Nuclear Throne is one of the most sleeper hit video games of all time; an absolute must-play for roguelike fans. It executes the roguelike formula a bit differently than most other games of the genre, which I think plays to its strengths.

Beating the “final boss” isn’t the end of a Nuclear Throne run. Once you kill the boss of the 7th zone, you are sent back to zone 1 for a much more difficult “loop” through all the levels you already cleared, but now with remixed enemy pools and significantly more enemies. You go on for as long as you can survive, killing as many enemies as you can, before dying to the relentless difficulty of the game. The game is very fast paced, so if you die it won’t take long to get decently far into a new run. The first loop through the levels isn’t a joke either. The game asks for your full attention, which I like a lot. It keeps the game from feeling like its wasting your time with easy levels.

Unlike most other roguelikes, Nuclear Throne does not have a huge emphasis on the number of unique powerups (called mutations in this game) available to the player. Your first 8 level ups will allow you to choose 1 of 4 random mutations out of the 29 available in the game, and your final level up will let you choose 1 of your character's 2 ultimate mutations. There are a very large number of weapons available in the game, but a very skilled player should eventually be able to get the 2 best weapons by the end of any run simply by surviving long enough.

Rather than focusing on the number of mutations the player can collect, Nuclear Throne deliberately limits the selection of powerups available to the player so that it can tailor the difficulty and experience of the average run. As a very experienced player of this game, I actually think that the game would have benefitted significantly from trimming the 29 mutations down to be closer to 20 so that the gameplay experience could be even more consistent.

Because Nuclear Throne is a score-chasing roguelike, your goal each run will be to kill as many enemies as possible by looping through the randomly generated levels multiple times before dying. 4 or so of the mutations are must-haves, and your run will be severely hampered if you aren't given the option of getting all of them. Because you are given mutations randomly, you may not be given the opportunity to get these critical mutations, meaning you just won’t be able to beat any respectable high scores you’ve previously set without them. I think this is the biggest flaw of the game. The roguelike and score-chasing elements are clashing on a fundamental level, which leaves runs that haven't been blessed with a near optimal loadout of mutations feeling unsatisfying.

I would love if there were a way to reroll bad mutations after looping so that, like weapons, a skilled enough player would be able to get an optimal loadout eventually by simply surviving long enough. My only other significant complaint with the game is that rad-starving (an exploit for experienced players that allows you to get 1 extra mutation for free) is really annoying to perform and disrupts the quick pace of the game. The game also could use some alternate floors and bosses (like how Isaac has multiple different floor types and bosses that can appear in a specific chapter), but this isn't a big problem and would just be nice to have. If these issues were all addressed I think that Nuclear Throne would be a perfect game. Regardless, this is an excellent game and I highly recommend it to anyone who wouldn't be turned off by its high difficulty.