Raw Metal

Just beat the last boss and... In short, it's a hard game to "recommend". I kind of liked it but I don't think I'd recommend it to a friend. It's probably one of these games where the devs got so good at their own game that they couldn't make a compelling and engaging difficulty curve anymore. The normal levels are alright and definitely the highlight of the game. The mechanics evolve and new enemies gets introduced as you get deeper making the balance between infiltration and combat pretty fun. Though I found the weight limit pretty harsh when focusing on gathering loot so I just kept using the gear which increased weight limit. The bosses on the other hand are just painful. Not only is the difficulty of each boss far above what the game has constantly made you face until then. The runback to a boss on "default" difficulty is insanely punishing. The boss gameplay just doesn't line up with the rest of the game. And of course, all bosses are insanely weak to cheese tactics (aka farming and spamming taser) which makes you engage even less with them. My tactic ended up completely forgoing gear and just repeatedly fighting the same boss over and over naked when I wanted to defeat them without cheese. There is no way this is how the game is intended to be played. Ultimately, it's not a bad game, it's just in a rough state.

tl;dr: Lovely game! Great stealth, highly engaging combat, incredibly charming voice acting and worldbuilding. Well worth the buy! anyway my thoughts: Raw Metal is a unique game. I was first charmed by the videos that Team Crucible put out teasing the game, then I bought it on release and never beat it because it was really, really hard. However, back in December 2024, the game got a big balance patch that didn't really make it *easier* as much as it just made it *less* punishing. And now I have beaten the game, it took me just under 5 hours after restarting my save. I don't actually want to write a super long review, but this game has it all for me. I've been a big fan of stealth games for a long while, and this game handles it pretty well. But then, funnily enough, the combat is so engaging that I never really want to do a bunch of stealth... Speaking of such, yeah, the combat rocks. Really simple, but has the potential to make you feel reaaally cool when you get some perfect-chain juggle combos. The roguelite systems of "dungeon" crawling, getting loot, and extracting is something I haven't seen done like this in a game before. Like I said before, they toned down how punishing everything was, but there's still a really intense & fun risk-reward balance with taking your best gear down for a better chance at getting further. I kinda played mostly gear-less though so oops The subtle bits of character writing and worldbuilding, though difficult to parse given how little we get, make an interesting world that left me wanting so much more. The voice acting is incredibly charming, too; you can really tell the VAs had passion for the world and the characters they voiced, who are all really engaging in their own ways! (ESPECIALLY BOSS 3 THEY'RE SO DAMN COOL) And finally, the music is wonderful. go listen to "A Perfect Weapon" and you'll understand

Raw Metal is an amazing project that puts everything its got to offer on full display as soon as you boot up the game. So why am I writing a negative review to this game which I purchased on release? Don't get me wrong it is so much better than what it was when I played it first. But on my revisit I have realized that the main incentive of this game is to utilize all of the things it offers you. Those things being: - Stealth - Combat and arguably the most important thing - Gear Here's the problem. It is a genuine hassle to even obtain gear on the standard difficulty. I am stubborn and do not feel like switching the difficulty down and played the whole game on the default difficulty. It's so much of a tedious process that I instead opted to just skip the long descents for gear and just started picking up where I left off gearless... See the problem yet? Playing gearless is genuinely fun and it makes a lot of the game more challenging in the fun way, it almost feels like everything is meant to be done gearless and itemless, that is until Sublevel B and Layer 4. The biggest gripe I have with this game if not what I just mentioned is the final 2 segments of the game. It feels like the last 2 bosses are made to punish those who don't feel like spending hours maxing and optimizing builds to counter these bosses. (I also feel the punishment of dying on the actual final boss makes you refight the boss prior, just comes off as a lazy f you to the player.) Overall it's a great game, but its got some parts that kind of ruin it for me. This doesn't really feel like a game I would recommend to anyone else unless I knew they're exactly like me in the sense they want a game where the odds are almost always stacked against them. The fact that every fight is like that is what makes this game special, however its also its downfall in the last fights. It's definitely one of my favorite games due to the fact its such a specific kind of game that scratches a specific itch. However, I have no idea if I'm really compelled to 100% this game or not.

Good game, was pretty difficult. Loved the Soundtrack and Voice acting.

This game tries to do two completely different games at once and fails at both honestly. The beat'em up part feels close to God Hand but without 90% of the combos and the combat feels so weightless and bad. The stealth feels like garbage when enemies that are so far off your screen you would never know they were even there can spot you before you even have the time to see that they see you. Genuinely it would have been better to do one or the other but trying to do both for your first game just makes both bad.

Great game. Better on steam deck

Parry slop. Not for me.