One in every of my favourite issues about gaming is the unbelievable number of genres, difficulties, and accessibility. It’s like if Baskin Robbins wasn’t relegated to producing solely ice cream and determined to get actual bizarre with the flavors.

With the AAA bubble collapsing inward, indie studios like KeelWorks are rising up to absorb disenfranchised players. Can this studio knock it out of the park with its debut shmup, CYGNI: All Weapons Blazing, or will it succumb to the trimmings plaguing the trade at massive?

CYGNI: All Weapons Blazing (PC [Reviewed], PlayStation 5, Xbox Sequence X|S)
Developer: KeelWorks
Writer: Konami
Launched: August 5, 2024
MSRP: $29.99

Studying the promotional materials for CYGNI: All Weapons Blazing could have you crushed over the top about how fairly the shoot ’em up is. It appears like a magician making an attempt to distract the viewers with one hand whereas getting ready the trick with the opposite. Whereas the distraction is certainly fairly beautiful, this finally undermines the opposite points of the efficiency. It shortly turns into obvious extra time ought to have been spent making the gameplay equally lovely.

CYGNI: All Weapons Blazing has a tough time deciding its tone. The pilot is rendered in a method very paying homage to Pixar movies like Huge Hero 6 and for causes which elude me, the opening cinematic even encompasses a gratuitous shot of her pulling her pants up over a thong-clad backside. It’s such a bizarre inclusion that immediately makes this difficult to advocate for a youthful viewers, regardless of there being nothing remotely sexual for the remainder of the sport.

Cinematics are both totally rendered affairs or illustrations with minimal motion, akin to cost-saving measures seen in titles like Future 2 or World of Warcraft‘s later expansions. Ranges, the pilot’s ship, and enemies are in any other case rendered in a extra real looking manner with the bosses trying just like the offspring between a chainsaw and an H. R. Geiger illustration. It’s merely in all places and very similar to myself in faculty, is gorgeous, but complicated.

The narrative is oddly current for one thing using within the again seat whereas visuals and gameplay sit up entrance. It’s clear a not-insignificant period of time was spent creating the world of CYGNI and crafting the lore of utilizing alien know-how to bolster humanity’s personal. I discovered the idea of those eldritch mechanical beings slumbering till humanity awoke them by harvesting their “corpses” fascinating. Sadly, it solely exists to arrange a bare-bones clarification of why we’re taking pictures these aliens.

By way of gameplay, CYGNI: All Weapons Blazing may have benefited from extra time within the oven. There’s an amazing quantity of shallow mechanics at play. As a substitute of forcing the tutorial on gamers, this selection is off to the facet and finally units the participant up for failure. That is compounded by the truth that the primary stage is arguably essentially the most troublesome and longest. It’s a trial by hearth that can depart all however essentially the most masochistic a trifle aggravated.

The most important subject with CYGNI‘s gameplay is balancing. There’s no even development and also you’ll be punished for belongings you don’t know exist. With the primary stage feeling extra like an endgame stage, gamers aren’t capable of acclimate themselves to the assorted methods and mechanics. Even worse, you’re going into it underpowered for what it’s.

Except you’re taking part in on Straightforward, you’ll solely have one life via ranges which can be upwards of 20 minutes lengthy, don’t have any checkpoints, and could have you tackling a number of bosses. Not like different video games within the style, there’s no level system the place you may acquire one other life. Do you have to run right into a barrier that seems out of nowhere and instantly die, it’s too unhealthy.

This, in flip, has a unfavourable impression on the upgrades, that are essential to surviving missions. Enemies have an opportunity to drop Power Factors on demise. These factors are used to replenish shields, enhance firepower, or hearth missiles. They’re additionally used to buy upgrades. Which means you’ll be compelled to stroll that line between utilizing factors to outlive and saving sufficient to truly improve your ship. Don’t die although as all of these factors disappear like a fart within the wind must you die.

Sadly, the upgrades are largely ineffective. Facet drones enhance outgoing injury and extra homing missiles are nice, however all the things else is moot. For instance, CYGNI has a layered strategy to fight in that you just’ll have to cope with foes within the air and on the bottom. Nonetheless, you may solely assault one layer at a time and it’s extremely uncommon to not be preventing each concurrently.

Assaults in opposition to floor troops are weak, even with upgrades, and most of the time it’s higher to easily ignore floor troops in order to not be utterly overwhelmed by splitting your consideration. Hell, giving me the choice to alter my floor assault to one thing like a carpet bomb would have been a thousand occasions higher.

Lastly, your final, the Defend Blast, would possibly as effectively not be a factor. This assault makes use of your shields to unleash a screen-wide AoE that obliterates all the things. The issue is that enemy reinforcements shortly repopulate and also you not have a defend. Do you have to get tagged by a stray shot earlier than you may replenish them, that’s it. You’re finished. Time to begin over.

Not being a masochist, I opted to play on Straightforward with the intent of buying upgrades after which tackling more durable difficulties. With a couple of selection upgrades, Straightforward grew to become simply that. But, trying Medium is a idiot’s errand as that core balancing subject rears its ugly head. There are just too many enemies, too many projectiles with none significant evasive maneuvers, and the degrees are manner too lengthy. Truthfully, you could possibly bisect every stage and finish it with one of many pleasurable boss fights and it will be so significantly better.

All of this then makes me rethink the $30 asking value. All in all, it took me about 4 hours to beat the marketing campaign, unlock the entire upgrades, and replay it a couple of occasions over. Positive, there’s an area co-op and an Arcade Mode that’s only a points-driven model of the marketing campaign, however it’s missing an excessive amount of to ask that a lot cash.

Maybe if it was balanced higher, had extra significant upgrades, or strove to play in addition to it seems, it is perhaps price it. Because it stands, I’d say look ahead to a sale and don’t trouble paying greater than $15. It’s a enjoyable option to kill a day and offers you a style of the style, however that’s about it. Right here’s hoping that developer KeelWorks can be taught from its debut effort and produce its gameplay design to the identical stage as its visuals.