Neon Abyss Review

Isaac in chains

Neon Abyss feels an awful lot like what would happen if you took The Binding of Isaac and spliced it with a run and gun shooter, and then just lots of drugs and a club. I’ll break that down in reverse order for you because I like doing things out of sync.

So, the drugs. The visual style of the game is incredibly colourful, but each enemy you fight and boss you come up against is equal parts cute and horrifying. Everything looks like it’d sell out if it was a plushie, but also, everything has teeth or some absurdly powerful ability that can take you out if you’re not careful.

On top of that, you’ve got the constant thumping soundtrack behind everything that’s going on. One of my favourite things that Neon Abyss does is to do with the music. While you’re in battle, the bass kicks in and the music pumps up; it makes you feel like you’re in a dingy club somewhere with too many lasers, too much smoke, and not enough oxygen. Then, once you’ve defeated everything, it pulls back to a more reasonable level, the kind where you and your mates could be sat around in a pub and chatting instead.

Steven, God of Rhinos

You also fight bosses with names like “Kimmy, God of Idols”, and “Chuck, God of Pills”. It’s all vibrant and full of life, much more so than you’d expect in a game all about jumping into an abyss because Hades has asked you to do so.

Now then, onto the run and gun section. This is the core of the gameplay; you run through different rooms trying to defeat everything in that room that’s trying to kill you. It feels a little bit like confining Contra into room-by-room gameplay.

Alongside your standard run and jump, you often end up with double jumps, the ability to hover, and some incredibly absurd weaponry. You can only (generally) have one weapon at a time, but this one weapon can shout streams of homing lasers, or fire invisible bullets instantaneously across the arena.

What if we just added more?

Along with the weapons, you get upgrades as you go through the levels that can do anything from giving you a little extra health, to increasing the size of your bullets, to making them pass through walls. This is where the roguelike nature of the game feels strongest, and accidentally stumbling into an over-powered build feels great.

Now to The Binding of Isaac aspect. Obviously, the build variety comes into play here, but the multiple characters or function in a similar way too, with small variations in stats and the odd special ability here or there to define them. Plus, both keys and bombs are incredibly rare, which means you have to be very careful when using either.

The combat itself isn’t quite as intense as some other roguelikes, but this Neon Abyss also has difficulty levels, which means you can tailor it a bit more to your own tastes.

We have to go deeper

Now I, as you probably are aware if you’ve been on the site before, am quite partial to a good roguelike. There’s something incredibly satisfying about the combination of pure arcade action, the RPG unlocks, and the gratification that comes from beating a seemingly impossible task. As long as the gameplay is tight, they’re basically my favourite type of game.

Neon Abyss is a really solid roguelike that has a great visual style, some incredibly cool features, and a really fun build variety. The concept is fun, the bosses are generally quite funny to fight against, and the feeling you get when you’ve got an obscene weapon and a bunch of followers is excellent. It’s definitely got the makings of a really great game, and I’m excited to continue putting time into it.

[Reviewed on PC]