This game fulfills a very important niche to me: The genuine feeling of being an actual space explorer. It gave that and even more.
Genuinely one of the most magical gaming experiences I've had in a long while
The hardest part honestly is how to recommend this game without spoiling anything, andI mean ANYTHING

Best way I can do that is to simply say that all progression in the game isn't through collectibles or doing things, but rather it's all based around discovery and learning the mysteries of the solar system itself.
Honestly BECAUSE progression is based on what you learn through the 22 minute time loops, rather than what you DO in those loops, makes it probably one of the best time loop based games ever. Whenever you start a loop, you're not going to do the same sequence of events and then something slightly different to progress. You're using what you learned in the previous loop to build your knowledge of the world even further (Which funnily enough, is one of the core themes of the game).
Go in blind, hop into your ship, and go uncover all the secrets of this system yourself. Go be a cool space explorer, and apply what you learn to discover even more.

The simplest way to break this game down: Giant robot chess.
This game is simple in a lot of ways, executed wonderfully.

Each mech you can use is pretty simple and serves one function, pilots have one ability that ranges from free to powerful (That requires extra resources to use!), stages are small and simple with a random twist every now and then, the bugs you fight are straightforward
With these simple problems, you can figure out a lot of creative solutions, all without feeling too overwhelmed with options or abilities or all that jazz
Like I said: Giant robot chess. Loads of fun, go on and get it

The one huge thing I wanna give strive is that it is probably one of the best entry level fighting games I've played
I'm mostly saying this as somebody who hasn't played too many traditional fighters.
It's very flashy, pretty cool presentation, a relatively small cast of fighters, and simple learning curve as well
It's flashiness basically brings in newcomers, and simplicity keeps them hooked, at least in my experience

It has a large enough playerbase to at least help me learn in scales enough to get the hold of the game feel. Then it was learning one step at a time: Combos, learning about what other characters can do and how to react, tension management, figuring out how to best use roman cancels, and so on.
Because of it's simple curve, however, it does leave me yearning for a bit more chaotic gameplay, but thanks to that it's at least given me a good gamesense and feel for how 2d fighters work. After this, I Moved onto Accent Core, and having a blast there, taking what I learned here to not get too overwhelmed over there.

It's a really really simple and solid fighting game. You're never really going to see anyone doing something insane or crazy with it IMO, but it's simple enough to get your toes into the water and used to the genre as a whole.

I would like to start this that I prefer the base game; The DLC tends to add bloat that just makes everything far more annoying and unpleasant to an unfair degree.

The base game is a very brutal lesson on knowing when to cut your losses, run away, regroup and try again.
A lot about this game is pretty brutal. The stress system, afflictions, disease, deaths door, several elements are seemingly stacked against the player. But at the same time, it does offer quite a bit of leeway
Stress passively goes down as long as your heroes idle about, so you don't need to constantly spend money to reduce high stress heroes
Heroes and camping skills can be used tactfully to keep stress low on missions
And most importantly, if something goes horribly wrong in your expedition
You can just abandon the mission then and there for a stress penalty.

Everything about the gameplay, art design, and game design is solid. You're going to get those hair-pulling moments where an enemy lands a crit and brings your hero down to deaths door in a matter of seconds, but at the same time you could also have miracles like a hero tanking three or four hits at death's door without stumbling. You're never really going to have a moment where you get 4 crit hits in a row that'll obliterate your party (Unless you decide to keep running with high stress, low health heroes who are on the brink of death.
If you want proof of this, you can check out my steam profile.Played for almost 200 hours, never had a single party wipe.
In the end, luck only influences whether an expedition horribly goes wrong at the start. The rest is about deciding what you're going to do with the cards you're dealt.
It's a long, painful climb which makes overcoming it all the more satisfying.


The only major complaint I have has to be with progression. Near the end-game, things slow down to an utter crawl as you need to make sure all your heroes are leveled up as high as possible, along with scrounging together all the artifacts to get your facilities as high as possible, and getting all the gold to make sure their equipment is as good as possible. It creates this utter vacuum of grinding right near the end to make sure you're dead set on taking on the final dungeon, but need copious amounts of gold and artifacts to ensure that.
There are some adjustments in the settings for this now, but it's still in the Stygian difficulty, so if you want to play with the time limit, you're stuck with a pretty bad end game grind

Best I can say about this is to be wary
overconfidence is a slow, an insidious killer.

The game is fun, but it feels a bit of a step down from doom 2016. It goes a bit more into camp, with big glowing powerups, the tone being a lot more like a B movie, and a change in art direction for enemy design, some better and some worse.
The gameplay loop of flamethrower to armor, chainsaw to ammo, glory kill for health felt like it got a bit stale, and none of the level design really stuck out too much to me. Whenever I return to replay, I just kinda get bored of the loop and tune out
Might be a me issue, but honestly still worth a play. I guess I Just expected a bit more