SENTRY Steam Charts & Stats

I suck at keeping track of things to use for my points but I just want to say I love it but its BS most of the time because why are there so many hazards stacking over, I could barely build or using anything. I was stuck with a anti material rifle and two traps because they took more slots and one was deactivated every round while also costing a ton to build. I made it to the last wave but the guys drained me of everything as I some of them just passed by without me noticing. Idk, this is a mess but i'm just upset like why can't we fix doors and close them when we want to. Maybe allow us to have a bot partner but if it dies you can use a life to respawn it but I bet that bot would be worthless since were basically toothpicks in this game. Wish we could bring more upgrades from previous runs because the limit is to low for just two or three runs and it gets repetitive and feels like I barely grow and when I do i just get smushed.

I've had to mull it over, but I don't think a negative review for this game is [i]too[/i] harsh, considering the £17 asking price and the fact I haven't really been liking it. I don't think the current negative reviews do a great job articulating the current issues with this game, so I'm writing this having bought it shortly after Major Update #3 (Hazards & Crew) to give some of my impressions and why I don't think it's currently worth it. [h1]Overview[/h1] SENTRY is an FPS tower defence. It's a roguelite as well, but that's a far more minor element, runs are relatively short and it's not really about lots of effects stacking- It's more like a minor framing device for the game loop than a focus. The persistent progression comes mostly through blueprints. If you've found a tower/gun/etc before, you can craft it from scratch in new runs, so you have a large amount of agency over what you want to use if you've found it in a run before. I saw another review saying this game doesn't know what it wants to be, but at least from my impression, SENTRY clearly leans towards FPS and away from tower defence. The player deals a lot of damage (but can die VERY fast if they can't take cover against certain enemies) and it's very rare that a defence setup can hold back enemies without the player there to manually defend the area. I'm gonna talk about negatives first, explaining what's holding this back from a recommendation, then end on the positive notes. [h1]The Problems[/h1] [list] [*][b]This game has a tower upgrade system that's persistent within a run, but these upgrades don't branch at all and are boring.[/b] Tower upgrading is so interesting that many TDs derive massive amounts of their identity from it. I'm not expecting Bloons 6 or anything, but the upgrades almost never change the way I intend to use these towers. Eg. The Health Station only increases things like how much the doses heal, how much they restock between waves, restock limit, etc. What if I had to choose between [i]"dosing makes you invincible for 5 seconds"/"Instantly doses an injured player that gets close. 30 second cooldown"[/i] as the final upgrade? That would be, you know, SAUCE, strategy, the thing I am here for. I would want to try both options on separate runs. TD thrives off aspirational play & strategy, this game has neither. Even when a tower has something interesting, it's only one neat upgrade in a sea of "-5% cooldown", "+20% damage". [*]Enemies move MUCH faster if the player isn't interacting with them. I get why, players don't need to wait for enemies to come to them, but the problem is that [b]you can never plan around enemy movement speeds.[/b] Even if you jump between two entry points nearby every <10 seconds, you'll see some enemies have abused their sprint privilege to sneak past you halfway to the exit. This means, on every map, you are forced to hold wherever the enemy paths converge- Often, at the very end of the map, and you have low incentive to push forward or stop them any earlier. [i](and, I'm filling the endgame door with turrets at the start of EVERY defense because I need something inbetween enemies and the exit when I can't be there)[/i] I would really prefer having a fast forward button instead. [*]The player dies far too easily. Shotgunner and minigunner enemies will shred you in seconds if you don't have cover to retreat to. (Shotgunners can easily take ~1/3 of your health with almost no warning, and they look like regular soldier enemies. Minigunners you at least see coming, but they're very tanky) Some levels give you an endgame section with cover, and some just don't, and in that case you might be cooked. Falling into a bottomless pit also always instakills you, which I don't think will gel well with the upcoming crew levelling system. [*]Spaceship choice isn't interesting. Your spaceship at the start of a run dermines some bonuses you get, but they don't encourage you to play differently. Eg. The Medical ship heals you at the end of each wave, and gives you +2 crew at the start of the game. [i](Crew simply act as extra lives. future updates will flesh them out)[/i] Those are alright bonuses, but I'm not gonna be playing any differently compared to any other spaceship. If it was something like "you passively regenerate health at all times", that would encourage me to play differently than I would normally. [*]The game's just not balanced well in general. Melee comes with no defensive potential, so it's a recipe for an early grave. Items like flashbangs or the stim have such bad default effects that they need several upgrades to be worth using at all. It's pretty easy to identify the best equipment fast and just use that for the rest of the game, and if you try to experiment with the new fun tools you get, you will be punished. So much of this game's gear is simply nonviable compared to "AR goes brrr" [*]The new Hazards system is also extremely unbalanced. Every enemy encounter adds a Hazard, which is a debuff that usually lasts until the next warp gate [i](=either a half, or a third of a run)[/i] with a few that only last for the specific fight. I have no idea why "permanently remove an upgrade from any equipment you use on this defense" is a persistent hazard instead of a one time one, for example, that's insane. [b]EDIT: This got changed in a recent patch, all Hazards are now one-time.[/b] [*]Levels are selected in an interesting way; Your ship has 7 maps, with 1 in the center that's always the same, 2 adjacent to it, then those branch into the 4 outer levels. Intruders will attack the outer levels first, and if they successfully destroy a level [i](you can repair levels, but it's costly)[/i] they can move on to the inner level if they breach there, and so on. I think this idea is cool, and sometimes you need get 2 boarders, meaning you can't defend one outer level and are guarenteed to play on an inner level, but at the minute, it unfortunately means [b]there's a ~1/4 chance that you will be playing the exact same level back to back,[/b] maybe with the enemies using different breach points. [*]Map design feels baffling at many points. Ceiling traps are a rare minority, but many maps go out of their way to make several ceilings can't host them. (Eg. Junction) If two breach points are practically adjacent to each other, I'm not sure why there's two. Blast Doors exist to potentially reroute enemy paths to the exit (or, if you block all paths, delay them by having them destroy the doors) but they're rarely used well- Either they're very OP and can funnel all enemies into one chokepoint, (eg. Junction!) or far more often, just appear right outside the breach point and only serve to pointlessly delay one spawn group for a minute or so. [*]I think this happened in Update #3, Weapon/Deployable slot buffs used to be persistent but are now run-specific. The problem is that you'll get like two opportunities per run to ever upgrade the capacity, and that means the variety of guns/towers I can use at once is quite low. [/list] [h1]The Silver Lining[/h1] [list] [*]Shooting feels good, arcadey and satisfying. If SENTRY had been developed as a traditional FPS, I think Fireblade Software would've made a good one. [*]Enemy animation is also great. Shoot open a window to space, and enemies will grab at the floor as they get steadily sucked out, and you can shoot them to ragdoll them and send them flying out. They also do things like try to dodge your bullets, throw grenades, it's pretty nice and very polished for such a small game. [*]I really enjoy the game's overall art direction! It's straightforward and economical, and the level deco is top notch. [/list] I really wish I liked SENTRY more than I do, I don't like ragging on a tiny team like this. But at the minute, it feels like there's some real work that needs doing before the good game in this thing's bones can actually emerge, and on Steam, £17 can get you better games, even off sale.

