Redacted

Sure enough, while it doesn’t seek to reinvent the roguelike wheel or provide an especially captivating story or cast of characters as Hades does, [REDACTED] nonetheless provides enough clever adjustments to the formula while embracing some incredible combat fundamentals to come out of seemingly nowhere and secure its spot as one of my favourite roguelikes of the year.

Nobody expected a spinoff to 2022’s The Callisto Protocol and so Redacted — a fast-paced, twin-stick shooter roguelike — comes as a pleasant surprise. Set in CP’s Black Iron prison on Jupiter’s moon, Callisto, you take on the role of a prison guard who is not only in a race to reach the last remaining escape pod but also a fight for survival against inmates who are transforming into weird, mutated monsters known as Biophages.

[REDACTED] thrives when you are moving as fast as possible, cutting through infected enemies in a rush to finish a run. This frantic combat flows together incredibly well, so you never feel held back by the game when you are gaining momentum. There is a nice selection of weapons and numerous upgrades to take advantage of, to create a nice power curve over multiple runs. Its narrative isn’t particularly deep and much of the humor leans heavily on edgy internet memes and references, but it occasionally lands a joke, typically one of the silly ones. Luckily, much of your focus will be on the soli...

With a colorful art style and roguelike hooks, Redacted has little in common with The Callisto Protocol besides a shared setting, yet it's a similarly uneven experience.