Grabbus

really not the kind of game that will appeal to many people, and unfortunately that group includes myself

As it is now, the itemization does not work. This could absolutely change, but the symbols for weapon aspects are very unclear on what they represent, and rules governing how items are generated do not produce interesting outcomes. The enemies seem to also be governed by similar itemization procedures and while that's an interesting idea, the resulting enemy variety currently ranges from posing no threat at all or being really annoying to deal with entirely due to the length of time it takes to dispatch an enemy rather than any difficulty in their attack patterns/positioning/abilities. If the trajectory of the project doesn't change to put constraints on the proc gen to produce results that are actually interesting to use or react to, this game is not gonna be a hit.

A very strong foundation which I'm already having a lot of fun with. Interesting weapons that you can fuse on the fly, an endless skill tree, strong visuals, and an intriguing world map system with plans to be expanded. The game is off to a fantastic start, and at only $7 at the time of writing I can definitely recommend the game as-is. Very excited to see where this goes, and I'm sure I'll get more than my money's worth along the way.

Grabbus at it's core is a top down twin sticks shooter with a dash of roguelike, dungeon crawler, and a bit of town building on the overworld. The premise is simple, you enter dungeons clearing floors by defeating all the enemies on a given floor all whilst collecting items and resources. The resources are used on the overworld map to place structures the facilitate further progression and growth of towers. You can also use them to purchase skill points to open up nodes on a skill grid or place new structures. One of the main mechanics is using Grabbus to fuse items and weapons to enhance their effects or experiment and switch things up! It keeps things fresh. The fusion is done on the fly by selecting the two items you want to fuse from a radial menu using the shoulder buttons and BAM! You got a new item, probably with a new shot type. You can also use the grab and throw stunned enemies using Grabbus, which seemed a bit tricky to pull off. Music is pretty reminiscent of a 16-bit era game. I got vibes of Sim City on the SNES on the overworld. The sprite work is good too, though there's not a ton of enemy variety at this early stage. My only complaint is the inventory, it's so…

Good foundation and nice relaxing vibes.

I grab it, I fuse it, I kill with it.