Game Review: Paranautical Activity (Xbox One)

My first 15 minutes of Paranautical Activity was one of utter confusion & frustration. I had no idea what I was doing and I died almost immediately. I suspect most would have had a similar experience with many just throwing the towel in.

Paranautical Activity is a hard game, not one for the casual gamer.

A first person shooter that drops you in dungeons with rooms that procedurally generate, each respawn will be different but considering the lack of room design it’s not really that impressive.

There is no story here…you choose a combo of weapons (with such ‘clever’ names as the David Bowie) which, depending on their strength, also affects how much health you get. Fight through rooms with randomly spawning enemies and fight a boss before descending to the next floor.

It’s not just rooms of bad guys though, as there are shops where you can spend the gold dropped by enemies on more health, armour and weapons. This might seem as though it levels the playing field a bit but I’ve never been able to survive long enough to earn enough gold to buy even the cheapest item.

Thankfully some enemies drop health when killed, this has been my saving grace on a number of occasions yet I’ve still never made it past the 3rd floor (I have no idea how many there are).

You die, you start again. Like I said, not for causal gamers (I consider myself a hardcore gamer but even I’m struggling here).

That’s about it for game play…it’s an ugly game that would be consigned to the bargain bins of gaming if it wasn’t for its addictiveness. There is just something about it, that when you die you’re always hitting start again. No lengthy loading screens means you’re back in almost instantly ready to try again & learn from your mistakes.

Every time you make it a little bit further, the sense of satisfaction is immense.

I feel as though with a couple of tweaks to weapons, more gold dropped by enemies and increased health this would be a much better game. The difficulty doesn’t need to be dropped, you just need to be able to have a fighting chance!