Xenon Valkyrie+

The former Playstation Vita and PC game Xenon Valkyrie+ finds his way on Xbox One, I have to apologize for not having played the handheld version, so don’t expect to read about the differences here but what you can expect is a challenging rogue-like randomly generated platformer that requires your full attention and skill to be successful. 

THE GOOD

• The look from the perma-death game Xenon Valkyrie+ is a perfect throw back to the early days of gaming. Not everyone wants to play a game with retro-visuals but props for having a very distinctive look. Despite the intentional blurry graphics the random generated worlds look pretty nice and detailed. Oh and It is a nice touch that your Xbox avatar picture in the menu receives some pixelated touch too.
• What I really loved was the XP mechanic, letting you upgrade your character with talent points. This progress is reset every time you die, this is a rogue-lite game after all. The only thing that remains is so-called Teamerite, something you get by defeating boss enemies. This carries over and allows you to buy new weapons. These weapons aren’t available right from the start though, you just unlock them and allow them to be found in levels.
• When you are aiming to do a retro-game it is important to have the visuals but also the music and sound. Xenon Valkyrie+ pretty much nails it with that. With some sophisticated catchy tunes and sound effects.

Mixed Feelings

• Thought it was pretty weird that when you are fighting a boss some of your attacks won’t work. I get that they wanted to make sure that boss fights are challenging but reducing your special attacks just feels weird and illogical.
• Controls work decent most of the times but I wasn’t entirely satisfied by it. It doesn’t feel as accurate as it should be, especially with jumping against walls to reach higher places. I played worse though, so most of the times you won’t really notice it.

THE BAD

• As with all perma-death games, and I didn’t reduce the score for it, this isn’t for everyone. As you have read this review you know that you will die and have to restart again losing everything. (besides the very rare Teamerite) So you know what you are buying. If that is fine for you go a head and enjoy the game!

Xenon Valkyrie+ [Score: 7,2/10] Breton Fabrice known from Demetrios (review) has done a great job porting Xenon Valkyrie+, the original developer Diabolical Mind made a decent game that hopefully finds a way to the Xbox rogue-like game lovers. It has the sound and look from the good old gaming days and remains fun for quite a few hours. 

Dev: (Original: Diabolical Mind) Game porting: COWCATGames Publisher: COWCATGames
Played on: Xbox One X | LifeisXbox received a digital Preview code, provided by COWCATGames. (Extra thanks for the very early game code and for trusting LifeisXbox.eu for providing early feedback)