Abyssus Review - A Shallow Expedition

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The allure of any roguelite will always be its gameplay loop. If it is a solid one, the style, story, characters, and even some mechanics won’t even matter to some. However, if it falters even in the slightest, it will eclipse everything else. That is what happens with Abyssus. This brinepunk FPS roguelite boasts a terrific art style, superb gunplay, and engaging encounters. Unfortunately, its gameplay loop is so shallow that it never stands out among the sea of other roguelites we have.

Welcome to the Expedition

If there is one thing I love about roguelites, it is how they tend to experiment with different art styles. Lately, we’ve seen many that go from colorful sci-fi worlds, like Hyper Light Breaker, and some that take a more folklore approach mixed with fantasy, like Ravenswatch. However, Abyssus stands out as one of the most unique ones because it takes one style that we rarely see out there: brinepunk.

As soon as you enter any of its levels and rooms, you quickly notice how Abyssus perfectly combines the style of underwater adventures like Atlantis, but with steampunk-like technology to create the abovementioned style. I also admit that I’m biased toward this game’s artistic direction because it has many pre-Hispanic tones, and since that is my culture, it was a massive bonus for me. Overall, this expedition felt as if I was playing a less scary version of Bioshock with some Tomb Raider locales on the side.

In terms of the story, there isn’t much to tell. There isn’t an explicit narrative that takes you from point A to point B, and most of the storytelling aspects happen through abandoned notes and journal entries. They provide some background elements to previous expeditions and some of the lore behind everything that’s going on, but nothing groundbreaking. Abyssus puts a lot of emphasis on its gameplay, and while that should be the way to go for any roguelite, it works as a double-edged sword here, but more on that later.

Overall, the highlight of Abyssus is its brinepunk style, which I’d love to see more in the market. Lately, it seems most roguelites either go down the sci-fi or high fantasy roads, and while there’s nothing wrong with it, it’s nice to see a new mold out there.

A Treasure Trove of Weapons

As a gamer, it is almost impossible not to compare new games with previous titles. Usually, when I look at roguelites, I can’t help but see most of them take inspiration from big hitters like Slay the Spire or Hades. To my surprise, the first game that came to my mind when playing Abyssus was DOOM.

If there is one thing that Abyssus nails faultlessly, it is its gunplay. You’ll be running around a level, shooting enemies without stopping, jumping to pull off some aerial shots, and then bashing them in the face with a giant anchor. It is pure fast-paced mayhem that gets better as you play alongside other expeditioners.

Shooting mechanics aside, the arsenal is also great. Abyssus focuses more on quality over quantity, which is the approach every game should have nowadays. You start with an automatic rifle of sorts, and can unlock weapons by discovering them in certain levels or the hub. Every weapon has two different mods that change how your weapon’s primary and secondary firing modes operate. For instance, the Shotgun starts with a semi-automatic primary mod that lets you fire bullets at a relatively fast rate of fire. For its secondary module, it has a buckshot mode that does a lot of damage to enemies but knocks you back with each shot.

After completing specific challenges, you can unlock new modules for your primary and secondary slots. Using the Shotgun as an example again, I unlocked one that turned my weapon’s primary firing mode into a fully-automated gun and swapped my secondary one to a module that dealt less damage but stunned enemies. Abyssus doesn’t have hundreds of modules to obtain. Still, the ones it features are enough to create impactful builds without cluttering players with dozens of weapons and modifications they will never use.

On top of that, there are abilities you can equip and also unlock. You start with a grenade that has three charges. These charges regenerate over time, and the cooldown will vary depending on the ability you have. The grenades, for instance, are some of the fastest and let you chuck explosives almost every few seconds. However, there are others like the Anchor, which only has two charges at first and can slam the ground and send a shockwave forward to damage enemies in its path, but takes longer to use again. Just like weapons, there aren’t a lot of abilities, but the ones you have are more than enough to create impactful builds.

A Shallow Loop

Unfortunately, and despite all the well-designed things of Abyssus, its roguelite loop is the one that left a sour taste in my mouth due to how shallow and uninspiring it feels.

When you start a run, you’re always thrown into the first biome. From here, different rooms will appear, with most of them having the same objective: defeat all enemies. Once in a while, you’ll get a few rooms with some challenges like “Destroying X number of Pylons” or “Charge the Beacons by standing below them for an X amount of time.” And that’s it. Some objectives will change depending on the zone, like the second one that swaps the Pylons for Healing Flowers that make enemies almost invincible, but there’s nothing beyond that.

