Upon hearing that the hook in this top-down roguelike shooter is that you accumulate curses, I was left wondering how the difficulty level would be kept fair. I was also somewhat wary about how fun it’ll be to play if the odds at constantly stacked against you, with every curse hypothetically making progression tougher. Reasonable concerns, I’m sure you’ll agree.
Thankfully, it only takes a couple of retries to discover that Curse Rounds isn’t out to kick sand in your face and call you rude names. It’s tricky, but not deceptively so, and as there’s a choice of two curses it largely amounts to shrewdly picking the lesser of two evils. Moreover, it throws you a lifeline surprisingly often. An extra life, shields, rapid firing weapons, and more. Enemies are often bountiful, but there’s always enough firepower to push back the festering hordes.
The set-up is that our pale skinned hero is lured into the attic during a late night gaming session, armed with just a torch. The trapdoor slams shut, and enemies start to surround – a peculiar assortment of rats that regurgitate their brethren, exploding toxic mushrooms, charging bulls ‘n dashing crocodiles, bomb-laying chickens, spinning turtle shells, and electrified jellyfish. While presented in monochrome, every enemy is instantly recognizable, and bullet formations are easily dodged by dashing. There’s a warning when enemies are about to appear too, in the form of large exclamation marks.
You’re given 10 lives – something that makes the difficulty level feel fair – and must fight off waves of enemies within a single screen environment before tackling a random boss every three stages. Curses are doled at the end of each stage, with examples including fireball rain, bomb dropping enemies, stronger/faster/larger foes, weapons that randomly jam, bullets that may pass through enemies, slippery/oily/juddering floors, and enemies that duplicate if they cause damage. Many curses are manageable, like not being able to fire until five seconds into a wave, while others are best avoided. You’ll soon learn that allowing enemies to duplicate is a complete no-no.
Bosses are appropriately putrid, spawning maggots and flies, but aren’t difficult to beat despite their grotesqueness. Most are large yet slow and simply roll around the arena. However, upon defeat their minions must be dealt with, and this can be problematic if they’re great in number.
Another downside worth mentioning is that enemies sometimes appear or wander under the HUD in the left-hand corner. This means a wave will appear complete, only for you to notice a few second later that there’s a small enemy concealed by the health bar. More detrimental is there will be times when a charging or fast paced enemy will cost you 2-3 lives in one fell swoop, although this is usually after being cursed with slow movement speed.
For the most part, Curse Rounds is pretty compelling. If you’re down to just a couple of lives it usually throws an extra one your way, and upon defeating a boss you’ll get to pick a bonus that can turn things around, increasing chances of reaching the end. Taking out several enemies at once with a rapid-fire weapon is satisfying, as is beating a stage with loosing a single life.
Occasionally after beating a boss you’re able to restore every lost life, putting the total back up to ten. This is a godsend, but I did wonder how heavily success depends on gaining this perk.
Available for under a fiver, Curse Rounds might be cheap, but it certainly doesn’t look it, being noticeably slicker than similar games in the same price point. The sprites are joyously animated, with enemies having a vivid personality, and the low-fi beats soundtrack suits the monochromatic visuals perfectly. It’s a decent budget buy that’s lean, offering nothing in the way of additional modes, but focused as a result. For something based around curses, it’s a blessing. A blessing within the world of sub £5 digital games, at the very least.
TENTACLES INTERACTIVE’s Curse Rounds is out now consoles. Published by QUByte Interactive.