Gastro Force Review

Space colonies’ existence are in danger as gargantuan aliens from an eldritch nebula are invade the galaxy and their only instinct is to eat whole starships! It’s up to the last soldier of the highly specialized Gastro Force elite troopers who are trained to infiltrate alien guts and exterminate them from the inside.

Gastro Force is a pixelated first-person shooter, or FPS, reminiscent of classic old school DOOM games except less gory. Each level is peppered with enemies to waste and pickups such as health, shield and ammo; as with any typical first person shooters. And while you start off with a simple pipe as a melee weapon, you’ll soon enough start picking up some firepower.

While you’ll first pick up a simple pistol, as you progress through the game’s 30 levels, you’ll also pick up a rifle which allows for a quicker rate of fire. Followed up by a shotgun for some close up goodness with three bullets fired per shot. And then the grand-daddy of weaponry the good old rocket launcher for some devastating damage which will become your best friend.

The levels, while mostly similar, are huge maze-like area you can navigate thanks to the mini-map (which can be disabled for an additional challenge). The environments are bland with a flair of “metallic” style. Enemy variety is pretty slim. You’ll come across the handful of the same enemies as you navigate the various labyrinth-ish levels. The soundtrack is another forgettable generic affair that you’ll tune out as you try to find your way through levels and avoid constantly dying.

Oh boy. Where do we begin. First off, most weapon do the same amount of damage output, meaning whether it be the pistol or shotgun for example, expect to shoot the same amount of bullet to take down the various baddies. Enemy damage output is a bit insane, even on Easy mode. While you can pick up shield pickups, it feels completely useless and inconsequential where enemies are blast through it with a few shots. Once exposed, you have no chance. Dying also means your ass is booted back to the start of the level. Also being forced to kill enemies before progressing to another room is completely unnecessary. The game has 30 levels, but it overstays its welcome after 10.

While Gastro Force offers a unique premise, the rest falls flat. Barely effective weaponry, rocket launcher aside, bland and repetitive level design, way too long and bafflingly high enemy damage output, makes this game an easy pass; especially considering it’s seemingly trying to homage classic FPS such as Wolfenstein 3D or original DOOM duology. It feels like someone ordered the classic pixelated shooters off Wish.com. Why buy a cheap imitation when you can get the real thing?