Nightmare Reaper (2022)

Nightmare Reaper is a fun, albeit frustrating addition to the FPS (or horror) genre. The shooting is solid and the environments are well done and creepy to explore, but the damage output from some enemies will lead to a quick death, especially when trying to figure out where they are shooting you from. The weapon diversity is surprisingly deep and it makes you want to keep playing to see what you can find. Fans of roguelites will enjoy this entry of the genre. However, if you’re not a fan of the genre, Nightmare Reaper won’t change your stance.

It’s not often that a game’s composer tells you most of what you need to know about a game, but in the case of Nightmare Reaper, it does. See, the music here was created by Andrew Hulshult, who has previously worked on games like Doom Eternal, Quake Champions, Dusk, and Prodeus. If you’re looking for a list of games to which Nightmare Reaper could be compared, that’s a pretty good place to start.

So yeah, I think the game’s biggest issue was scope creep. It needed more focus as there are just too many gameplay and system elements fighting for attention to really spruce things up at an individual level. If we are talking about FPS games from smaller devs, this is competing for attention from titles such as Dusk, Prodeus, Metal: Hellsinger, and Cultic. That is some heavy competition to be going against in this day and age. It doesn’t help that Nightmare Reaper is $24.99 on Steam, and $26.99 on console. It’s far from bad in the end, even if I recommend the PC version exclusively, but the competition it has is particularly high. Look into this if you are interested in a game with random layouts, events, and a lot of bonus content to be had.

Nightmare Reaper is a roguelite boomer shooter that knows how to exploit the advantages of its elements to provide a frantic action experience. The title isn't perfect, especially having problems with its attempt to tell a story that could be better implemented, but it's a game that will easily appeal to fans of shooters.

In theory, a roguelike FPS could work, however, there needs to be a very specific reason to even try. Nightmare Reaper never gives us that reason. It comes across like a game that’s a roguelike purely because that was how an indie developer should shove 100 levels of grind into it. There’s no narrative nor thematic value to it being a roguelike, and in all that randomness, it loses the soul of what makes those games it pays homage to so special.