PERISH – Review
Roguelike and Roguelite games are often games that are easy to pick and play for short bursts, and this is probably also why the genre is so popular. This doesn’t mean that games in the genre are easy, as they are often easy to get into but extremely hard to beat. In the past, we have discussed great games such as Hades and Rogue Stormers, but we’ve rarely encountered a multiplayer Roguelite FPS game such as PERISH, which is the game we’ll be taking a closer look at today. We found ourselves enthralled by the game’s gameplay loop as well as its visual design and explosive soundtrack.
Story
The premise of PERISH is quite simple. You find yourself in purgatory and you believe you have earned yourself a spot in Elysium. When a priestess tells you you should earn as much Danake as possible to impress King Minos, you find yourself butchering cursed souls and demons left and right to collect their Danake. Of course, things are never as simple as they seem, and you will discover what is truly going on in due time. Overall the story value here is quite slim, but the overall framing makes you want to press on and see what happens when you reach the end.
Graphics
Graphically PERISH is a good-looking game. The enemies you’ll be facing all have haunting designs, and the different locations are varied enough to keep things interesting. More than once, even with homicidal monsters attacking us, we found ourselves looking at the backdrops or gazing upon impressive structures. We do have to mention that some of the game’s environments look a bit less detailed than others, and sometimes the lighting of said areas makes things rather unclear. The weapons all have great designs, and the overall animations are fun to look at. We did encounter a few minor graphical bugs such as clipping errors.
Sound
Even though the sound effects and the few voiced lines are perfect for the game’s setting, it’s the soundtrack that truly hogs the spotlight here. Outside of the ominous music that you’ll hear from time to time, you can count on a very explosive heavy metal soundtrack. The latter creates a certain sense of urgency and it also gets the adrenaline flowing.
Gameplay
PERISH is a Roguelite FPS game in which you’ll have to vanquish hordes of monsters on your way to Elysium. To get there, you’ll probably have to die several times first in order to unlock new upgrades, stronger weapons, consumable items, and so on. While the game’s overall gameplay loop is very straightforward, PERISH will throw a few curveballs your way, which we are not going to spoil in this review.
In the game, you’ll go through short stages, in which you always have to complete a certain objective or kill a boss minion. This does remain the same for every single run you play in PERISH, but the objectives may be different in each run. This makes it so that the game doesn’t grow stale after a few attempts, and even though everything in the game you do boils down to the same thing, it remains entertaining even after longer sessions. When you inevitably die in a run, you still retain some of your acquired Danake with which you can buy new weapons, rings, crowns, consumables, and Orphic Rites. The latter will also reward you with new items upon completing their requirements. Should you want to quit while you’re ahead, you can also turn back to the game’s hub after each objective or boss battle. This will allow you to keep your money, as dying will reduce your acquired coins by a lot.
Even though the game is a lot of fun to play through on your own, PERISH truly shines when you spill blood all the way to Elysium with friends. The game will make it so that players who die will still receive another chance if the other party member(s) reaches the end goal of the stage you’re in. Playing with more players does increase the spawn rate of enemies, making the game considerably harder. Of course, having more players means you can deal a lot more damage, but enemies will also sneak up on your more easily.
During our playthrough, we did encounter quite a few minor bugs. Most of these bugs, however, were limited to small graphical glitches, which were sometimes annoying but they didn’t truly damage the overall experience. Things got a bit dodgier when upgrades just didn’t work, or when we lost health even though nothing hit us. We even encountered a few instances where we were sinking through the floor and got stuck this way. If you then take damage, or even worse, die, then the game starts feeling a bit unfair. Luckily these bugs were few and far between.
Conclusion
PERISH is a great Roguelite FPS that gets even better when you can enjoy it with friends online. The game has a very straightforward gameplay loop but things get more and more hectic as you progress. Outside of the excellent art direction we absolutely adored the explosive metal soundtrack, which truly gets you in the mood to send some demons back from whence they came. Even with a few bugs present, we can easily recommend this hellish shooter.
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