Early Access Review: Hyperviolent

destructoid.com:

The retro-inspired FPS market is getting extremely crowded, and standing out is becoming more difficult than ever. Hyperviolent doesn’t really do a good job of doing that on the surface. Even the name is as interchangeable as Turbo Overkill and Ultrakill. It advertises violence, which you can get pretty much anywhere.

But taking the time to actually get into Hyperviolent reveals that it’s not just another retro-inspired FPS. It’s not just explosions and heavy metal music. It’s not as frenetic as Doom or Dusk; it’s actually more akin to the original System Shock.

As it makes its delayed landing in Early Access, Hyperviolent shows that it can stand out. However, there’s still a lot of work to do to actually make it worth playing.

While Hyperviolent won’t beat you over the head with a narrative, it does try to give you some context. You’re some dude who answers a mining colony’s distress signal and finds everyone has decided to change professions and become monsters. There aren’t many cutscenes, and a lot of the text is optional, which is good, because the interface isn’t very good.

I mentioned the System Shock roots, but Hyperviolent isn’t an immersive sim. It mainly just provides an inventory and sets you through a series of levels that aren’t entirely linear but maybe should be. Sometimes you get keycards and have to take them back to places you’ve already been, which is kind of like Doom, but involves more pointless backtracking. Sometimes Hyperviolent will spawn in more enemies to make your backtracking more eventful, but that’s not a good thing. It’s intrusive, artificial, and noticeable.

Health and ammo are also extremely limited. Your weapons aren’t perfectly accurate like they are in some retro FPS games, but when