sleep. Good, now, do you want to read or talk to the head in the wall? The head in the wall says you should go on your mission. Okay. You wanna talk to the head in the wall? Alright. Let's get going. [/i] Despite the flaws, I'm giving this a recommend because I genuinely had a good time playing this. It is inspiring artistically, and the gameplay is engaging enough to sustain focus over 7 or so hours. This is a good game. If you skip all of Fawkes's dialogue, it may even be a VERY good game.

Dev team disbanded. Restarting or dying after collecting codex entries and other collectibles will reset them if you haven't grab a new checkpoint so you need to collect them again. Codex entries emit specific sound when you are close to them, for some reason at some levels the same sound just randomly used as ambient, that made me confused. Even on the hardest difficulty i haven't feel much of a challenge until last 4-5 fights and that includes two last bosses. Environment too dark sometimes i would appreciate a flashlight but game doesn't have one. Too woke for my liking.

this game was so fun to play. the music is great with the atmosphere, the maps are immersive and the fighting system is balanced and i liked how each weapon has a purpose but it is not binding as you could use it for other things. the lore is rich and well-built which was amaaaazing and honestly i was impressed by it alongside the voice acting. if you like soulsborne games in terms of the lore, some fps and good mechanics like doom+ nier, this game is for you. amazing work by the devs and everyone involved.

Very unfortunate to hear what happened to the dev team, this game is amazing. It has it's flaws but it's very charming and a great experience so far. Definitely recommend it.

Хорошая игрушка на пару вечеров. Картинка в игре очень красивая, намешали мегаструктуры с готической архитектурой и в этот замес ещё образы персонажей присущие обычно анимешным картинам, получилось не дурно. Однако, бюджетность проскакивает тут и сям, например, один раз попытались в дневную локацию на природе и это выглядело как типикал Unreal-слоп с его вызженными белёсыми цветами... В тот же момент тёмные закрытые помещения визуально прекрасно удались, но они пустоватые и в них нету практически никакого эксплоринга, максимум простые секреточки. Кстати, поощрять игрока запиской, а не чем-то полезным в секретке это ну очень дурной тон, странно что разработчики об этом не в курсе. К тому же в записках много воды и чаще всего о судьбе очередного заводчанина сгинувшего в потёмках местных локаций, конечно полезные раскрывающие суть происходящего тоже есть, но их не так много. Да, сюжет тут подаётся не слишком откровенно, а персонажей которые изрекаются загадками аж треснуть хочется. Тем не менее, мне мир понравился, история не плохая, но концовочка оставила странное послевкусие. Я больше наверное наслаждался присутствием в этом мире и его эстетикой. Вот например помимо визуала, мне ещё очень понравилась музыка. От проекта я бы ожидал чего-то нейросеточного, а оказалось там полноценный композитор при содействии оркестра поэтому местами создаются очень трогательные вайбы и не плохие эпические мотивы, хотя на боссов поставили какой-то дабстепный вуб-вуб... ну и ладно, но к сожалению, это одна и та же тема на всех боссов, meh.. ну это к слову о бюджетности. Кстати, о шутерной части, кек, стрелять тут дают меньше чем ожидаешь от буллетхэлла и большую часть мы всё-таки платформим, однако, наверное оно и к лучшему 😁 Не знаю, как-то стрелять во врагов начинает утомлять уже ближе к финалу, сплошные губки для урона и ты зажав гашетку просто ожидаешь когда кончится их полоска хп... ну такое. О боёвке много не попишешь, сделали примитивный шутан — он и быстро приедается. Как-то мне показалось что проект ценен за другие вещи, и очень жаль что разрабам не дали распахнуть крылья... ведь как уже многие писали, разработчиков схлопнул издатель спустя неделю после релиза... Да, вот такая грустная история... и если вы всё же хотите поиграть в неё, то задумайтесь сколько именно вы хотите отдать денег именно издателю, а не авторам которых выперли на улицу.