Deadlink

Deadlink doesn’t reinvent the wheel. Despite its shortcomings, it presents a well-tuned, fast-paced experience that remains engaging from start to finish, and on more than one occasion I found myself so locked in that my knuckles were hurting from gripping my controller. Deadlink asks its players to walk a thin line between success and failure, and in so doing captures a sense of intensity that vastly overshadows its lack of variety and disappointing story. Anytime I find myself in need of a quick shot of adrenaline, I have a feeling that Deadlink will be my fix for a good while now.

Deadlink is a polished cyberpunk FPS arena shooter with fast kinetic gameplay. As is so often the case these days, there’s roguelite elements. Due to the fixed progression, replaying the first few levels can get a bit overfamiliar and a little stale, but it merely adds impetus to progress further into the game. Great weapon balance and nicely done upgrades make for compelling reasons to keep playing.

Deadlink is an excellent mixture of Robobeat’s roguelike structure and DOOM (2016)’s frantic but strategic frenzied gunplay. That’s a very high compliment, as I loved both games very much, and Deadlink proves there’s still plenty of life in the roguelike shooting genre. The gunplay is rapid, clicks together well, and provides plenty of room for experimentation to help soak up some, but not all, of the burnout the lack of enemy and level variety brings. Even when I get a bad run, I still feel accomplished in what I get from it, whether that be more XP and Tokens or even a little secret nugget or two. Just make sure to keep yourself on the move; Deadlink goes full throttle right from the start. From the absolutely electrifying beats to the simple pleasures of racking the pump of a shotgun, every sound comes in crystal clear, and the Dualsense additions are icing on the cake. If you want to run and gun with a bit of randomness in between, Deadlink’s cyberpunk flair just cannot be passed up.

Ultimately, Deadlink couldn’t have been released on Xbox at a better time. Fans of fast-paced shooters have tons of time to kill before Doom: The Dark Ages swings around, and I can’t see a better roguelike than Deadlink releasing before Hades II launches onto console. Add these two flavours together, and you’ve got a pretty delicious meal indeed.

I like the bosses, even if they are a bit overpowered sometimes. There is a single strategy that applies to all the bosses I've encountered and that is to push hard and mercilessly from the start, which I like but I would have loved a little more variety here. There should have been a boss or two where I as a player had to become a bit strategic and defensive to beat it, which I think would create more variety overall. However, this is a small complaint about an indie game that, in summary, offers brilliant FPS action drenched in character and passion.

A shooter that echoes the old school with modern sensibilities, Deadlink will scratch that roguelike itch if you let it. A little lacking in variety, hopefully time and TLC will prove us wrong on that front.