Success often leads to imitation. Whereas Souls-likes took a year or two to surface following the critical and commercial success of Dark Souls, games looking to replicate Vampire Survivor’s winning formula started to appear within months. This was clearly due to their simplistic nature, with the first batch of clones mimicking the retro-style pixel art and low-fi menus.
REMEDIUM: Sentinels stands out from the forever growing crowd by featuring 3D visuals and putting players in control of a primitive Sentinel – a steam-powered mech designed to eradicate festering, plague-ridden, humans and other creatures.
It also ties into another game, albeit one yet to launch. Twin-stick shooter REMEDIUM is due later this year, with screenshots suggesting richer and more detailed visuals than those found in this spin-off. Presumably to help the engine cope when things become hectic, a low-poly PSone aesthetic has been chosen here. Character models are rather angular, while the environments are thinly coated in pixelated textures. Upon zooming the camera out, it closer resembles something contemporary.
It makes sense to detail what a Vampire Survivors clone (or an ‘auto-gunner’ to use the term in the product description here) entails. Your chosen character attacks automatically, leaving just movement under your control. An assortment of enemy types attack in groups, becoming larger and more ferocious as time passes. Every defeated enemy drops an XP token, which must be gathered; putting a focus on moving around the map to avoid enemies while collecting XP. Upon levelling up – something that happens regularly – an upgrade or ability must be chosen, and it’s vital to balance offence with defence so that when waves of enemies start to fill the screen, you’re well equipped to deal with whatever comes your way. Crowd control, enemy avoidance, and shrewd decision making will see you beat the timer and emerge victorious.
Just one Sentinel and a single stage are available from the outset, with additional Sentinels required to be found and freed from metal cages. The remaining stages unlock after surviving for 15 minutes on each map – something that may require several retries. Sentinels have their own stats and a unique default weapon, varying from a pneumatic lance to a swirling sawblade. They have their own permanent upgrades too, with scrap metal used to improve speed, damage, etc.
Confusingly, the main menu features another permanent upgrade screen with the same list of improvements – plus the ability to unlock time dilation and x-ray chests. Not many permanent upgrades are immediately noticeable, and it isn’t obvious initially that mechs can be upgraded either as your attention is drawn to the main menu upgrade path.
Endless Mode is fast paced, with XP drops and new abilities/upgrades coming thick and fast. Normal Mode is a tad slower and more methodical, drawing the experience out over a fifteen-minute duration. The pool of abilities to choose from is relatively small, reducing the potential for experimentation. There’s still enough to play around with though – a mixture of grenades, mines, exploding decoys, missiles, and a mountable machine gun. Armour, health regeneration, and speed boosts can be applied too – and all of these can be enhanced five times over. Health top-ups can be found in smashable crates, while Endless Mode features meteor showers and other random events.
There’s quite a bit to unlock and discover – it’ll take a long time to obtain a full Sentinel roster and beat every stage in Normal Mode, garnering enough scrap to purchase the permanent upgrades that pave the way to success. With the £3.99 (approx.) price point in mind, I can’t knock REMEDIUM: Sentinels for value for money. But unsurprisingly given that low price tag, it does have a slightly cheap and unpolished feel. Character animation is stilted, with enemies often appearing to be running on the spot, or in slow motion. The sight of enemies running across the bottomless voids surrounding the edge of the map even induced an eye roll.
While far from basic, the presentation could have been more user-friendly. The italic font makes numbers hard to differentiate while the translucent health bar is easily obscured. On Xbox Series (I can’t vouch for other versions) the sound is also slightly distorted, with too much reverb.
I’m hoping REMEDIUM: Sentinels gains an update or two and hasn’t just been thrown on storefronts to cash in on a trend. It’s a decent budget buy for those hankering for more auto-shooting thrills, and the list of unlockables provides something to focus on, but it’s also a game in need of a few tweaks, more abilities, and a touch more polish. A solid foundation for something greater – so fingers crossed that the developer plans to support it.
Published by ESDigital Games, Sobaka Studio’s REMEDIUM: Sentinels is out now on all formats.