As far as bullet hell roguelikes go, this is everything I'd want out of the genre. It's so tight and polished to a glistening sheen with small rooms that make for dense encounters, scenarios that feel genuinely varied so it's never stale but are still controlled enough that every room should be reasonably clearable without taking a hit regardless of your loadout, a versatile weapon selection where even your base weapon can hold its own and using it in later areas isn't a death sentence, and an incredibly snappy pace that lets you finish runs in 20-30 minutes.
All of that's great, but Monolith's design goes far deeper than this as it both subtly and explicitly pushes you towards interesting playstyles.
Right off the bat, aggressive play is encouraged through its money system. Destroying an enemy will make them drop collectable debris that flies off in random directions and can be picked up and traded in for items. The catch is that debris can fly off-screen and disappear when not collected in time, but if you defeat every enemy in the room then you will automatically collect all debris still on-screen. Not only that, but you gain a debris multiplier the more enemies you defeat without taking damage, which adds an additional layer: you need a solid plan for any room to keep the multiplier, but you still have to clear it quickly to avoid any debris disappearing. Fast, consistent play gives bonuses, but shop prices aren't so punishing that it feels like your run is already over just because you got hit and lost your multiplier once.
You can only hold one weapon at a time and if you replace it or completely run out of ammo it's gone, and multiple tricks are used to push you to keep changing around your weapons: ammo can be spent on healing items, new weapons, and upgrades, max ammo can be exchanged for permanent damage bonuses to make a good weapon even better at the cost of having to conserve shots on your current and future weapons more carefully, and replacing your weapon with a new one both refills health and gives you more debris. "Encouraging players through rewards rather than punishment" isn't that new, but it's cool!
I appreciate how Monolith handles its health system as well. The easy way out for raising the stakes in roguelikes is starving you for health to make every encounter that much more tense, which works but it can also end up limiting the enemy design. When getting hit two or three times can so quickly lead to a game over (especially when it's sometimes so easy to get wombo comboed), attack patterns need to be straightforward and quickly digestible--enemies in other bullet hell roguelikes that I can think of often shoot with basic patterns that aren't nearly as complex as in many traditional bullet hells. While standard Shmups may also only allow you to only get hit a couple of times, that's why they almost always give you several bombs upon every death to allow for that extra room for error. Some roguelikes offer a similar item, but usually don't give you the same amount.
In Monolith it's the opposite, with you starting out being able to take 10 hits by default and also being able to raise that amount further in several ways alongside having a steady number of screen-clearing bombs. It's interesting that it's based specifically around how many hits you take and not a unique damage value for every enemy, meaning that there's never any confusion about how many more attacks you can survive before dying. Minus a couple very specific exceptions, if you have 6 HP, that always means you can take 6 hits, no guesswork.
Because you're allowed to be this messy, you're regularly put up against some absolutely brutal bullet patterns and enemy combos, always pushing you to come up with an escape plan if an area is becoming too cluttered, watch out for environmental hazards, and plan out enemy priority. These are obviously very basic ideas which are important to every roguelike, but the takeaway here is that because the game isn't so ridiculously stingy with health it's able to fully make use of all its mechanics without needing to hold back and compensate for those types of design restrictions. If you turned Monolith into a regular linear bullet hell, most of the bosses would fit in there perfectly and enemies would still be engaging.
But if it's so tight and well-crafted as a bullet hell, does it actually gain anything from being a roguelike instead of a linear experience? I would say yes! Combat encounters may be carefully controlled, but the fact that you're presented with them in random orders helps push it more towards quick thinking rather than pure memorization, which is one of the best strengths a roguelike can offer. I always pitch Monolith to people as being the Shmup version of WarioWare, thanks to its 3-7 second rooms that always keep you on your guard even when experienced with the game.
I can't recommend it enough and it easily deserves more recognition. Even if you aren't great at Shmups the default difficulty is pretty reasonable and gives you a lot of leeway, and if you want to push yourself further there's plenty of extra challenges and modifiers to seek out. Play the DLC too, it makes it even better!
All of that's great, but Monolith's design goes far deeper than this as it both subtly and explicitly pushes you towards interesting playstyles.
Right off the bat, aggressive play is encouraged through its money system. Destroying an enemy will make them drop collectable debris that flies off in random directions and can be picked up and traded in for items. The catch is that debris can fly off-screen and disappear when not collected in time, but if you defeat every enemy in the room then you will automatically collect all debris still on-screen. Not only that, but you gain a debris multiplier the more enemies you defeat without taking damage, which adds an additional layer: you need a solid plan for any room to keep the multiplier, but you still have to clear it quickly to avoid any debris disappearing. Fast, consistent play gives bonuses, but shop prices aren't so punishing that it feels like your run is already over just because you got hit and lost your multiplier once.
You can only hold one weapon at a time and if you replace it or completely run out of ammo it's gone, and multiple tricks are used to push you to keep changing around your weapons: ammo can be spent on healing items, new weapons, and upgrades, max ammo can be exchanged for permanent damage bonuses to make a good weapon even better at the cost of having to conserve shots on your current and future weapons more carefully, and replacing your weapon with a new one both refills health and gives you more debris. "Encouraging players through rewards rather than punishment" isn't that new, but it's cool!
I appreciate how Monolith handles its health system as well. The easy way out for raising the stakes in roguelikes is starving you for health to make every encounter that much more tense, which works but it can also end up limiting the enemy design. When getting hit two or three times can so quickly lead to a game over (especially when it's sometimes so easy to get wombo comboed), attack patterns need to be straightforward and quickly digestible--enemies in other bullet hell roguelikes that I can think of often shoot with basic patterns that aren't nearly as complex as in many traditional bullet hells. While standard Shmups may also only allow you to only get hit a couple of times, that's why they almost always give you several bombs upon every death to allow for that extra room for error. Some roguelikes offer a similar item, but usually don't give you the same amount.
In Monolith it's the opposite, with you starting out being able to take 10 hits by default and also being able to raise that amount further in several ways alongside having a steady number of screen-clearing bombs. It's interesting that it's based specifically around how many hits you take and not a unique damage value for every enemy, meaning that there's never any confusion about how many more attacks you can survive before dying. Minus a couple very specific exceptions, if you have 6 HP, that always means you can take 6 hits, no guesswork.
Because you're allowed to be this messy, you're regularly put up against some absolutely brutal bullet patterns and enemy combos, always pushing you to come up with an escape plan if an area is becoming too cluttered, watch out for environmental hazards, and plan out enemy priority. These are obviously very basic ideas which are important to every roguelike, but the takeaway here is that because the game isn't so ridiculously stingy with health it's able to fully make use of all its mechanics without needing to hold back and compensate for those types of design restrictions. If you turned Monolith into a regular linear bullet hell, most of the bosses would fit in there perfectly and enemies would still be engaging.
But if it's so tight and well-crafted as a bullet hell, does it actually gain anything from being a roguelike instead of a linear experience? I would say yes! Combat encounters may be carefully controlled, but the fact that you're presented with them in random orders helps push it more towards quick thinking rather than pure memorization, which is one of the best strengths a roguelike can offer. I always pitch Monolith to people as being the Shmup version of WarioWare, thanks to its 3-7 second rooms that always keep you on your guard even when experienced with the game.
I can't recommend it enough and it easily deserves more recognition. Even if you aren't great at Shmups the default difficulty is pretty reasonable and gives you a lot of leeway, and if you want to push yourself further there's plenty of extra challenges and modifiers to seek out. Play the DLC too, it makes it even better!