Rogue Singularity, the new title of Considerable Content, aims to blend the precision required by the very first 3D platformers with the randomness of the roguelike genre.
Will he have succeeded in the enterprise? Find out now in our review.
A little robot on the run
The nameless hero of the adventure is a little robot who, after the disappearance of his home, finds himself having to cross a myriad of increasingly lethal obstacles.
To follow his misadventures there will be a mysterious entity who will sarcastically comment on his every action, laughing at his frequent failures.
The player's task will therefore be to help the protagonist make his journey, going through several levels randomly generated by the game.
Each of these will have inside particular coins that we can use to unlock permanent special abilities e Consumable, thus allowing us to simplify the challenges that we will gradually find ourselves facing.
They can also be obtained new body parts e texture to customize our avatar, which, however, will not affect the gameplay. There are hundreds of each type, which can be mixed freely offering almost unlimited customization options.
Flying through futuristic levels
In Rogue Singularity, as already mentioned above, each level is generated randomly, in such a way as to offer new challenges every game.
Dying within a level however is not the end, since we will be able to count on 5 lives which can be restored by collecting batteries while exploring. Once we have exhausted all of them and obtained a game over, we will return to the central hub and we will be forced to face completely different levels from the previous ones.
Both in this hub and at the beginning of each level we will be able to prepare ourselves by purchasing skills, objects and changing the appearance of our avatar.
The former will also serve as the perfect testing ground for experimenting the moveset at our disposal, consisting of a triple jump (very similar to Super Mario 64), a jump in mid-air, a jump loaded and a rolled.
Jumping against a wall finally we will cling to it, allowing us both to climb vertical surfaces, and to save our lives at the last minute when we make a jump too short or in the wrong direction. Even in mid-air it will always be possible to change your direction, so as to correct any errors committed in the heat of the moment.
The commands turn out to be always responsive and precise, making it even easier and more fun to overcome any obstacle you will stand in front of you and cover huge distances with a single leap.
A level design worthy of a robot
While the levels are generated randomly, they still manage to offer a great balance between challenge and exploration.
There will never be a lack of precise jumps with obstacles to overcome in the middle, but there will also be more subtle challenges and secret areas where to get new items for customization or extra lives.
The only flaw in the level design is the fact that sometimes an obstacle that we have just overcome will cover part of the screen, thus preventing us from seeing what we will have in front of us.
When it happens, we just need to move further away or turn the camera to solve everything, even if sometimes we will not have time to do it before dying against an invisible obstacle. However, we would like to specify that this is quite a rare case, and which therefore will have little or no effect on the enjoyment of the game.
Each level will have its own exclusive gimmick, such as gods particular types of platforms that disappear or circular saws swinging back and forth. Thanks to the roguelike nature of the game, however, we will never know exactly in what form they will be offered to us.
Finally they are present daily challenges e leaderboard online, which add a little more challenge for the most avid and skilled players.
Final conclusions
Rogue Singularity successfully completes his mission. The randomly generated levels will not only offer us potentially infinite replayability, but will also maintain the right level of challenge without ever being impossible or too simple.
The techno-style soundtrack it fits perfectly into the setting, and provides the right charge to push us to want to run even faster between levels.
The possibility of obtaining additional rewards to change the appearance of our avatar also provides a perfect excuse to spend more time inside the stages, giving that sense of exploration more characteristic of every 3D platformer.
Rogue Singularity is currently available on Nintendo Switch e PC (via Steam).