Genopanic is a pixel-art, Metroidvania-inspired adventure-platformer. Explore corridors of the space station, teeming with secrets and dangers, and engage in boss fights. Solve puzzles and uncover hidden mysteries in the dark atmosphere of a sci-fi research complex. Discover the truth with each step.
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Genopanic es un metroidvania, aunque bastante lineal, que hace muy sencillo divertirse. Cuenta con una historia interesante, un apartado gráfico pixel art genial y una jugabilidad muy pulida. Totalmente recomendable.
This is a good ,pixelized 2d platformer that I had 4 hours of fun with. Don't be fooled though, this is not a metroidvania.
I'm not sure you can consider this a metroidvania game as the progression is linear. The game gives you a false sense of genre when it starts because it feels VERY Metroid, but as you go, you realize there is only one path forward and no open exploration. I mean, you can explore a bit in the beginning, but there is no real reason to (no secrets).
As of launch week, the game does have a few bugs here and there. Falling through platforms and odd physics stuff popped up now and then but very rarely.
The AI is absolutely dumb. None of the enemies were a challenge, even the bosses were super easy.
The game doesn't ramp up true challenge until the last half of it. You spend the first half collecting abilities with mild challenge and then you spend the 2nd half navigating much more treacherous areas with all your abilities.
I wish the GMO/Pokemon characters were the abilities that you collect instead of just collecting equipment. The GMO seemed very tacked in for no other reason than just to collect them.
Much of this is nit picky except for maybe the AI stuff. Looking forward to the sequel!
I'm not sure you can consider this a metroidvania game as the progression is linear. The game gives you a false sense of genre when it starts because it feels VERY Metroid, but as you go, you realize there is only one path forward and no open exploration. I mean, you can explore a bit in the beginning, but there is no real reason to (no secrets).
As of launch week, the game does have a few bugs here and there. Falling through platforms and odd physics stuff popped up now and then but very rarely.
The AI is absolutely dumb. None of the enemies were a challenge, even the bosses were super easy.
The game doesn't ramp up true challenge until the last half of it. You spend the first half collecting abilities with mild challenge and then you spend the 2nd half navigating much more treacherous areas with all your abilities.
I wish the GMO/Pokemon characters were the abilities that you collect instead of just collecting equipment. The GMO seemed very tacked in for no other reason than just to collect them.
Much of this is nit picky except for maybe the AI stuff. Looking forward to the sequel!
Genopanic is a competently made action platformer with music, sound effects, and visuals that give off a good atmosphere, it has responsive controls that a lot of indie platformers can lack, and it changes things up often with the introduction of new abilities and items. But it is also very short, taking me under three hours to finish, it plays a bit more like you are in a tutorial for at least 2/3s of the game, and while some enemies can look cool or add to a somewhat creepy atmosphere they pose no real threat.
You play as a robot tasked with going to a quarantined planet to recover illegally modified creatures called GMOs with the help of your virtual assistant Laik. After you land and take a train to the facility you find it full of mutated creatures of what were formerly scientists, dangerous hazards, an AI that doesn't want you there, and you find that the GMOs have escaped to different sections of the area. Each section of the facility tends to have its own kind of biome from a section that is more covered in green and has some spiderlike enemies, an area with pipes shooting fire and lava rising, an area with water that you need to find valves to raise or lower the water level, ice sections where you can slide on some types of floor, etc. There's not too much of a story to uncover as many of the notes you can find on dead scientists or computers is more of the referential humor or ridiculous messages between characters rather than adding much to an overall plot. The station AI Volga you don't spend much time with and most of your enjoyment there is how much you like busty cat girls. Your doglike assistant Laik is frequently talking and has a few funny lines but better than that are some great expressions he gives in more surprising or dire moments.
The game has a good visual style that both makes you want to see how new locations and enemies look while also highlighting hazards and where you should be heading next effectively. Although the game has an easy to follow map, locations that allow for backtracking, and you find new abilities as you play that are common in metroidvania style games this is primarily a linear game where you will take a path allowed by your current abilities and then move onto the next natural section as you gain a new skill or a plot moment changes something on the map or your current location. Even those areas formerly blocked off for you are typically gotten back to by tacking a roundabout path or a new path found after gaining equipment, this makes it so you are unlikely to do much backtracking.
