Atomic Heist

Genre: 2-Stick Shooter / Roguelike

Players: 1

.

Review:

Atomic Heist is a 2-Stick Shooter with Roguelike elements released on PC and Xbox One in 2018 and ported to Nintendo Switch in 2019. Players must navigate to the end of each level while fending off enemies and managing their own radiation levels.

The presentation here is nothing noteworthy, using unimpressive 2D visuals backed by a forgettable soundtrack In fact, overall there’s little here that sticks out as noteworthy or memorable.

Sadly, the gameplay doesn’t help things here. The game is already punishingly difficult, with players’ ships only able to take a few hits before blowing up. However, the game seems to want players to contend with all sorts of issues they need to juggle while fighting enemies – your ammo is always limited, forcing you to conserve your firepower (which really runs counter to the spirit of 2-Stick Shooters). What’s more, players can’t just methodically go through a level and take their time, because the constantly-rising radiation will do them in if they take too long. In effect, this game seems to have it in for you no matter which way you want to play it. At the very least, you do gradually unlock upgrades for your ship, but this is a slow process, and it doesn’t guarantee that the new upgrades will be especially helpful.

In the end, Atomic Heist is a really joyless 2-Stick Shooter, and it’s hard for me to imagine this being a worthwhile purchase on Nintendo Switch when there are so many better games in the genre on this platform. Go for one of those instead.

tl;dr – Atomic Heist is a 2-Stick Shooter with unimpressive visuals and punishing gameplay that requires players to conserve their ammo but also not take too long in the game’s levels. The result is a distinct lack of fun in a genre the Nintendo Switch has in ready supply – get another better game instead.

Grade: D

^{You can support eShopperReviews on Patreon! Please click HERE to become a Sponsor!}

^{This month’s sponsors are Andy Miller, Exlene, Johannes, Ilya Zverev, Connor Armstrong, Eli Goodman, K.H. Kristoffer Wulff, Stov, and Gabriel Coronado-Medina. Thank you for helping to keep the reviews coming!}