BioGun

Written by Joseph Moorer on 6/3/2024 for PC  

Biogun kept me at a good pace during it's demo. I was worried about the silliness of the story, and the abstract view of being inside the dog as a vaccine, going through it's bladder and anal cavity, as a colony and a city. Now that I'm playing a further built version, I feel like whatever they crammed into this canine, and this game, both are suffering equally because of it. There is still time to remedy what ails Biogun; the game is still in early access. I think a lot needs to be done. 

Let me start off with the obvious. I know it's a Metroidvania. I know you will visit places, and won't navigate through those places to the fullest without getting a power up or upgrade to do so. I know facing a mini-boss is probably not the best choice if you only have the weapon you started with, but I cannot escape the fact that the game is not difficult in the sense of being difficult, it's difficult in the sense of basic gaming mechanics that are supposed to work in this game simply not working. At all. Ever. Do not play this game right now. It is not ready. 

The most frustrating are the game's constant stutters. Even on lower settings, the game doesn't respond to inputs. In a game like this, platforming is a staple, and it gets old really fast missing a platform that you could've easily jumped to. This isn't a shader issue. It's at random. It does it whenever it wants. Sometimes it leads to falling into pink Goo, which doesn't kill you, but makes you respawn from the entrance. This also happens when your enemy or mini-boss does a lot of jumping around, and you have to dodge with pristine timing. Because if you don't, the second most frustrating things occurs.

In some games, if you get hit, you get 2-3 seconds of invincibility, to recalibrate. To make the game a little more fair. In Biogun, it seems like it's shorter than that, if at all, and don't be caught in a corner with a enemy or a boss. You might as well call it quits. I don't know if this was done to up the difficulty, or it's something they're still working on, but it is very dysfunctional, and takes me back to trying not to break my controller. If you die, you respawn back at a save point. 

Save points are the only place to do a lot of things. You can equip perks, or chips, to enhance your suit. You can only equip one chip at a time, so trust me. Just use the first one you get. Don't even bother with the others. And don't waste your money on the glass cannon. A glass cannon is where you dish out more damage, but take MUCH MORE damage. Why that mechanic is still a video game trope is beyond me. You can also add life or meter if you want for every 4 ions (I think) you collect. And yes, Some of the save points are hidden. And I'm not talking like hidden behind a wall, or found whilst exploring. I'm talking in the shop, behind the items, where you think you can't go. Why? 

The enemies are everywhere. Everything can kill you.. Smaller enemies, Bigger enemies. Pop up mini bosses. Level bosses. Grass. Super grass. Everything all at once. For every enemy you kill, you get in-game currency, and you can use those in those few-and-far-between shops that were mentioned earlier. There are also treasure chests and rewards you get for killing mini bosses, and level bosses. You also get paid for carrying out tasks sometimes, which are necessary, because you don’t want to go through this game without the reward you get for completing them. And most of these tasks are “go get this new mechanic, so you can get to this next spot”. Also, I won’t laugh at you at all, if you just run away from a boss that you can’t beat just yet, because you don’t have the right weapon, or the game is stuttering. Just come back later. You’re going to anyway. And use the fast travel, whenever and wherever you can.

Yes, there is a map, and yes, you can unlock certain aspects of the map by getting synapses, and using those to fill in the map. Yes, there's a way to refill your life if you have enough in your syringe to do so. You fill it up by destroying enemies, and yes, you can use it for your weapons super power. There's a better version of that powered up gun, but it sure doesn't seem like it. You also have to be still when you recharge your HP, like Hollow Knight, but there's a chip that you can equip to bypass that. Also, I said this is a twin stick shooter, and it is, but you still have to pull the trigger, and jump, and glide, and dodge, and run out of fingers.  

Last, but certainly not least, if I go from my computer to my ROG Ally, my progress won’t come over. I tried it on several different games to make sure it wasn’t on my end, but it wasn’t. The progress just won't port over. And good luck trying to cloud stream this from your computer to any other steam linked device. The button delay is much much worse, probably at no fault to the game, but I thought I should say something nonetheless. 

I took a while to do this preview, because I get it. Biogun is in Early Access, and there will be hotfixes, and updates, and the like, but as previously stated, this game feels like it got hit with it’s own dooper virus. I'm glad that Gaming Nexus does not score previews, because at this point in Biogun's development, the score would not be pretty. With all this to go through, the dog you get to name yourself is better off in someone else’s hands. This game is not ready to adopt you yet. Wait until it’s older, and more secure. Then give it a shot. As a vaccine.