As you play you will find new weapons and equipment that can be used to access formerly blocked paths. Some of the weapons you find such as a flamethrower allow you to burn through paths formerly blocked by spiders, an ice gun can destroy molten rocks, your main gun can allow you to hit and destroy explosive crates from a safe distance, gadgets like a gravity gun lets you move and launch heavy crates, and gaining gravity boot to slow your fall and the abilities to double jump and to dash left and right at a fast speed that can carry you over cliffs give you new options to navigate your environment. Some weapons are more effective against certain enemy types, being able to kill some almost immediately and possibly while removing hazards created from their deaths. For example, the ice gun can instantly kill flaming enemies while preventing the explosion caused by other weapons. You can quickly swap through your weapons with a controller's shoulder buttons and dash with the right trigger or Y and everything is fast and responsive, though you do have an energy bar that can limit the use of some of your abilities and weapons until you allow the bar to recharge.
One of the main elements of the game is the crumbling infrastructure where you will frequently see walls or run over floors that will break on impact that can open up paths that allow you to bypass hazards or blockages to continue through the area. The idea of this is interesting, but nothing really comes of it. You will just learn that if an area looks like you can't get through it to look for the wall with the visual differences to highlight that you can go through it, a laser is blocking your path you can dash over it and through the next wall. There was likely going to be more to this at one point. When you enter a wall there is kind of a "fog of war" effect in the area where you ability to see the entire section or only sections you have moved through could have been used to hide enemies and hazards. It feels like that probably was the idea at one point as it seems like that would be the thought behind it and the reason from some of the areas with more space to them, but I would imagine it was discovered that running through partially visually blocked off areas and suddenly running into an enemy or instant death hazard isn't actually much fun and probably really frustrating. Running through or into the walls or ceilings just kind of becomes something you do to get around and get used to. It's not good, bad, or something that provides much in the way of unique challenge or interestingly utilized mechanics, it just how you get around. If some games would have stacked some blocks so you could just jump over something, maybe here you fall through the floor to walk under it instead.
The game is quite easy. Your main challenge will come from platforming while avoiding some instant death lasers/fire/etc but even those sections tend to be simpler than a lot of similar and popular games. While there are a variety of enemy types, with some having good designs for the atmosphere, most enemies are far too docile to provide any kind of challenge. The average enemy can be easily avoided, charged and hit with your sword, or just shot from a distance that prevents them from even attacking you. Even some of the stronger enemies can do nothing to you if you hit them first or just wait until they turn around before engaging them as they might not even react to being hit from behind. Even the few bosses, that again look good visually, just aren't good at actually attacking you. Attacking enemies feels fine, there is a bit of weight to your blows and the impact of attacks. There were two or three times in the game, all where I believe I was moving through some series of instant kill laser traps, where I thought that this might be the kind of much longer section you would find in a moderately challenging area of a similar kind of game, only here the sections probably only lasted for the time it took me to have that thought. Because of how quickly you are finding new abilities the first 2/3s of the game can feel almost tutorial like as you run into sections made to get you used to the new item you picked up and are still seeing graffiti on walls with text like dash here or messages from Laik telling you what to do.
If you want a short and fairly relaxing platformer where you can take it easy and enjoy the visuals and music (and Laik's expressions) or are just getting into or getting someone else into the genre and want something simpler then this is a solid title that does the actual movement and ability use well while still making it fun to hit enemies with your attacks. If you want a deep story to uncover, a long or challenging game, or something more unique mechanically then you probably want to hold off.
Screenshots: https://x.com/Legolas_Katarn/status/1790559795394777554
(Was given a free key for the game through the Steam curator system)
You play as a robot tasked with going to a quarantined planet to recover illegally modified creatures called GMOs with the help of your virtual assistant Laik. After you land and take a train to the facility you find it full of mutated creatures of what were formerly scientists, dangerous hazards, an AI that doesn't want you there, and you find that the GMOs have escaped to different sections of the area. Each section of the facility tends to have its own kind of biome from a section that is more covered in green and has some spiderlike enemies, an area with pipes shooting fire and lava rising, an area with water that you need to find valves to raise or lower the water level, ice sections where you can slide on some types of floor, etc. There's not too much of a story to uncover as many of the notes you can find on dead scientists or computers is more of the referential humor or ridiculous messages between characters rather than adding much to an overall plot. The station AI Volga you don't spend much time with and most of your enjoyment there is how much you like busty cat girls. Your doglike assistant Laik is frequently talking and has a few funny lines but better than that are some great expressions he gives in more surprising or dire moments.
