Ever since its initial reveal trailer and my brief time with its demo, I have been eagerly awaiting my chance to play more Luna Abyss. My prayers have seemingly been answered with a new extended demo that Kwalee Labs has dropped for preview purposes.
I’m happy to report that Luna Abyss is still a lot of fun to play, while its extended demo offers a better vertical slice from deeper within its single-player FPS campaign. Upon booting up, I was given the option to play the Sorrows Canyon level and Scourge Crater, a brand-new level from further within the game. As an earlier build, Sorrows Canyon is already available to play on Steam via a free demo. I will only briefly touch on its contents before moving on to the newer material.
Waking up in a mysterious underground labyrinth, players assume the role of Fawkes, a woman with a chequered past turned prisoner, tasked with aiding an AI overseer referred to as Aylin. Taking place mainly on a megastructure known as the titular Abyss, which mirrors the moon, Luna Abyss is a sprawling action-adventure FPS with bullet-hell elements that feel like a mix of Returnal and Metroid Prime.
“Luna Abyss is a sprawling action-adventure FPS with bullet-hell elements that feel like a mix of Returnal and Metroid Prime.”
Despite its gorgeous use of a mostly monotone colour palette accented with red on black, I was worried Luna Abyss would rely too heavily on the dark and oppressive aesthetic that is heavily featured in its opening chapter. Thankfully, the Scourge Crater level appeased my concerns with a liberal smattering of open-air sections, an arena-style gauntlet room featuring a playable giant organic mech, all topped off with a wicked boss encounter inside a techno sphere that feels reminiscent of something out of a Guillermo del Toro movie.
For those unfamiliar with Luna Abyss, the FPS title employs a lock-on mechanic reminiscent of Metroid Prime, something that also makes it easier to bob and weave between the shower of bullet-hell-style projectiles that pepper the screen. Weapons in Luna Abyss serve a dual purpose, such as opening specially marked doors and breaking enemy defences, with examples including the shieldbreaker shotgun. Your kit, at least the guns available in the two levels present in the demo, is energy-based, meaning players don’t need to worry about ammo and can instead focus on juggling weapons efficiently.
The Scourge Crater level opens on an inlet of floating rocks that introduces the player to the dash mechanic and a sniper rifle-like energy weapon. The sniper, like the shieldbreaker shotgun, delivers a powerful, focused shot and is primarily useful for taking out the core of a floating, laser-based enemy. Sustained damage, once an enemy is stripped of its shielding, allows players to drain their health à la Doom, encouraging fast, frenetic chaos to keep health topped up.
Additionally, at times the player will come across flying orbs that they can control, acting as jumping-off points or nodes that further the parkour and platforming gameplay beats within Luna Abyss. More interestingly, this transference ability also applies to some larger targets, including a biomechanical mech that momentarily transforms the player into an almighty war machine. These sequences appear to be used sparingly, making them feel more like fun gameplay deviations than the primary focus.
The core appeal of Luna Abyss is its bullet-hell-style approach to enemy encounters, which often feature mobs capable of overwhelming the screen with orbs of pain that players must learn to evade, almost giving the game a puzzle-like element. Boss encounters, in particular, amp up the chaos, featuring more aggressive barrages of bullets alongside interesting patterns and gimmicks that make fights memorable and tense.
The boss encounter that ends the demo in the Scourge Crater level is a strong test for the player, employing every game mechanic introduced thus far. This includes phases that force the player to switch to specific weapons, such as the shieldbreaker shotgun or sniper rifle, in order to make the boss vulnerable to attack.
“This dance of managing your arsenal while evading enemy fire is the central crux of Luna Abyss’s gameplay loop and left me wanting more.”
Relying on your starting pea shooter is the way to go for dealing the bulk of the damage over time, but unlike most smaller mobs, bosses feature a much larger health pool. In other words, switching between your entire kit is key to victory. That also means being mindful of your charges, as being caught off guard when enemies and bullets overwhelm the screen can result in a quick death.
This dance of managing your arsenal while evading enemy fire is the central crux of Luna Abyss’s gameplay loop and left me wanting more. Even with only two levels to complete, I can already tell that Luna Abyss is shaping up to be a game that will definitely be on my radar. If you’re a fan of movement-based FPS titles or enjoy games like Returnal and Doom, I highly encourage you to check out the demo on Steam. Hopefully, Kwalee Labs can maintain this momentum as Luna Abyss is released sometime later this year.
