Tom vs. The Armies of Hell

This game has a very nice graphical style and a great sense of humor. The gameplay is fun except for one glaringly obvious problem that hurts the game dearly. The simple fact is that most players will not want to try the "normal" or "hard" modes when the first mode is already annoying and ridiculous (particularly with the boss battles). The game also makes another classic design mistake. Take the boss battle in level 2, it's actually a pair of back to back battles with no chance to heal or anything in between. Being poorly designed, its also setup so that if you die in the second battle, you have to redo the first one again... NOTE: There is a patch in the works addressing this difficulty issue, and so I will need to re-evaluate this review when that comes out as it wouldn't be fair to the developer if I don't. Tom vs. The Armies of Hell simply fails to understand that its easiest mode is the gateway for new players to join. It fails here by being one of those games to follow the painfully misguided "difficulty for the sake of difficulty" design style, which has ruined countless games. The difficulty levels in this game are all shifted up by at least one, especially when it comes to the boss battles. The boss battles in the easiest game mode feel like what most games would call "hard mode", which is not intelligent design... Tom vs. The Armies of Hell is just another game that couldn't figure out the basic game design fact, that turning away new players makes it very hard to build a fanbase. Worse, it curses the game to a niche existence where it is doomed to decay forever in the void of obscurity. So this design style that already makes no sense in a game design context, makes even less sense in a business context... Video games first and foremost are about entertainment and fun, not unnecessary effort retrying poorly designed levels 400 times (like this game's boss fights) or pointlessly trying to prove something by seeing how hard of nonsense you can beat. Beating such nonsense is irrelvant in the grand scheme of things, and therefore completely pointless (not to mention a collosal waste of time). Difficulty in video games is a double-edged sword. It can make a game much better if done well, or turn players away in droves when done poorly (as in this game). All too often, video game challenges are poorly designed (the boss fights in this game are no exception). You've no doubt seen them, the types of challenges that serve as a brick wall to artificially slow the player's progress by making the player bang his/her head on a proverbial brick wall for no good reason. Besides that, most challenges in video games (and this one) are lazy stuff thrown together in under 5 minutes through the use of one or more of three basic things: unreasonable time limits, unreasonable scoring goals, or unreasonable amounts of enemies or other hazards. Cheap BS like this is far too common in video games, and Tom vs. The Armies of Hell makes the same tired old mistakes (by putting very little thought into how its difficulty is designed). It's unfortunate that so many developers put very little thought into game design or even bother to research it at all, as I have indeed done. It is a very important topic to know about if you're going to make games, which seems extremely obvious, and yet we still have a world with far too many examples of poor game design... And there is yet another basic rule of game design that this game breaks: the rule that when the player fails, they should feel that the failure was because they screwed up and not because the game is being cheap and unfair. Tom vs. The Armies of Hell heavily fails on this one.

Tom vs. The Armies of Hell is a topdown shooter in an office setting with demons! *read below for more info* Here is a video showcasing the first stage *spoilers* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4yu_u0Yhao Another video showcasing more weapons (cheats enabled) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xThvEBc1nds Things you should know about the game in its current state (Early Access) as of Feb 9 - *keep in mind things will probably be tweaked as the game progresses* - The first 3 levels are completed and available. - Levels 4 & 5 are in progress. - it is not easy. (I have been told they are still balancing the levels) - Very scarce health & ammo drops - No voices from NPCs just text (which may be good or bad depending on your opinion) - No tutorial (there really isn't any need for it, as it is very self explanitory) - RPG has terrible damage. - Some weapons dont armor pierce (confirmed fixing in progress) - Boss hit boxes are really off. - 1st boss attack pattern is way too fast to avoid. PC Performance - No game crashes - solid fps, no major drops. (if you would like to see my PC specs, check my profile) - Keys are rebindable & the ability to play with a controller is available. Overall summary, the game is solid, just needs damage and enemy balance tweaks, which I can confirm are in the works. (Also the videos above were recorded as of Feb 6, so things might be easier now than when it was before) Feb 10 update - - apparently there is a drop rate from enemies, I thought I just wasn't getting any from runs. Understandably the game is supposed to be challenging, but not getting any drops should be tweaked.