The game has a good visual style that both makes you want to see how new locations and enemies look while also highlighting hazards and where you should be heading next effectively. Although the game has an easy to follow map, locations that allow for backtracking, and you find new abilities as you play that are common in metroidvania style games this is primarily a linear game where you will take a path allowed by your current abilities and then move onto the next natural section as you gain a new skill or a plot moment changes something on the map or your current location. Even those areas formerly blocked off for you are typically gotten back to by tacking a roundabout path or a new path found after gaining equipment, this makes it so you are unlikely to do much backtracking.
As you play you will find new weapons and equipment that can be used to access formerly blocked paths. Some of the weapons you find such as a flamethrower allow you to burn through paths formerly blocked by spiders, an ice gun can destroy molten rocks, your main gun can allow you to hit and destroy explosive crates from a safe distance, gadgets like a gravity gun lets you move and launch heavy crates, and gaining gravity boot to slow your fall and the abilities to double jump and to dash left and right at a fast speed that can carry you over cliffs give you new options to navigate your environment. Some weapons are more effective against certain enemy types, being able to kill some almost immediately and possibly while removing hazards created from their deaths. For example, the ice gun can instantly kill flaming enemies while preventing the explosion caused by other weapons. You can quickly swap through your weapons with a controller's shoulder buttons and dash with the right trigger or Y and everything is fast and responsive, though you do have an energy bar that can limit the use of some of your abilities and weapons until you allow the bar to recharge.
One of the main elements of the game is the crumbling infrastructure where you will frequently see walls or run over floors that will break on impact that can open up paths that allow you to bypass hazards or blockages to continue through the area. The idea of this is interesting, but nothing really comes of it. You will just learn that if an area looks like you can't get through it to look for the wall with the visual differences to highlight that you can go through it, a laser is blocking your path you can dash over it and through the next wall. There was likely going to be more to this at one point. When you enter a wall there is kind of a "fog of war" effect in the area where you ability to see the entire section or only sections you have moved through could have been used to hide enemies and hazards. It feels like that probably was the idea at one point as it seems like that would be the thought behind it and the reason from some of the areas with more space to them, but I would imagine it was discovered that running through partially visually blocked off areas and suddenly running into an enemy or instant death hazard isn't actually much fun and probably really frustrating. Running through or into the walls or ceilings just kind of becomes something you do to get around and get used to. It's not good, bad, or something that provides much in the way of unique challenge or interestingly utilized mechanics, it just how you get around. If some games would have stacked some blocks so you could just jump over something, maybe here you fall through the floor to walk under it instead.
The game is quite easy. Your main challenge will come from platforming while avoiding some instant death lasers/fire/etc but even those sections tend to be simpler than a lot of similar and popular games. While there are a variety of enemy types, with some having good designs for the atmosphere, most enemies are far too docile to provide any kind of challenge. The average enemy can be easily avoided, charged and hit with your sword, or just shot from a distance that prevents them from even attacking you. Even some of the stronger enemies can do nothing to you if you hit them first or just wait until they turn around before engaging them as they might not even react to being hit from behind. Even the few bosses, that again look good visually, just aren't good at actually attacking you. Attacking enemies feels fine, there is a bit of weight to your blows and the impact of attacks. There were two or three times in the game, all where I believe I was moving through some series of instant kill laser traps, where I thought that this might be the kind of much longer section you would find in a moderately challenging area of a similar kind of game, only here the sections probably only lasted for the time it took me to have that thought. Because of how quickly you are finding new abilities the first 2/3s of the game can feel almost tutorial like as you run into sections made to get you used to the new item you picked up and are still seeing graffiti on walls with text like dash here or messages from Laik telling you what to do.
If you want a short and fairly relaxing platformer where you can take it easy and enjoy the visuals and music (and Laik's expressions) or are just getting into or getting someone else into the genre and want something simpler then this is a solid title that does the actual movement and ability use well while still making it fun to hit enemies with your attacks. If you want a deep story to uncover, a long or challenging game, or something more unique mechanically then you probably want to hold off.
Screenshots: https://x.com/Legolas_Katarn/status/1790559795394777554
(Was given a free key for the game through the Steam curator system)