Nex Machina

I wasn't aware of this game and I bought it solely for the flashy colors and the hillarious pitch. Well, it happens to be the best shmup I've played since Ikaruga. If you're into that kind of things (high scores in the zone), you'd better warm your thumbs up because there's quite some challenge into this game. The soundtrack is incredible, voxels are flying everywhere and despite all the stuff happening on screen everything is clear and readable. Playing this game is like drinking electricity, it's an explosion of arcade love and I can't stop enjoying it. Hey Housemarque, bring more games on PC, you rock!

I am typically a big fan of arcade-like games such as these, but I never score, I only go for a 1cc. When I first bought this game, I was extremely impressed; the graphics looked great, the gameplay was fast-paced, and saving humans was fun. However, the further I got into this game, the more my opinion of it deteriorated. First off, there is a 6(including current) life limit, and you start out with 4. That means you can only gain 2 lives before other ones go to waste. Admittedly this is a small nitpick, but many games have a higher limit, usually 9. Second, is the way you gain lives in the first place: you find them by breaking things in the environment. This, among with other things in the game such as beacons, usually means you'll have to kite around the last enemy in a level for a minute as you shoot everything in sight to make sure you didn't miss everything. For a fast-paced game like this, I can't see that as anything other than poor design. Oh, did I mention that this is the only way to gain lives? Yup, reaching certain scores does not net you extra lives, in fact you get nothing for it; acquiring score is good for nothing other than bragging rights. This means that for survival: rescuing humans is pointless destroying special enemies/objects is pointless acquiring multipliers is pointless secret levels are pointless(actually you want to avoid them) So, if you are only playing for survival about half of this game's mechanics are pointless. Almost every arcade game in existence allows for a fun and fulfilling survival experience, with scoring being the icing on top for players that want to go the extra mile, but not this game. To add insult to injury, the GOG version of this game can't connect to the servers, so you can't even look at other people's scores. Do not buy this game unless you are a scorechaser.

A while ago I read an article, I don't remember exactly where, maybe on Housemarque's own website stating that arcade is dead due to the dissappointing sales of Nex Machina and that they would move on to other genres. If I'm honest I'm hardly surprised, not that arcade is dead, because while it may not be the most popular of genres, I don't think it is dead but that Nex Machina isn't as good as the developers think it is. Back in the '80s and '90s arcade games were made insanely hard because they were designed to rob schoolchildren out of their lunchmoney in the shortest amount of time. But time has moved on since and this maniacal ploy isn't applicable on consoles and homecomputers where people want a more rewarding gaming experience and this is where Nex Machina offends. Nex Machina is made only for the most machosist of gamers as this game is brutal even on the easiest difficulty. The first couple of levels are managable but very soon you'll be overwhelmed by enemies and obstacles that take a ton of hits to destroy. This is not helped by the cramped levels themselves, your movement is restricted as your path will be blocked often. All this is not helped by the otherwise good visuals but these are so chockfull of effects it's hard to keep track of your character. And the art style which uses mostly similar colors doesn't make it any easier, at least old school arcade games were clear in that respect. The last thing that could have had more attention is the setting. I earlier mentioned Smash TV which had some context, humor even, compared to that Nex Machina feels rather bland. I don't think this game is truly that bad and maybe my three stars area bit low, but for me a good arcade game should make me want to play it, even if it is only for short burst. This game however isn't for the casual gamer and requires dedication, meditation and medication to enjoy it.

Nex Machina is a bullet hell game where you can't see the bullets or the enemies clearly because the background is apparently more important. - Not much content, you're just replaying the short campaign over and over - Enemies and bullets that blend right into the background IN A BULLET HELL GAME. Most of your deaths are going to be "what even killed me?" moments. - The game looks like it's rendering at 720p with 2 passes of FXAA being applied. There's literally no way to make it look not completely blurry. - Different difficulties have different amounts of continues, but they just don't work. When you lose your lives, the game takes away all of your upgrades, which makes dealing with anything beyond the very beginning of the game borderline impossible, and if you could still do it regardless, then you would not need the continue in the first place, so the entire system is pointless. - In coop, the game doesn't revive a dead player when their partner finishes a level/stage, maximising the time one of you spends not actually playing the game. - The dash is set to a trigger, but it only starts when you push it down more than halfway, making it feel delayed for no reason - you can fix this with Steam Input, but you shouldn't have to - nobody holds their triggers partially pressed when they're NOT trying to do something in the game. - When you reach the last boss, the game suddenly forgets it has a lives system and just doesn't let you respawn if you die because f♥♥k you for trying to learn a new boss's attacks.