20 Minutes Till Dawn is a bullet-heavy roguelike that’s off to a strong start

destructoid.com:

The horde survival genre, I guess you’d call it, has had quite the year so far. Vampire Survivors lit the world on fire, and of course, there have been imitators. But what sets 20 Minutes Till Dawn apart from the crowd isn’t just its similarities to Survivors, but its key changes that make quite a difference.

I checked out the demo version, cleverly titled 10 Minutes Till Dawn, earlier this year and came away impressed. Well, after a decent number of runs in 20 Minutes Till Dawn‘s Early Access launch, that enthusiasm hasn’t gone away. Developer flanne’s roguelike survival still has room to grow, but its core concept is pretty darn solid.

20 Minutes Till Dawn has you pick a character and weapon, then jump into a darkened woods to survive the night against an ever-growing horde of creepy ghoulies. If you’ve played Vampire Survivors before, certain parts of this experience will look very familiar to you: the giant XP bar at the top, leveling up via tiny XP droplets from enemies, and treasure chests left behind by boss foes.

In the same breath though, you’ve probably already caught some notable differences. Alongside selecting a character that has their own passive ability, like summoning a shadow clone or firing a flaming shot every few bullets, you also have a weapon. And you fire it, yourself. This isn’t the auto-fire survival game, but a more traditional twin-stick shooter.

These changes alone open up a lot of new avenues for 20 Minutes Till Dawn. While some level-up options add additional forms of damage, like a mystical dagger or a ghost pal, many also simply augment the gun’s abilities. Load it up with Pyro Rounds, give bullets a chance to freeze enemies or call down lightning, or make the bullets bigger. We’re