Mercenary Kings: Reloaded Edition

Steam really needs a "meh" rating. The game is alright; it plays well and it's a shooter-action-platformer of sorts, so it has that typical feel, but that's about as far as it goes. The rest of the game is just a grind - the same mission types / selections over, and over... and over.... AND OVER... again. Getting to the next bracket of missions takes a while, and there are lots of these brackets, so doing the same thing for way-too-freakin'-long is exhausting. You have to farm for materials which only come from certain missions, so that only prolongs the progress. Overall, maybe this game just isn't for me. I LOVE Monster Hunter, but that's because the missions and monsters are exciting. This game just feels like an oversimplified slog. If you really enjoy that classic 2D shooter style game with some grinding, you'll enjoy this. If you get bored easily or see the light at the end of the tunnel too quickly, you won't like it. 4/10

An enjoyable gun platformer with some engaging crafting and buildout elements. Overall, it would be an easy recommendation, if nothing especially revolutionary. But the experience is loading up the game, crossing your fingers it won't progress from title screen to dead black screen; disabling Steam overlay to see if that helps (still a crapshoot); running in windowed mode to see if that helps (still a crapshoot); trying little workarounds that never quite work around with any more consistent success rate. Then you know you've got a good load when after only a few solid seconds of black screen to a splash screen riddled with broken HTML code, and you can play your game from there. But try not to exit until and unless you mean it.

There aren't enough resources to go around, so get ready to feel the futility of grinding unless you accept that the best weapons are out of your reach. Beautifully animated though.

Gear forged for battle Friends reload beneath gunfire Victory is built

Awesome couch co-op game. Last few cheevos are grindy asf, but worth it to perfect this little gem on Steam.

timer kills exploration, but levels are huge so you need to explore. the need to collect materials, grind for them, grind for money and craft stuff in a game like this is entirely unnecessary and tedious. sprite work looks good, but the level designs will leave you saying "where the ♥♥♥♥ do i go?" multiple times within the allotted limit. you dont get a lot of health items, which wouldnt be annoying if your normal gun did more damage so you could kill enemies faster and stop them from damaging you. i like the timed reload, there seems to be a crit system though im not sure if its random. it definitely feels like it. hitboxes of enemies are weird and inconsistent also but that might just be the devs trying to make it seem more like an NES game. i understand the point is to collect materials and craft better guns, but it just doesnt feel worth it when your stock gun is a pea shooter so it takes forever to kill most things, and most guns you craft are mediocre. the movement is clearly trying to mimic NES era platformers, and it succeeds on that front, but it doesnt succeed in feeling good. the jumpsquat animation is insanely long and gets me damaged very often because my character …