VOID/BREAKER Preview

I got the chance to check out VOID/BREAKER, a high-octane roguelite FPS developed by Stubby Games (a solo dev, Daniel Stubbington) and published by Playstack. You might have enjoyed Stubbington’s previous game, The Entropy Centre, back in 2022, and now they’re back with a game that is decidedly not like Portal. So, what should you expect while complying with your new AI overlord?

You are 1473, one of many humans who has been placed into a simulation to do one thing: run through combat scenarios while under the watchful eye of IDRISI, an AI. Do this… forever, and you will have all your debts forgiven. However, you have help in the form of the last Subject 1473, a former (read: dead) man who managed to live on through the System. He only asks of you to do one thing: escape by any means necessary and bring him along. It’ll take many runs, but hey, you have time.

Stop me if you’ve heard of this before, but you’ll be travelling across a branching map full of enemies to fight, loot to find, and upgrades to make your boomstick a little more… boomier. Your basic set will consist of a gun (Pistol, Assault Rifle, Shotgun, and Marksman Rifle at the time of writing), a grenade meant more for destruction than killing, and finally, the Gravity Tether, which you can use to pick up and throw objects or grapple onto hooks.

That being said, you’re already really good without any upgrades. You can sprint across entire areas in five seconds, slide to go even faster, double jump to reach high places, and even grind on rails like you’re Sonic the Hedgehog. It all has momentum, so you can fling yourself pretty far with a big enough run-up or launch. However, despite being lightning fast with a serious talent for destruction, you aren’t invincible and you will get hit a lot. Thankfully, you can regain health by killing staggered enemies, which can be done by throwing objects at them or bringing down the building around them.

VOID/BREAKER features an extensive weapon modding system with many unique effects and attachments, such as one mod that increases your magazine size based on your current screen resolution. The lower it is, the more bullets you get, with the minimum being 480p! This is real, I have the screenshots to prove it, and it’s hilarious. You can also grab mods that can make your gun have different firing modes, optics, projectiles, and abilities to use. Why not stop time, summon lightning bolts, and rain missiles from the sky all at the same time? This is only limited by the grid system that has its own complexities with how you’ll layout your mods and attempt to take advantage of Repeater spaces.

As for the encounters themselves, they have some variety despite needing to fight the same enemies over and over again, and there were some unique events that not only gave you more info about how this insanity started, but also neat challenges or scenarios to get a special reward. The most notable one I got was the Weeping Angels thing that filled me with dread as soon as I read the text log. It was really intense, and I nearly died a few times; it was great.

Between your runs (after inevitably dying), you can spend the Voidum and Decryptions collected during your attempt to unlock new stuff and upgrade your character into an unstoppable warrior that not even the System can control. From new guns, stat boosts, starting bonuses, and skins for your arms and weapons, you’ll be busy for quite a while if you want everything at your disposal.

After many, many attempts, I got a good enough feel for VOID/BREAKER to realise that I can’t believe this is a solo effort for the most part. There was only one other person credited, and all they did was the soundtrack. It’s lightning-fast with amazing gunplay, interesting abilities, and upgrades, and so far I’ve only scratched the surface. It’s like someone took all the coolest ideas from other games and combined it into one, and I am all here for it. I just hope that I don't fall through the world again in the full release.

You can pick up VOID/BREAKER by the time this preview comes out for £17.99.