Сидел себе один программист работал, не кого не трогал и тут на тебе! Армия демонов из ада напали на мир, весь офис разрушен, да что там офис, руку оторвали... И к нам на помощи приходит какой то там еще один демон и вместо нашей руки дат нам демонскою граблю, которой можно пи3деть направо и налево. Потом выйдя из туалета, это там где наш программист просыпается, один чувак перед смертью дает нам эксперементальную пушку, которую можно зарядить с помощью душ убитых нами демонов. И дальше понеслась душа в рай, кучи демонов которые хотят вас замочить и ... как же без них) Боссы - они ваще жесть) Мое мнение - игра бомба! К покупке обязательна! Графика: Красивая мультяшная графика Саунд: Музыкально сопровождение то же не подкачало, приятно слушать во время игры Сюжет: Он в игре присутствует, будет интересно! Достижения: В игре 31 достижение Поддержка контролера, я играл на клаве управление отличное! Я на данный момент вижу один минус - в игре нет коллекционных карт, буду надеяться, что их добавят. Хотя и без них игра стоит своих денег! Ниже вы найдете пятиминутное видео гемплея - лучше 1 раз увидеть, чем сто раз прочитать) https://youtu.be/y042-bU8w24

Loved it. It was challenging, which I feel most games lack now a days. Or games have you pay to make it easier. There is a lot of humor, and old school game mechanics like checkpoint system, limited lives or you start from the beginning, off-the-path hidden treasure boxes. It is only early access, so there will be changes moving forward and loads of new content. Especially GUNS! GUNS AND GUNS AND GUNS WITH UPGRADED GUNS! For being an early access, I ran into very few bugs and seems to be a pretty complete for the first few levels. I highly recommend this game for its funny story (especially if you work in corporate), and beat 'em ups (With new school technology). I hope the difficulty does not change, personally.

I love this game! It fills for me a gaming void I wasn't even fully aware existed. I really can't recommend it highly enough, even in its still somewhat rough state, for a few reasons listed below: -It's extremely fun. This may seem like an obvious reason to recommend a game, but I had to mention it all the same. -The developer is awesome. You really wouldn't guess that it's from a one-man studio with the level of quality the various components show! It's Early Access, but plays like a well-designed full release. In my experience, there have been almost no bugs or glitches and the game runs beautifully with full quality settings enabled. And on top of all that, the developer has been incredibly dedicated and active in continuing to improve everything... each time I've left a comment/question/suggestion/etc, the response time is incredible. He really takes on board everything you have to say, good or bad, and responds so quickly your head'll spin! If only more Early Access experiences were such... -It's really well-crafted. The visuals are fantastic, the style fits the satirically humorous theme perfectly! And if they're too smooth and 'modern' for you, you can turn on various levels of a filter that gives everything a pixel-art look. Nice! The music is just great and adds a great feel, and the sound effects are well-designed and programmed. Really quality all the way. -It's really FUN! Did I mention? If you at all enjoy top-down shooters, ARPGs, fast-action titles, or just having fun in general, you owe it to yourself to try this out. It'll be a joy to watch as it progresses towards a finished release. There are only a relatively small number of levels thus far, but there's still plenty of play to be had in the build as it stands right now. It can only get better! PS - I've been playing Tom vs TAOH quite a bit with Steam in Offline mode which doesn't seem to have accurately recorded how much time I've actually spent playing this game - it's really quite a bit more. :)

Isometric shooter/brawler/claw-er with entertaining characters, constant action, and challenging gameplay.

Really funny (just watch trailer!) game with all right twin-stick shooter+slasher gameplay. Prepare to die a lot to bosses, especially on Hard. As you play you find various enhancement gear - damage boosts, max ammo boosts, etc. You also find consumables that lets you temporarily turn into a Demon that regenerates health and one-hit slaughters all non-bosses, and deals hefty damage to bosses too. All these are of course extremely helpful, but they disappears when you die, leaving you with only whatever ammo you had left at time of death. At this point you can choose to proceed from checkpoint "naked" and start collecting again. The other alternative is to quit to the Hub, which loads your save from there, including all the gear and consumables - assuming you had any at that point. I only did this for the second-to-last boss because going up against that thing nearly naked on Hard was not very fun. One great thing is that, even though the game is almost 3 years old now at time of writing, the developer still responds to comments and fixes bugs and balance issues when they're brought to his attention! For example, there is a helpful checkpoint before the final boss fight, which is rather hard (as expected of the final boss fight ofc.) But as mentioned before, once you restart at the checkpoint you lose all your stuff, which makes the fight all but impossible on Hard. When I expressed frustration about this in the discussions, the dev agreed that this was a balance issue that needed fixing and added treasure chests full of loot right at the checkpoint!

