[h1]Overview:[/h1]
'[i]Fateless[/i]' is a first person shooter where you play as an unnamed individual on a mission to save the earth from a plethora of monsters. That's pretty much the plot and for a game like this, you don't really need a story deeper than a deep dish pizza. Clearly inspired by early first person games such as '[i]DOOM[/i]', '[i]Fateless[/i]' is a shorter and more simple take on the genre with only a handful of levels with simple gameplay that holds little challenge. It's actually not bad but at the same time, it isn't great either but I'll break down both aspects the best I can.
[h1]Gameplay:[/h1]
Playing like a dumb-downed version of '[i]DOOM[/i]', you're given a double-barrel shotgun to start with rather than a pistol. And might I say, this shotgun is quite a contemporary weapon as it deals a decent amount of damage to every single enemy in the game. Seriously, you could play through the entire game using just the shotgun you begin with. There [i]are[/i] other weapons such as a rifle, minigun and rocket launcher however and all of them perform very well but you're definitely going to be using the minigun as it's objectively the best one to use.
The game itself has 3 chapters each with a handful of levels but the game can be completed in less than half an hour. Some levels are extremely short while others are a little longer. Gunplay is also alright to some extent but can become bland for anyone wanting gore or blood. Not only this, but you don't even have to kill every enemy in the level. If you're slick enough you can bypass every enemy in the map and reach end without any penalties. But even with that, killing enemies is extremely easy and to be frank, you could honestly finish a level without even getting hit once. Even the larger mobs that wield rocket launchers and miniguns are laughably easy to kill without even taking a single hit. I was originally going to complain about the game not having any health items to replenish your health with, but with the crazily easy difficulty, I don't even find the absence of them an issue. That's how easy the game is.
[h1]Controls:[/h1]
Just like the original '[i]DOOM[/i]', you can only look left and right, not up and down. That being said, all the maps in the game are leveled and all the enemies are on the same plain as the player. Mouse sensitivity is a bit awkward to control as it feels static and won't really react well with quick versus slow mouse movements. Switching weapons also feels a bit delayed because pressing the corresponding keys don't always switch your weapon, sometimes it takes a few tries to get it to work. The controls in general are simple and don't require the brain of a scientist to figure out.
[h1]Graphics:[/h1]
Now this is where the game kind of flops. I get that the idea was to adopt a classic style of first person shooter games but the game if I have to be honest doesn't look good. The world although ugly itself, looks a little too detailed considering the 2 dimensional looking enemies that are in it. But then again, they're monsters not from this world so who am I to say these low-poly monstrosities should look like they belong in the map? They clearly don't.
All jokes aside though, the mobs in the game have choppy animation frames that you can probably count on a single hand and can even phase in and out of existence if you're looking at them behind walls. It's a pretty graphically glitchy looking ordeal and can be a detriment to the gameplay as it's difficult to shoot at something that keeps on disappearing. Not only that, but the game itself is pretty choppy too. Despite my frame counter clocking at a stable 144 frames, the game feels more like 20 frames. And to be playing a game that looks like [i]this[/i] at a choppy 20 frames, I can safely say this game could give a lot of people nausea and motion sickness. I'm not kidding, I don't hate the game or anything but I seriously recommend you not play this game if you're easily nauseated by choppy game performance.
[h1]Audio:[/h1]
Contains your typical cheap sound effects and stock music that most beginner game creators have at their fingertips. But again, it doesn't do anything to harm the game's theme as it's something I would expect a game from a time long forgotten to sound like.
[h1]Conclusion/TL;DR:[/h1]
'[i]Fateless[/i]' is an old-style first person shooter with a handful of levels that total up to about 20 or so minutes of total gameplay. It's extremely easy but contains a few graphical issues that can make playing the game a minor inconvenience but doesn't break the game in any way. It's a relatively short game and if you're into '[i]DOOM[/i]' and don't care much about game quality as long as the game plays similarly, then '[i]Fateless[/i]' isn't bad. I [i]do[/i] have to stress though that if you're easily nauseated by games that play at a choppy framerate, then I highly recommend against this game because it can definitely trigger these reactions. I don't get nauseated playing games of any sort but the fact that I can see this game causing queasiness to others, take that as you will.
