By Chris Picone, 12 June 2024

A quick note:  I don't ordinarily review demos.  One of the reasons I don't review demos is because they aren't necessarily indicative of what the finished product is going to look like - and that's what I'm worried about here. So why this review? It was an accident, basically (I didn't realise it was a demo until after I'd signed up for the review), but lets dig in - keeping in mind that my experience here may differ significantly to the finished product which is still set for release several months away. 

The graphics stand out immediately; while appearing in some areas slightly dated or perhaps lacking those final stages of polish, they're pretty good.  The monsters look cool, and while the first environment is a bit sterile, they seem to progressively become more interesting as you get further into the game. While the game's mostly quite attractive, the level design is a weakness - the demo only allows access to the first few levels, which are primarily tutorial, but they feel quite barren and uninspired. There are a few obstacles you have to jump or crawl over but none of them added to the atmosphere or the feeling of the level being alive, or affected the combat, so I was left wondering what the point was. And the controls are a little clunky, so navigating levels is not an overly enjoyable experience.  Likewise for the combat encounters; so far there are slugs that wriggle after you - very easy to dodge but take a lot of bullets to kill - and some shoot back at you but the projectiles are very slow and just as easy to dodge.  There's another alien that's a bit more aggressive but they're just as predictable, attacking you directly, and featuring a very obvious signal when they're about to attack which makes dodging a very simple process.  The real highlight of the game was facing the "big boss" on level three.  In theory this could have been a really cool experience - unlike all the other enemies, this one unleashes huge waves of attacks and multiple attack patterns; the devs, I think, were aiming for a first person bullet hell feel.  In reality, most of the attacks, while looking flashy, didn't actually come anywhere near me, and were still very easy to dodge, so the battle was sadly very easy. I love the idea behind it though, and hope they can make it work by the time the game releases. 

The verdict?  Hard to say from the demo. There are certainly aspects of this game that looks promising - the boss fights, in particular.  But there's a lot of work to be done.  It needs polish, sure, but the level design and enemy attack patterns really need a bit more love to make the main game fun while you're waiting for the bullet hell-style boss fights. 

 Links:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2242970/Project_Tower/