I've always been fascinated by those games on Steam which cause me ponder and reflect upon real life moments outside of the game due to the thematic subject matter being addressed. And it's even more impressive to me when the game itself is a very comedic, tongue-in-cheek, & light-hearted one in nature...yet which explores & touches upon these deeper darker undertones of human nature....albeit in a way that is both highly entertaining and able to fill your room with endless laughter while enjoying it. I now introduce to you such an indie title, whimsically called Tom vs. The Armies of Hell which was developed by Darkmire Entertainment. In this isometric action-adventure game, you play as a nerdy software-engineer named Tom who finds that his entire office complex has suddenly been sent straight to hell after an experiment goes terribly wrong. And it is your sole duty to fight off these hordes of evil minions, demons, and diabolical bosses in order to uncover exactly what happened as you valiantly try to find your way back to your normal everyday 9-to-5 job again - all while packing your shiny new "Soul Blaster x9000" gun which can both shoot as well as capture their released souls afterward, essentially using their inherent dark power directly against them as a temporary power-up for the gun itself. An interesting concept, and a rather fun one gameplay-wise I might add! Clearly, the game itself is a metaphor in describing the inherent wickedness of the cold, uncaring, heartless, and dehumanizing aspects of the modern-day workplace...as well as our relationship to it where profits, deadlines, and greed trump all else...especially reinforced by its intro-video which distinctly highlights as much. And yet, it manages to do so in a very accessible way which we can all readily relate to since the aesthetics and tone found here are very much cartoon-style and infused with an ample quantity of humour throughout. And thus, this merger of an underlying serious subject matter to the silliest possible presentation was nothing less than ingenious to me. Level design itself was quite varied I felt within its 6 different ones, and nowhere did I feel that any aspect of the game was becoming monotonous whatsoever. Because not only did the office/hell scenes change regularly, but the enemies themselves were also creatively inspired and varied considerably in design. And these include multiple weirdo bosses to do battle with as well. Furthermore, your character is able to quickly roll/dodge + melee in close-quarters combat situations when many enemies are ganging up on you. It was all very satisfying as far as its fast-paced gameplay goes, feeling fresh and certainly quite challenging the entire way through. All in all, it possesses (pun intended!) a wonderfully engaging campaign whose diverse cast of characters breathe life to its absurd story with their hilarious caption-based dialogue. However with that being said, I can't help but to feel that this game could have been taken to the next level of comedy if they instead all audibly spoke, with quality voice acting included. Although for an indie game, I suppose there are limits as to what can realistically be done...and perhaps this was one of the compromises. Nonetheless, the actual dialogue is still fantastic. Another of its strengths is how it uses old-school mechanics like a health meter + health pickups, ammo pickups, plus the ability to upgrade your gun considerably. You won't be fumbling around with complicated inventory systems or any such nonsense here at all. This is decidely more geared towards the pick-up-and-play crowd who seek to immediately jump in and get going. Fortunately the controls are rebindable and very easy to understand, and it also includes full controller support which is a nice touch. On the audio side of things, background music is wonderfully comprised of orchestral jazz selections which bestows upon it a rather unique flavour & charm. I suppose for its office type setting, this would certainly make the most sense to go with. Whereas gun/combat effects were very much punchy & solid as well, accentuating rather than distracting from the expeience. All in all, no complaints here. And even though trading cards aren't present, it does at least sport Steam achievements...which only helps to make an already very fun game that much more of a blast to sit back & play. [h1]Verdict[/h1] Tom vs. The Armies of Hell recently came out of Early Access on Steam and feels very polished indeed, with an active dev who who clearly listened closely to the community's input and has spent a great deal of time improving it to perfection while ensuring that it feels balanced throughout. So kudos for that. And it is an adrenalin-inducing title with which you can pick up and start playing right away with no big learning curves, as the game does a stellar job in explaining exactly how you must proceed further into it as you quickly master its straight-forward goals and combat mechanics - allowing you to sit back and actually enjoy this action-packed experience to the fullest with minimal frustration...the way it should always be! There are no cheap deaths here, and if you die then it just means that you need to keep practicing as you hone your tactics. With such a pleasing graphical style with its fluid animations, entertaining storyline, and light-hearted atmosphere...I'm confident that you'll be more than eager to sink some quality time into it. Because this is a game full of soul at its very core...so now go start collecting 'em inside of it as you go head-to-head against these forces of darkness in your workplace...and perhaps soon, you'll too eventually find your way back from hell over there! I'll rate this one: 9/10 [h1]Pros:[/h1] - Fluid & colourful cartoon-style animations - Non-monotonous and varied gameplay with fast-paced combat - Minimal learning curve - 6 expansive and carefully designed levels + creatively designed bosses - Cut-scenes - Steam Achievements - Configurable controls - Full controller support - Good amount of graphical configuration options [h1]Cons:[/h1] - No voice acting - No Steam trading cards - No adjustable difficulty settings (although the default is pretty good for most) - No online play For similar reviews and great giveaways please visit http://www.steamified.com

So far so good! This game shows a lot of care and love. The developer is very active, listens to feedback and has been very open with the community. Looking forward to release - to get a complete and polished play through. A note about my high number of hours - it appears that my anti virus software - wrongly - locked the exe file and it accumulated a lot of run time.

It's different, fun and challenging and reminds me of the feeling playing "Zombies Ate My Neighbors" on Sega Genesis as a kid. I also like the early implementation of the weapon upgrade system that gives me a feeling that I can tackle the game in my prefered way. Only thing that I miss is more open areas where I really can move around while facing enemeis that are harder to kill, but I'm sure something like that will come in future updates.