I'm probably bad but this game is pretty hard. Anyway tl;dr it's a wave based TD like game. set defenses, stop waves of enemies from getting to the evac point. a little like sanctum 2 in terms of gameplay, still worth checking out

Its certainly no Sanctum 2. Sentry does a lot of things well, and likely is a ton of fun in co-op - but solo, the odds are strongly stacked against you. Starting from your loadout, to the map design, you will be hard pressed as a solo player to persist through some maps. Your loadout is randomly chosen at the start of each campaign from a list of unlocked gear and deployables. You can pay some of your initial resources to unlock other items, but you can also just restart the campaign, so why is this a thing? The initial deployables are going to force a majority of the work on you, and when you regularly have to cover multiple angles of attack this means most of your fights will take place at the exit. The maps are cramped and valid placements for your towers are sporadic at best. As all fights thus devolve into a deathgrip at the exit, a single death or untimely ammo fiasco and you've lost a number of lives - if not the stage entirely. You have limited ammo, which you can recover from rare enemy drops or via stations which also have limited supply - deplete your ammo station and you'll need to go pretty far to find the next one. Early on, its not such an issue, but in later "acts" or with the right hazard it is just a game over if you get the wrong map (your ship's maps are randomly assigned as well, so pray the harder maps are placed in the right spot), deployable, or hazard combo. There also doesn't seem to be a way to learn a map without time pressure, and no enemy previews for each specific wave, or an indicator for when a particular branch is fully depleted (all enemies dead), though there's a meter showing wave progress it only indicates how many enemies have yet to spawn. It needs more time in the oven, honestly. There's a good game here but some of the balance and design decisions really put me off as a solo player.

Fun game, co-op is not required but much more fun.

I enjoy it so far. should have 4 player coup feels like that was the intention. good gunplay and the trap system feels rewarding once you experiment and learn each types role in the game.

First things, first, I have come to realize that I am a casual gamer, and not as good as I once believed I was. For me, this game is VERY hard (I played solo so far), and stressful, especially without leveled weapons. I dread certain ships and certain enemies (I hate dogs and bugs, because I can't hit the darn things, and the zombie things just laugh at my bullets and walk through the door.) I am glad they reduced the hazard-stacking, but certain hazards remain highly feared (instant action). Overall, a game that deceived me into thinking it was innocent and easy, but is now having me not wanting to leave my sentry pod, clutching my pistol to my chest. I love the simplistic style and designs. I love the weaponry, and the FPS aspects feel good and smooth. I'm still finding new weapons and enemies, which is pleasant too. I like how the maps are randomized on your ship each game, but consistent within each playthrough, and that you are given time to just walk around and enjoy the dev's work and details after a match. You are held hostage at the start to whatever defenses you can find/are given. I saw the turret once, lost the campaign, and haven't seen it since, which makes things quite hard. Note: Don't let that ship that chases you catch up with you. Call me crazy, but I have a feeling it's supposed to be some sort of punishment for lingering.

The crew update as a concept is inherently strange. Why do we need 4 individual characters, what's wrong with lives? Why do we have progression on them which effectively cuts progression down to 25% while also just doing nothing. This is overcomplicating things.

Challenging but extremely fun, music is amazing and the presentation is fantastic. The weapons are very satisfying and the environmental kills are always great. Can't wait to see what they add to the game in the future

weapon and trap are good but map design are terrible. it's design with coop in mind making some map absurdly hard in solo. without counting the amount of open area without cover in a FPS making the experience even worse for new player. some map are to short between the enemy lane to the door living no space for you to reposition. or being sandwich between enemy and dying really fast because of it. the only 2 map i count has being very well made are "crossing" and "thermal vats" but otherwise, for new player, i can't advise you to play the game at this state. (also the modifier to start the wave immediately when you spawn on the map is just completely unfair, change it to something else like 1/3 time before wave start for the entire defense for example, challenging without being unfair)