I had to check… oh, wait. I had to check Wrath Colon Aeon Of Ruin every day to remind myself that it was a meaningless name. A delicate title like that deserves a much worse game, but this one captures the behind schedule 90s, as it were, and ends up being familiar enough to work, and original enough to freshen up the formula. Sometimes it’s a bit too true, but even considering the irritation compounded by the pressure of playing too difficult for the sake of a review, I’m impressed with the balance that was achieved.
Age Of Wrath is clearly inspired by Quake (I’d say more Quake 2, right down to the biomechanical infantry guys who fill a role that’s a tad more than cannon fodder until the very end), but there’s also a touch of Unreal, especially in the first of the three worlds with its palette of muted metallic blues and soggy green-grays. Even Exhumed gets a shout-out in the sandy tombs and snotmonster temples of world two, before a well-executed but conceptually somewhat underwhelming finale in Hell. There are plot touches in the semi-secret text scrolls and the spirit guide who tells you things even the writer probably doesn’t remember when you return to the center of each world between levels.
But the story and setting matter, if not get in the way. You’re here to shoot weird monsters with nippy weapons in fancy, semi-realistic environments full of optional secrets, and Aeon: Rage Of Ever absolutely delivers. The standard FPS arsenal is here, with a delicate but true pistol, a machine gun, an electromagnetic cannon, and eventually some fancy energy weapons reserved for the huge guys or trivializing the swarm of weaker ones. There are also thematic twists like a “grenade” launcher that shoots gooey cysts of evil ooze like Unreal’s bio-rifle, and a crystal cannon that turns victims into purple statues. The weapons are a strange case of being functionally standard but feel good and varied enough that the lack of weird options matters.
If the shotgun is still the yardstick of a good FPS game, Fury Ruined Colon delivers once again. It’s powerful and robust enough that the few levels that drain you of ammo make it shine even brighter. The delay between shots is enough to cause panic when you miss or don’t do enough damage, and its alternate fire is a long-range, hybrid rocket/anti-air launcher that punches well above its apparent weight but requires skill to time and aim properly. The best part is that right-clicking and releasing before firing makes a chak-chik sound without expending any ammo. Yes, thanks, I’ll take some stim with the stim.
Skill is key here, as each of the game’s monsters and weapons have their own unique behaviors and patterns that complement your skills. They’re frustrating at first, then they’re an acceptable challenge, then they’re opportunities to experiment with novel weapon combinations, and finally you’ll fit their deaths into the rhythm of the larger shootouts you’re taking part in. Ammo is also exceptionally well-balanced, as you’ll always have enough of it for a few viable options, but so little that you’ll have to switch them out regularly and learn the ins and outs of each weapon and enemy. You might think that the hidden spiders are an annoying enemy, but I still deeply hate the little robots that shoot electric eyeballs that explode on death. You’ll hear their buzzing, endless vision attacks early on, and THEY NEVER STOP.
Theoretically, power-ups (artifacts) also contribute to all this, providing a local shield, electricity that prevents melee combat, or a tempting black hole grenade. But as a natural gatherer and absent-minded fool, I almost never used them beyond the occasional “heal on kill” and “temporary god mode, but then you drop to 1 HP.” The most fun mode turns the arena into a hilarious relief, turning monsters against each other with doll gas while you hang out and smoke under the stairs. But these options are more useful in difficult mode, which I should probably moved to earlier.
FPS fans and those who don’t ponder the grim inevitability of entropy on a daily basis will, in my opinion, be content with the game’s high difficulty, but if you’re just okay or fairly good at shooters, the medium difficulty provides a fair amount of friction and frustration. Crucially, the game is also well-paced, with levels that are well-suited to playing through two or three and then leaving it for the day, providing a breather in levels with a bit of exploration or jar-smashing rather than constant overwhelming action. Even the occasional level where I got completely lost in a maze was the kind of frustration that quickly subsided in retrospect.
There If frustrations, though. Aside from the early ones where I had to learn the monsters, Aeon Realm Of Something brings back the archaic habit of annoyingly getting stuck on vertical corners while insisting on covering every horizontal edge and curve with soap. This is really compounded by the third act and the increased emphasis on leaping through lava challenges as you’re bombarded, with additional enemies that can teleport in at any moment. All of this is exacerbated by a dash move that requires an awkward switch to a sword and an alternate attack. Oh, and there are the occasional crouching jumps. I thought we agreed to never talk about them again.
Quicksaves are also a constrained, collectible resource, an intriguing system with a somewhat clunky UI that soon became irrelevant as I soon collected dozens of them. I’d estimate that 70% were used to bypass the tedious backtracking that occurs after falling off a ledge, and another 15% to getting trapped by a wall lamp while a legally separate cacodemon ate my face.
Wrath Colon Aeon Of Ruin could do with a bit of polishing here and there, could be a bit more extravagant, and probably shouldn’t have started with some of its most monotonous levels to begin with. But while many of its peers simply ape the raucous and obnoxious reputation of ’90s FPS games, this is a solid shooter that remembers how it was played and why it worked.
This review is based on the version of the game provided by developers KillPixel Games and Slipgate Ironworks.
