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Ares Omega Review

Ares Omega Review

Rogue-lite games have become popular among the indie scene. They offer a large variety of gameplay mechanics with huge amounts of replayability, with many having procedurally-generated levels. Ares Omega, from developer Selenion Games, is another amongst them. This time instead of the common fantasy setting; Ares Omega takes place in the future at a military base on Mars.

Ares Omega doesn’t have any real story, merely a premise. The military base has been overrun by self-aware weaponised robots. After seizing control and killing everyone, It’s up to you to retake the base and destroy everything standing in your way. This isn’t shown off in any flashy cinematic but by nothing more than narrative text with the addition of pictures of robots. It all could be mistaken for a loading screen if it weren’t for the plain old-school loading screen you get after the intro. From there on, nothing much else is provided and you’re thrown into the boots of your faceless husk of a character.

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From the very start, Ares Omega has a distinct ‘90s look to it. From the menus to the loading screen, everything is cladded with a tacky grey border; It isn’t terrible but certainly gives the impression that the visuals weren’t the main appeal, and that it’s all about the gameplay. Unfortunately, it has to be said that this won’t be the case case. Ares Omega doesn’t really have much going for it in terms of gameplay. In its simplest form it’s a top-down shooter: you move with WASD, aim and shoot with the mouse and there isn’t much else to it. You have a health bar and shield (which does recharge) and you have medpacks to heal, but once out of health, it’s all over.

You have a vast variety of weapons at your disposal, many of which can be found during levels or purchased using your collected credits. The weapons are dull looking, considering the game is set in the future and on Mars, but a few special futuristic weapons do make an appearance as you engage with the “totally original” enemies. They prove that the developers have seen Robocop, as the striking resemblance to ED-209 many of the mechs is uncanny, while the others: the drones, spider-bots, turrets are as generic as you can get. Even our hero looks like a discount Robocop.

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The level design doesn’t leave anything to the imagination either. Blocky, bland, metallic boxed rooms makes the whole experience tedious. That’s not to say they’re just repeated rooms full of enemies; they do contain the random assortment of control panels, explosive barrels, credits, weapon and ammo crates, but they’re littered around the rooms simply to flesh out the dreary decor. It is understandable that you’re not going to see any heavily detailed rooms due to the procedurally generated design, but a bit more creativity and polish could’ve gone a long way into making the environments a lot more engaging.

Ares Omega offers only a single mode and, just like the game's premise, it too is lacking. Your task is to progress through the floors blasting away the overabundance of robots, defeating bosses and getting to the eventual end. If you’re killed in the process you’ll be shown your stats and it’s back to start of the floor again, but not before venturing into perhaps the only interesting part of Ares Omega: the skills. As you progress, you’ll gain experience, level up and gain new skills which come in three categories: Assassin, Mercenary and Specialist. You can customise as you please, offering abilities that increase your health, shield, movement speed and accuracy/damage output on specific weapon types. Whether the game holds your interest long enough to work toward gaining those skills is entirely up to you.

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Ares Omega might interest some players with the pursuit of reaching the final floor, and like many rogue-lite games, it can be difficult and you will die a lot, but the more you play, the more it becomes a tedious, frustrating experience, which lessens any encouragement to go back.

5.00/10 5

Ares Omega (Reviewed on Windows)

The game is average, with an even mix of positives and negatives.

Ares Omega might interest some players with the pursuit of reaching the final floor, and like many rogue-lite games, it can be difficult and you will die a lot, but the more you play, the more it becomes a tedious, frustrating experience, which lessens any encouragement to go back.

This game was supplied by the publisher or relevant PR company for the purposes of review
Calum Parry

Calum Parry

Staff Writer

A bearded fellow whom spends most days gaming and looking at tech he can never afford. Has a keen eye for news and owns a dog that's a bear.

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