Assault Android Cactus

The other night I saw a retweet on Twitter.  The developer of Assault Android Cactus was looking for any bloggers, podcasters, or non-traditional media people that were interested in trying the game out.  It had been on my radar for awhile, so I reached out and said I was interested.

Surprisingly, the developer gave me a Steam early access key!  So, I've been trying it out.

Assault Android Cactus is a twin-stick shooter where you get to be an android trying to destroy swarms of evil robots.  I think there's some sort of story, but it's very loose.  Mostly this game is about crazy twin-stick shooting action.

I've honestly been really disappointed in the twin-stick genre lately, most games haven't held my attention for more than a couple minutes.  With Assault Android Cactus I've found myself going back to play almost every night.

At times it's a shooter where you're absolutely demolishing swarms of enemies.  Sometimes you're falling back and just barely holding them off.  Other times there's a ton of room to move but lots of projectiles are flying around and it almost becomes a bullethell game of dodging.  I've honestly had a great time with it.

This is one of the few games I've played in the last few years that actually lets me get into a state of flow and for that it gets major props from me.  There's something both challenging and soothing in fighting these waves of enemies.

I've also been enjoying the different characters, with their unique weapons and loadouts.  It's easy to change characters between levels and get a slightly different feel to the game, even though the core gameplay experience remains.

There's some variety to find here too.  The bosses are all unique and fun.  There's an infinite wave mode.  There's a daily challenge mode.  And it seems like all of the game modes support 2 players simultaneously, although multiplayer is not something I got to try out in my time with the game.

Assault Android Cactus may end up being an evergreen game for me.  A game I can go back and play over and over.  Like I said earlier, I've been doing a fifteen to thirty minute play session of this game almost every night.  And that's perfect.  I could never sit down with Assault Android Cactus for hours on end but I can definitely keep giving it a few minutes here and there between other games.

The developer said the game is officially out on September 23rd.  That's tomorrow!  That's also why I'm posting this today, so that you can pick it up at launch if you're interested.

Since I got an early access key given to me I have no idea how much the full release will cost, but if you ever see this game on Steam for around a $10 price point I would grab it.  Especially if you're a twin-stick shooter fan.