A Contusion launched back in July 2022, which means players have had more than four years to stumble across gakovniza’s hardcore top-down roguelite shooter. Unfortunately, not many have.
There are currently just 11 Steam reviews, despite there being quite a lot packed inside this hidden gem. More than 70 perks and 20 artifacts are joined by five enemy factions, five types of procedurally generated levels, plenty of weapons and armor, and a damage system where a single attack could leave you seriously injured or kill you outright.
There’s also the robots, we’ll get to those later…
You’re Injured and You Have No Idea What Happened
A Contusion begins after you’ve been badly injured, although you don’t know exactly how you ended up that way. You were making your way through a compound looking for help, with the voice of your mentor guiding you. Then reality started to twist, your mentor disappeared, and you’re left trying to work out what’s actually happening as you continue further inside.
Where you end up changes with each run. There are catacombs, underground bunkers, warehouses, sewers, and outdoor areas to make your way through, all procedurally generated so you won’t be following the same route every time.
Exactly what you find there can change too.
The Robots Are a Problem
Five different enemy factions are waiting around the compound, and none of them are going to be welcoming. Armed criminals are probably the most straightforward of the lot. Mutants have randomly changing DNA, while the undead are bloodthirsty and extremely difficult to kill.
The robots are a little more complicated. They can improve themselves by adding new armor, sensors, and weapons, and some can even develop the ability to self-destruct. More worryingly, they’re also capable of using dead human bodies to improve themselves.
As if that wasn’t enough, there’s a fifth faction made up of ominous black goo. At this point, the criminals are starting to look like the easy option.
Getting Hit Could End the Run
Fighting any of the enemy factions comes with quite a bit of risk. Attacks in A Contusion don’t simply knock a predictable amount off a health bar. A hit can do very little, cause a serious injury, or kill its target outright. That applies to your attacks too, so combat can turn very quickly in either direction.
There are plenty of ways to tip things in your favor. The game includes 16 firearms, shotguns, and melee weapons, along with six types of bullets, four shotgun shell varieties, and seven modifications for melee weapons. You can also find grenades, shields, helmets, first aid kits, and 15 different types of body armor covering light, medium, and heavy protection.
Stealth gives you another option when taking the shot doesn’t seem worth the risk, while more than 70 perks and 20 artifacts leave plenty of room for experimenting with different builds between runs.
A Great Game That’s Remained Relatively Undiscovered
It’s easy to understand how a small indie roguelite can get missed at launch. What’s more surprising is when it stays that way for another four years. A Contusion currently has an 81% positive rating on Steam, but with only 11 reviews behind that number, it remains very much undiscovered.
There’s certainly no shortage of ideas here. The unpredictable damage system makes every encounter dangerous, the five enemy factions behave very differently, and there’s a sizeable collection of perks, artifacts, weapons, armor, and ammunition to find while you work your way through the mystery behind your character’s injuries.
At $4.99, it’s also one of the cheaper games we’ve come across while digging through Steam for our Rogue Discovery series. Four years after launch, we think it’s finally time more people found it.