Alien Breed: Impact

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2/5

Just beat Alien Breed: Impact on Elite difficulty (hardest) and had a blast. It's one of those games that proves that often times simpler is better. The combat is satisfying. The graphics are solid. The sound design is quite good. There are enough weapons to give you a good variety. The enemy types are varied and each poses a legitimate threat. Elite difficulty provided a satisfying challenge. The campaign is the perfect length for this kind of game at around 7 hours. It's not all positives though: as other reviewers have mentioned, the levels mainly consist of running back and forth, activating terminals that open doors so you can activate more terminals. However, as an oldschool gamer who grew up on games like DOOM where the main objective is to find keys that lead you to more keys, I don't mind this kind of level design at all. I do wish there was more variance in the level environments though - pretty much the entire game takes place on spaceships. I love spaceship settings for games, but other environments would have been cool. Other small things to note: the Steam achievements in this game are mostly broken, I beat the game on Elite difficulty and did not get the achievement for it. Also, it seems like a dodge roll mechanic would have been great for this game, but not that big of a deal. When you die and select "Try Again" it gives you more ammo and med kits - this is probably to prevent you from getting soft locked and being unable to progress, but I found it kind of annoying because I wanted to try to overcome some of the more challenging areas without extra help. Overall, Alien Breed: Impact is a fun and well-made game and my rating for it is a very solid 8 out of 10. During Steam sales you can get a bundle with several of the Alien Breed games at big discounts, so if you're unsure just wait for the sales.