Furthermore, a run will always present you with the same route structure: the first area full of the abovementioned rooms, the second area with an Elite enemy at the end, a third area that replicates the first one, and the final one that is just the boss room of that biome. If you lose, you have to go through that again, and I’d love to say there are dozens of rooms to make you feel as if you were in a new adventure, but that’s not the case. Abyssus nailed the art style, but it sank its levels with an uninspiring design.

Another key aspect of a run in any roguelite is the boons you get by completing a room or finishing some challenges. Abyssus has its own in the shape of Blessings. At the end of some areas, you’ll encounter a Shrine with two Blessing choices. These Blessings drift toward one specific type of gameplay. For example, the Spirit Blessing unlocks a Spirit Bar that fills up after doing damage and sends forth a wave of Spirits that damage enemies. Fire, on the other hand, applies a Burn effect to foes, taking out a big chunk of their HP.

In truth, the design of Blessings is great, as you’ll often be picking one that activates through your primary firing mode, another for your secondary, and one for your ability, thus making an elemental cocktail that is great to pull off. Yet, the game does a lot of gatekeeping.

In every other roguelite in existence, you get a boon after even the easiest room. Even if it’s not a boon, you get some currency or a stat increase that feels rewarding. Abyssus rewards you only in specific places, but it makes you go through some unnecessary fights where all you get is three pieces of gold. A bit of this changes once you unlock certain permanent upgrades that add new shrines to some rooms, but even then, the rewards felt too spread apart. While I’m all for a roguelite being challenging, a vital element of the genre is the constant random rewards that tailor your runs. When a roguelite gatekeeps them or spreads them too much, it makes the whole gameplay loop feel stale.

Unfortunately, this isn’t the only thing that feels stale, as even the progression system is way too grindy and doesn’t sit well with a loop that offers you minimal rewards. Once you finish a run or defeat a strong enemy, including bosses, you’ll get Soul Fragments. You can use these items to unlock permanent upgrades in the game’s hub. Some increase your health, others let you start with a key and some gold, and a few others even increase the amount of healing items you start with. The system itself isn’t bad, and grinding in a roguelite is quite normal. However, my biggest gripe is that the loop is so stale that by the time I unlocked some powerful permanent upgrades, I didn’t have the drive to go through another run, mainly because all runs feel way too similar.

Other than that, Abyssus also gatekeeps many of a run’s functions behind its permanent upgrades. For instance, the shop is often behind a locked door that needs a key. If you’re lucky, you might find a key inside a chest or as an enemy drop, but if not, you need to grind Soul Fragments to unlock the upgrade that lets you spawn with a key. This is the first time that I’ve seen a modern roguelite putting such an important feature behind a door in runs where you don’t even get a key to open it. I’ve finished expeditions with a bag full of gold because I had no way of spending it.

While many will say that this is the nature of a roguelite due to the RNG elements, this isn’t the case for Abyssus. The challenge and systems are there, but they clash with one another, often making the game feel like a dichotomy. It has a lot of interesting permanent upgrades, but they rarely appear due to how spread the rewards are in a run. There is an excellent variety of enemies and superb Boss fights, but not all of them feel worth the effort, as the rewards never give you a substantial upgrade for your run.

A Light at the Bottom of These Briny Depths

Overall, Abyssus is enjoyable, but not like other roguelites that hook you until you reach the final floor. While the enemy variety and boss design are superb, there’s nothing that encourages exploration or experimentation. If it were an FPS with a solid narrative, then things might be different, but since it went down the roguelite lane, it didn’t take off as it intended.

Yet, despite my complaints, Abyssus has a lot of promise thanks to its well-polished elements, such as the gunplay and art style. Unfortunately, since it is a roguelite, it falls short in more than one aspect, as some of its design choices clash with the staples of the genre and create one of the most uninspiring roguelite loops I’ve experienced in recent memory.

Review copy provided by the Publisher.

Abyssus (PC Reviewed)

6.5 Good

Abyssus is a terrific first-person shooter, boasting one of the smoothest and most engaging gunplay mechanics with impactful gun customization. However, it falls short as a roguelite due to how uninspiring and unrewarding its gameplay loop is.