Gastro Force – Review

It’s the year 399H and massive aliens from an Eldritch nebula have come to our galaxy to munch on all the space stations, so it’s up to our unnamed protagonist, a soldier of the elite Gastro Force is on hand to battle off the new threat, plant the bomb and blast our alien friends back home.

It’s not going to be easy, so naturally you set out on the mission to defend the colonies from a massive alien ready to digest an entire starship, with nothing more than your deadly metal pipe,. Thankfully after walking into a few walls and squishing some bugs, you’ll pick up a pistol and have chance to actually shoot something.

As will be pretty clear from the screenshots, Gastro Force is a first-person shooter, similar in style and presentation to Doom. the main threat is initially from dormant eggs, which when disturbed will hatch a worm like creature which toddles forwards trying to headbutt our friendly trooper in his crotch, these guys are fairly easy to dispatch with that metal pipe, but it’s best to let them hatch and drop a few bullets into them, to keep them at a distance.
Soon enough you’ll meet a floating “drone” enemy who’s capable of firing back, these guys become your main threat as they’re a little more agile and can do plenty of damage, so you’ll want to keep moving and strafe around corners to avoid taking damage.

Thankfully you’ll find a decent amount of health, shields and ammo to pick up meaning you’re unlikely to have too much trouble in these early sections which gives you chance to fight the toughest battle of all, the control scheme.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m a big fan of retro shooters, it’s not all that long ago I went back and completed the original Doom games, but Gastro Force has a small identity issue, in trying to be retro, it has a simple 8-way movement system, you can walk forward and back, side to side and diagonal, but you can’t move across an axis, so if you’re sidestepping an enemy, you can’t just move away from them, you have to stop the movement and then make a new direction. There’s no fluent transition from moving forward and then strafing round an enemy, you need to keep your distance and keep your movements simple, otherwise you’re movement will freeze for a split-second while you press the next direction, an easy tactic is to side-step behind a corner, but clip the wall (common with these controls) and your movement will once again draw to a halt, It’s such a frustrating system, I sadly didn’t enjoy wrestling with it at all, but once I’d got used to it, I soldiered on to meet some new enemies.

As well as the pointless bugs, the worms and floating drones, you’ll eventually come across a larger creature with machine guns, known as “Big Alien” it still only takes 3-4 bullets to kill, so not any more dangerous, if anything I find their movement a little slower and more predictable, meaning if you keep your eyes open, you’re unlikely to take much damage.
By this punt you’ll also have a Shotgun, and soon a machine gun, which makes taking down the increased number of enemies pretty straightforward except for the highest difficulties.

Brought to us by Ratalaika, there’s no surprise that Achievements are pretty straightforward, most are unlocked through progression, such as killing one of each of the 3 main enemies, picking up each weapon and coloured key (used to progress through levels), as well as a couple you’ll need to spend about 30 seconds making an effort to do, such as finding a secret (which are pretty obvious to spot when you bring up the map) or shooting an explosive barrel.

All achievements should be unlocked by the time you’ve defeated the first boss at level 10, there’s 30 missions in total, and you will find more varied enemies, including a more vertical drone, which answers the question “why on earth didn’t they keep shooting on a horizontal plane – like Doom)
But unfortunately, most players aren’t going to stick around for that. Gastro Force certainly isn’t shovel ware, but there’s just not enough variation, those first 10 levels all look the same, with the same handful of weapons, enemies and textures, and while you might find a few hours of gameplay, you’ll struggle to keep going to level 20 or 30 when you soon realise there’s only minimal differences, and things start to feel far too repetitive long before you reach

While the overall gameplay is disappointing, there’s a nostalgic feel from the graphics and sound, which while very simple (and could be ALOT better) they still give you that early 90’s FPS vibe and the boss battles aren’t bad, vut 10 levels apart, and no real incentive to continue after the first boss, the good parts are just too few and far between.

It’s sadly hard to recommend, Gastro Force is a fun hour to get some easy achievements and decent value at less than £7, but with poor controls and a disappointing selection of weapons, enemies and levels, it’s not a game you can expect to enjoy beyond the first day.

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