Enemies have a lot of variety, and their design materially affects how best to approach them.

Tech items, like turrets or mines, can be deployed, and special attacks in the form of Skill Chips can instantly end a skirmish but come with a cooldown timer. Melee weapons like swords and hammers mix with ranged attacks like shotguns or lasers to deal damage, while defensive dodges and parries add fluidity to exchanges. Meanwhile, what human enemies lack in fighting ability they tend to make up for in creative uses of obscenities directed at Zixu.Ĭombat is fast and aggressive. It’s not gratuitous, but may make some folks squeamish.

The melding of flesh and technology is a common cyberpunk trope, and leads to a few instances that border on body horror. The art style and framing make most of the gore comical, as your foes turn to shrapnel after meeting your incoming attacks. Loopmancer is unabashedly an M-rated game. It’s enough to keep Loopmancer feeling fresh for a good while. Then you die, come back again, are shotgunning giant mutants while trying not to fall in electrified water. One visit to the dilapidated slum known as The Ditch may have you smashing giant spiders with a battle ax while you tiptoe between tripwires.

Enemy types reshuffle, powerups change locations. Paths that had been open become blocked, while new routes become available. Each level is divided into subsections with cohesive themes, and they remix each run in small but meaningful ways.

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