On account of the fact that the keyboard controls have been fixed (you can now assign commands to different buttons and WASD actually work), I have decided to delete my old review and write a whole new one. Yeah, this game is quite neat now. Functional and stuff. As a free class presentation, it is really very good.
There are areas that could use some improvement. I'm not going to complain about the enemy variety because, again, this is a free game made by university students so I can't demand too much of them. Rather than complain about what the game could have more of, I'll just complain about what the game has now.
First of all, why does this game demand so much of my poor PC? It hums like I've never seen before and it slows to a crawl at certain segments almost at random. Lucky this game is as short as it is, otherwise my PC might've combusted. Perhaps games don't need such realistic graphics and textures, hm? Maybe we could move away from that, perhaps do something like [u]Sable[/u]? Just a thought.
Also, battles don't have enough verticality. While there are floating enemies, they die extremely easily and feel like barely more than a distraction. Also, they're far too easy to miss. They need like flapping wings or something.
I like the ideas behind the weapons. They're good to get away from the far too ubiquitous pistol-shotgun-machine-gun-sniper rifle-grenade launcher combinations. That said, I didn't really feel much of a reason to swap between them; I just stuck with the charge beam until it ran out, whereupon I went with the first power because I had accummulated a decent amount of ammo for it by that point, and then I'd just go right back to the charge beam. Having said that, having an ammo system where your weapons are all on cooldown bars and combat becomes about switching between them so that you're juggling your ammo cooldowns could make for a fascinating new gameplay style for an FPS... We'll see, I suppose.
The powers, I reckon, could've been assigned to different buttons rather than a weapon wheel. The deflecting shield is nice but I don't want to swap over to it, use it once, and then switch back to another weapon that actually does something constantly. While it is a nice ability, it's not a nice weapon. Put it on my right click or whatever. Same for the grenade power up; that also deserves its own button. Also, while we're at it, buff the bloody thing. It flies about as far as a wombat and it barely has any impact.
Come to think of it, the weapons don't feel cathartic enough. You just point them at the enemy until the enemy decides to go away. There's not enough satisfying piercing thuds with the shards, not enough roasting and carving with the laser, not enough BOOM with the grenades, and not enough... well, anything with the final power. Sound design and enemy animations go a long way towards making things like this feel impactful and fun to use.
Also, I'm just going to say it bluntly; the [u]DOOM[/u]-esque setting of demons taking over is WAAAAAAAAAAY overplayed for FPSes. It's just so old by this point. Having said that, while the setting is boring and tired, we have never been able to play as a [i]demon[/i] before, using actual demonic powers. That's new and cool. I like that turnaround. And, since it doesn't work outside of a [u]DOOM[/u]-esque setting, I can forgive that.
So there's something promising here. Good on the developers and good on the university. Hope to see more.
