Quick rec before the review Check out DiscoMaps . You grab the mod off Nexus and pair it with their site, which works basically like a workshop for songs with beats already programmed, so you get a constantly growing library of tracks to play instead of being stuck with the base game's selection. It also handles online leaderboards and tournaments, auto submits your scores, separates Standard and Infinite modes, and shows your run's score next to other players' right in game. Way more replay value, definitely worth grabbing. The actual review: Game's great but pretty raw right now. The combat has real promise and the music absolutely slaps. Honestly the jump from the demo to the current build was huge, you can tell the devs are actually putting in the work. The new skills especially added a lot to how the combat feels and gave you way more room to express yourself in fights. Really hoping they keep going that route, more moves, more options, more ways to mess around. The combat itself is genuinely great, even better than the demo, and obviously there's always room to grow, but it's already in a really solid spot. The problem is everything around it. The whole package still feels kinda unfinished, it plays more like an extended demo than an actual game , even for Early Access. Characters and animations Biggest thing for me is the characters. The designs are sick, no complaints there. The animations between boss phases are honestly a highlight too, super characterful and stylish, they give each boss a real sense of personality in a way the rest of the game kinda struggles with. The combat animations in general look really good. The downside is the lack of facial animations during fights, the bosses' faces stay completely frozen even in their biggest moments, which kills a lot of the intensity and emotional weight. At the Encore they kinda just stand around like mannequins too, and in dialogue scenes you just see their static art. All of it together makes it really hard to get attached to anyone when nobody's face ever reacts to anything. One more combat note while I'm at it: the bosses lean pretty hard into damage sponge territory. Personally I don't mind that, but if that's the direction, they really need more movesets to back it up, otherwise the fights start feeling repetitive once you've seen everything they can do. More variety in their attacks would go a long way. The story and the bosses The setup with Charlie getting killed and making a pact to come back for one night is cool, and the mystery of who killed him and why is a solid hook. The bosses, who are his old bandmates, do technically have personalities and motivations, but everything stays really surface level and pretty generic. You've got: [*] The rebel punk rocker who wants to reshape the world [*] The AI that became a popstar and caught god syndrome from being connected to too many humans at once [*] The rocker who swore he'd never get aggressive cyber implants and ended up doing it anyway [*] The solo street rapper who turned into a label exec And like, that's it. The whole arc for each of them is basically "this artist had values X, then Charlie died and they needed to keep their careers going, so they sold out to the evil label" . Cool premise, but it's the same beat over and over with no real depth, no flaws that make them feel human, no specific moments or memories that tie them to Charlie. A good comparison is No Straight Roads , same kind of premise with the evil label and the artists who sold out, but that game actually makes you care about every single boss because they're written with real specificity, full of personality, and the game gives you mechanics and moments to actually get to know them. Dead as Disco really needs something like that. The Encore is underused After you beat them, the bosses end up at the Encore too, which should be the perfect chance to actually develop them. But the conversations there feel really mechanical and kinda boring, like you're just clicking through dialogue boxes instead of actually getting any real moment with these people. It's right there, the framework is set up, it just needs way more soul in the writing. The hub itself is kinda the same deal. The Encore is right there, there's a bartender who's apparently an old friend of Charlie's, but again, you don't know anything about him so he ends up being just... whatever. And to actually go fight a boss you literally just walk to an "exit" door that takes you to the boss select screen. It's a missed opportunity, the space is already there, it just doesn't do much with you. Imagine if someone there actually pointed you toward who to fight next, if the bartender had real dialogue and history, if the place felt alive between fights. Would do wonders for the pacing and for getting attached to this world. Level design feels too thin While I'm at it, the level design itself is a big part of why the game feels so thin right now. You basically pick a boss from a menu, get dropped into a small arena, and the "stages" are just the arena switching mid-fight as you do enough damage. There's no real level to speak of. Sifu is a perfect example of how to do this right: each boss has their own full level (a slum, a nightclub, a museum, a corporate tower, etc) where you actually run around, fight common mobs and mini-bosses, find shortcuts that open up on later runs, and pick up items and clues scattered around the environment that fill out a Detective Board with the bosses' motivations and history. The Squats is literally built around the drug the boss manufactures, you find samples, notes, the addicts using it, and by the time you reach him you already understand who he is and what he does. That kind of environmental storytelling and exploration would do absolute wonders for Dead as Disco. Imagine actually walking through the punk rocker's underground scene, or the AI popstar's digital concert space, fighting your way through it, finding stuff that tells you who they were before, and only then reaching the boss. Right now it's basically just the boss fight with extra steps. Content wise there isn't a ton here yet either. What's playable is fun, but it's hard to shake the feeling that you're seeing maybe 20% of the game the devs are actually pitching. Verdict That said, I'm still recommending this one. It IS Early Access, and you can genuinely feel the love the devs are putting into it, the combat alone is proof of that. There's a real future here, just a lot of room to grow. So just go in knowing you're buying a raw product right now. There's a ton of potential, and from how much care is clearly going into this thing, I'd bet on the devs actually pulling it off. Worth supporting if that sounds like your kind of bet.
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