Abyssus answers the question of what a game like Hades would feel like if it were a fast and frenetic boomer shooter with friends, set in a retro science fiction pulp setting ripped out of the 1960s.
Up to four players take on the mantle of brine hunters, intrepid explorers of the depths of the abyss. Despite not really caring about the overall narrative or hidden story beats peppered throughout the game world, one thing Abyssus does nail as far as its narrative is the voices of the playable characters. If you’re a fan of games like Deep Rock Galactic, you’ll feel right at home with the humorous, nonchalant attitude of the brine hunters despite the ever-increasing dangers that lurk down below.
Set across 64 levels punctuated by four distinct biomes, Abyssus is an addictive rougelike that is hard to put down. In other words, DoubleMoose Games has nailed the roguelike formula in delivering their debut title.
Starting out in Abyssus may feel overwhelming with the limited arsenal and firepower given to the player, made doubly worse by the increase in difficulty of having additional comrades. Still, like any good roguelike, Abyssus earns its sea legs by providing a steady stream of powerful unlocks that go from levelling the battlefield to decimating it.
“Abyssus is an addictive rougelike that is hard to put down.”
Unlocks come in a few varieties, including both persistent permanent upgrades that last between runs and powerful augments that can be acquired when in the depths, which take the form of charms. Charms come in three rarities, green, blue and yellow, similar to popular games like World of Warcraft and Destiny, making them easy to discern when blazing through a run in Abyssus.
Charms can drastically augment the players’ abilities, including upgrades for not only your equipped weapon and deployable, but also effects that beef up Blessings. Like charms, Blessings, or aspects of power can be found in chests, from defeating bosses, or even bought from the end-level item vendor, which give the player special abilities attuned to different elements, such as fire, ice, ghost and a defensive shield, among others, nautical-themed boons.
In addition to the charms and blessings, gold can be earned by defeating enemies, getting specific modifiers or destroying gold-laden pots, which then can be exchanged for helpful items at the item shop, such as additional blessings, an extra syringe (health item) or an increased health pool for the remainder of the run.
“I haven’t had this much fun with a roguelike since my time with Risk of Rain 2.”
Finally, one of the most important currencies in the game takes the form of soul fragments, which can generally be farmed by defeating bosses, but also can be found within chests. Soul fragments unlock powerful permanent upgrades via the hub area of Abyssus and grant game-changing persistent boons, such as extra deployable secondaries. These include turrets and extra grenades, additional syringes, better reloading and weapon damage, and even the option to have two charms at once per run.
A typical run in Abyssus will include having to defeat all the enemies in the room before moving on, as is standard for the genre. Still, DoubleMoose Games did throw in a few handfuls of unique objective-based challenges, such as having to stand on pressure plates, carry a payload to a specific point in the map, having to destroy growths that heal enemies before moving on, and less random, mid-level bosses that must be defeated.
Early on, some of the challenges can feel somewhat hopeless, but once you die enough times after clearing a few bosses, you’ll be more than prepared to take on what the game throws at you. One example, which happened to be the first time I finished an expedition or run, my character had the turret deployable unlocked, in addition to a boon that granted me six turrets at once, on top of a charm that gave me a 50% chance of the cooldown not triggering, essentially giving me unlimited turrets.
This deadly combination made for one of the most entertaining and satisfying runs to date, on top of the hilarity of having to contend with my friend who ran into performance woes due to me spamming turrets all over the map. I haven’t had this much fun with a roguelike since my time with Risk of Rain 2, with the main gameplay loop incentivizing players to experiment and see just how broken they can make their characters.
This makes getting over the numerous humps the game throws at you early on that much more satisfying to overcome. Of course, if you’re a roguelike enthusiast, the real game doesn’t start until you get access to brine canisters, the primary modifier used to increase the base difficulty of an expedition. Brine canisters can be earned by completing a run and can make the game significantly harder, but always with the discretion of the player.
Finally, outside of the addictive gameplay loop, Abyssus features a robust roster of weapons that gradually unlock via in-game challenges. On top of a well of weapon-specific mods and skins for both the player and your loadout, there is a lot to sink your teeth into as you get through Abyssus. Two of my favourite weapons include the Tesla gun and the Combat Bow, with the former acting like a Ghostbusters-style beam of high electricity that can melt enemies, while the bow, instead, feels like a super-fast semi-automatic gun that can shred through bosses or larger mobs.
Secondary deployable weapons are also quite fun to experiment with, such as the turrets mentioned above, and my favourite, an arcane tesseract-like object that, when stacked with other players, can absolutely destroy bosses by spamming the Q key.
Overall, Abyssus is an excellent FPS roguelike title and a must-play for fans of the genre, especially fans of boomer shooters or fast and over-the-top games that ditch realism for fun.
