Having lived through the glory days of the arcades, I’m quite familiar with simpler games that are built on repetition and sucking in your attention with a satisfying gameplay loop. In many ways I’d say my enjoyment of your typical roguelike game is built around that understanding, since the best of that variety tend to tap into that same basic system. The challenge here is that, just like many classic arcade games, if the particular flavor you’ve managed to come up with doesn’t seem that interesting, the entire experience essentially falls apart. For me that’s roughly where REDEX lands, delivering a specific type of pretty intense platform shooting, but not really managing to make it worth returning to, when there are so many better options out there.

The core gameplay hook is pretty simple, but limited. You’ll have a pretty small space to contend with your enemies in, and they’ll come from both sides in waves. Your abilities are pretty well limited to a dash and a jump, which will allow you some limited evasion since you’ll temporarily be invincible while dashing, and there are some platforms you’ll be able to get up on as well. Aside from that, for the most part your focus will be on using whatever weapons you have available to take out enemies, collecting some loot as you go. Using that you’ll then be able to purchase some handy equipment or upgrades between rounds, but there’s also then some special loot for unlocking more permanent ones.

The problem is that despite changing around the scenery and general stage layouts a little bit, for the most part the play is unchanging. You’ll gain access to some better gear, have less issues knocking out the enemies you’ll face, and slowly get further… but it’s all pretty uninspired in the end. With so many roguelikes that add complexity or are simply more rapid-fire and intense out there, this style feels somewhere in the lukewarm middle. I suppose for the price it’s reasonably fair if your interest is just in something disposable, but it’s hard to get excited about.