Astrality Review

Treasures and adventure await with the release of DigiPen Europe-Bilbao’s Astrality. Taking cues from Star Fox, Star Wars Arcade, and other adventures in the stars, should players dive into this rail shooter?

Astrality Review

As a bounty hunter, players will seek out their next big score in this title. However, there’s just one problem – everybody out to get them. Never fear, though; with the AI assistant Broomer at your side, even the biggest ship doesn’t stand a chance against your might.

In order to get ahead, players will have to dodge debris and blast everything in sight. Controls use a WASD setup, with firing mapped to the mouse. Those that sit still can fire faster, but that is often a luxury that does not come up quite too often. Rather, players will always be kept on their toes.

This somewhat works, but can oftentimes feel like walking and chewing bubble gum at the same time. Some might claim this is a skill issue, but we’d counter by saying it’s not quite as intuitive as titles like Star Fox. There are some added perks like a bomb called the Ultra Killer 3K and a dash ability, but these all have cooldowns players need to be mindful of. In short, it can sometimes feel like you don’t quite have the resources you need to kick butt and take names.

Another thing players need to be mindful of in Astrality is the bar at the bottom of the screen. Everything lives and dies by this bar, with it gradually increasing the more you defeat enemies. Top it off, and players can get themselves a nice double that dishes out twice the pain. However, each hit drains some of the bar, and it is constantly moving ever so lower. Empty it out, and it’s game over for the player.

This is most certainly a unique mechanic, but it can oftentimes feel like it is a bit unbalanced. There were times where we were kicking butt and taking names due to the sheer amount of enemies on the screen. However, there were other instances where the foes were few and far between. A bit of balance with the enemy placements would have gone a long way.

However, Astrality does not give players too much of a chance to grow, with the title running a little less than an hour. It’s just a shame too that things wrap up before they even get the chance to really kick things into stride.

Astrality does some interesting things with the rail shooter formula in the form of its meter, but the awkward shooting is like walking and chewing bubble gum at the same time. Those that can tolerate a bit of awkwardness will dig this interstellar adventure.

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