Top-down shooters are hardly a new genre (I still remember how much fun I had with Crimsonland back in the day), but they’re usually filled with plenty of action to satisfy those looking for some mindless shooting. It’s just you, your guns, and an endless horde of monsters eager to encircle and overwhelm you, making it all the more satisfying when you unleash absolute hell on them and survive a particularly hairy situation. These fundamentals are more or less present in Viscera, a fresh addition to the top-down shooter genre, but sadly, they’re not executed in a way that would result in a fun, addictive final product.
Trigger-happy
To start things off on a positive note, though, the basics feel decent enough. By which I mean, the shooting is fine, and especially when you hoover up some powerups, the resulting rain of destructive projectiles can be really satisfying. As you continue to slaughter the hordes of monsters trying to swarm the map, you’ll gradually level up – and every time you do, you’ll get to choose from a random lineup of bonuses, sort of like in your average roguelite. These bonuses come in all shapes and forms: increased line of sight, HP regeneration, a shield to protect you while reloading, the ability to cause an explosion every time you grab a powerup, you name it. And the good news is that level-ups happen often enough where you’ll get to choose from a new upgrade fairly often, and provided you don’t die, you can really turn into an absolute killing machine that just cleaves through monsters like a hot knife through butter. When this happens, Viscera’s nonstop mayhem can indeed be quite fun – I just wish it could have maintained this momentum for longer periods of time.
An unbalanced arsenal
As you might imagine, there are some pretty glaring issues. For one, the visual style of the game is bland to the point it makes it difficult to see the enemies: the grey-brown creepy-crawly monsters often blend into the grey-brown environment, which means you’ll potentially walk into them and take unnecessary damage. As the game’s carnage escalates and more corpses and bloodstains begin to litter the battlefield, it becomes increasingly difficult to tell what’s even going on – I’ve had multiple runs where I simply had no idea why I died, although I suspect it was probably due to some semi-invisible critter chewing on my ankle without me noticing. Not fun. Viscera’s arsenal of weapons also leaves a lot to be desired: there are some instant classics, like the Grenade Launcher or the so-called Seeker, but I found too many of the game’s guns to be utterly useless and entirely too weak to tackle what the game throws at you. Many of the weapons you acquire make you feel like you’re using a peashooter with no real oomph to it, and that’s honestly the worst feeling to have in a game where fun hinges so heavily on being able to mow down the opposition.
Final thoughts
Unfortunately, as much as I would like to, I can’t really recommend Viscera in its current state. It has the fundamentals of a potentially good shooter, but it could be so, so much better. Occasionally, it manages to let the genie out of the metaphorical bottle to unleash some genuinely fun carnage (especially once you get some upgrades and powerups going), but most of the time, you’re struggling to have fun because you’re hindered by a bland art style, enemies that are difficult to make out on the map, repetitive levels, and a lackluster repertoire of weapons with too many guns that feel unsatisfying and unrewarding to wield. With some patches and updates, this could be a worthwhile game, but for now, I’m not sure I can recommend it.
Viscera is out now on Steam.
