Monolith

Monolith is not very difficult to summarize: this is exactly the binding of Isaac, except that it replaces the typical creepy atmosphere of Edmund McMillen with a more generic retro frame, and replaces the action elements that recalled the legend of Zelda by a dual stick shooter gameplay to the storm mutant, with just what it takes to manic shooter against bosses. Like the binding of Isaac, monolith is a rogue-Lite, that is, it borrows from rogue (the Dungeon crawler of 1980) its random generation of levels, its random distribution of enemies and rewards (money, stores, weapons, etc.), and the freedom that he leaves to the player: management of resources, choice of course and weapons, risks incurred... Part after part, we find ourselves facing different situations, to do with what we find and to tame the mechanics of the game without the ease of learning by heart its level design (since this one is constantly renewed). Each of the six levels of monolith is roughly structured in the same way: there are among all the halls of the level a number of mini-bosses, an exit to locate that only unlocks after destroying these mini-bosses, an improvement booth for our ship (an improvement to choose from three), another stand allowing to obtain a weapon with random characteristics (usually to choose from two options), shops (health, bombs, weapons, ammunition, if we no longer have ammunition we find with the default weapon), a hidden room with a special reward (it frees access through a bomb), and sometimes a vault locked by a key, which also contains a special reward. Everything is very well designed: the game is perfectly readable, the maneuverability is flawless (although I would have liked that the ship could be moved analogical and not only in eight directions, but it allows the game to be playable on the keyboard and the mouse ), the different types of enemies are well thought out, the arenas are clever and vary pleasantly, the weapons are distinctly distinct and actually lead to play differently, the game remains overall well balanced despite its random factor... I personally find the latest bosses (the levels all end with a boss) too hard and far too "manic" for my liking, and some weapons are clearly less effective than others, but I do not have a big reproach "objective" to do in monolith. For me, monolith is however too bland: it concretizes its promises and lends itself well to an almost infinite "arcade" replayability, but there is no surprise, true personality, or original idea-in fact, after defeating its final fake boss and then having reached his "last" boss and having acquired most of the weapons of the game, I got bored, and I much prefer him in the same genre the binding of Isaac, nuclear throne (while it is less well finished) or even enter the Gungeon. I recommend monolith despite having seen its good quality, I really enjoyed it during its first dozen hours, even if I keep in the end a mixed feeling.