Quasimorph Reviews

Hmm, Quasimorph. I can say this game seems polarizing: people either seem to [b]really[/b] like it, or bounce off it pretty quick. I think a good bit of the difficulty comes from a few aspects: 1) there's very little space in your backpack, after carrying ammo and food and health items, to bring home your spoils of war, and 2) there is very much a [i]better[/i] way and a [i]worse[/i] way to engage in combat. Learning to deal with both of those issues significantly levels out the difficulty to a more normal-ish plane, methinks. It's still Early Access in Q1 of 2025, but there have been a lot of major updates/patches to bring content in the year since I bought this title. It feels pretty feature-complete to me at this point. I've held off putting in a lot of hours previously becuase I wanted to wait for most of the content to get fleshed out, which it now is. I enjoy the game, I feel like the game wasn't too brutal once I came to grips with the aforementioned two aspects, I think the game is fairly priced for the content you get, and it's always been rock solid for me ... I don't think I ever encountered any noticeable bugs or crashes. So yeah, I'd recommend it if your jam is roguelike, turn-based sci-fi horror extraction shooters.

When in-mission, Quasimorph gameplay is a wondrous mix of Pixel Dungeon and Doom, with musical scores evolving with mission intensity and every engagement feeling like a calculated gamble. My favorite part of the game, though, is the anarcho-capitalist near-future sci-fi setting using our home solar system as it's playground. You will be fighting the bloodthirsty demons (quasimorphs) and greedy vampires (corpo scum) of Quasimorph on terraformed planets, moon, and even man-made objects that are creatively developed with foundations in our real-world history. The setting deserves it's own tabletop game tbh. Every update so far is a banger!

Super fun tactical extraction shooter. Game became way more approachable with recent patches so difficulty shouldn't be an issue for most people. The only things i'd like to see improved is: 1. The stock market could use a bit more transparency in how my actions affects it... UI should help to see the numbers go down, new tech levels reached etc. 2. Travel times between planets feel way too long. Makes planning your next mission kinda bad unless it is on a satellite of the current planet.

Great game if you love turn-based roguelikes. The movement system and how bartering works take time to get used to, and your first few deaths will most likely be frustrating and makes you want to quit as you can easily get yourself stuck in an equipment doom spiral. Power through it for a few hours and the game should click with you, at least it did for me.

The ONLY reason this is negative is the abysmal trading system. You don't get to sell stuff for credits and buy what you want when you want. It's like an awful system of sell for this exact amount or you get other items that'll fill in the total value of what you've sold. The games good if you like these rogue like type of games. Yea it'll bullshit you sometimes, but that's what rogue likes do. But with as huge an issue as the trading is, I felt it necessary to put the red thumb because the buying/selling really is just that awful. And having to memorize what they'll buy on your way down planet side is fucking awful. Why didn't they make the trading based on reputation where they'll buy at certain rates and sell certain items because of your reputation with them and adjust the prices of bought and sold items based on said reputation. The whole thing of sell these specific items for these other specific items at very specific values or else you get random stuff is absolute balls.

Alright, originally I wrote a bad review for the game, however, that was not really... correct. There are a lot of things this game does right. And a few it does... not so right. Not that the mechanics themselves arent good, its just in a way they interact with each other that is not good. First this is an extraction game. On one hand, this is good. A well made extraction shooter can be really good. However, this game has a few issues that make the unforgiving extraction shooter element not fun. Examples are: Enemies behind doors that shoot you the moment you open it, painshock you and then shoot you again and then you die. Or when the VIP in escort missions cannot be healed (you physically cannot heal him and he wont heal himself either) and dies you die with him. While the logical outcome would be that your character could just head out again because why not. Or when you accidentally start the mission with the wrong faction and you dont want to complete it because it would hurt you in the long run and you can only cancel the mission by finding a valuable item (which isnt guaranteed) or resetting which means you die. These are all things you can partially avoid or reduce the risk of but its not something I think belongs into the game right now. I am sure these will be ironed out eventually. But fortunately for now, you can make a custom difficulty and just turn it off. Which is good because if you just want a fun casual playthrough, you can have that, if you want a masochistic playthrough you can hav that too. Next the crafting. Technically good, effectively not so much. The Demo actually had a very good system in place: You can craft anything as often as you want, but you need to find a production chip for it. Aka, you need to win RNG to find the chip, then need RNG to get what you want upon chip activation but if you do, its nice. Good system. In the release its the same system but now you also need time to craft it (not an issue, makes the system better actually) but you also need copious amounts of resources. Which wouldnt be an issue if your inventory size wouldnt be comically small. You typically need some things to start a mission (ammo, weapons and meds) which eat a few slots. Then you find some nice goodies which do not stack typically and/or are insanely huge (take 2 item slots or so) and you NEED these to upgrade your ship, unlock new mercs, classes, items, that stuff. But you typically cant take crafting materials AND valuables out of a mission because your inventory is too small. Not good, cannot be turned off either. Can be mitigated through turning off drop on death because now you only need to go through the hassle of crafting something once instead of crafting it several times and then stockpiling it. Can also further be mitigated by turning on repair on return which just means you dont need to worry about repair kits or repairing your tools that much. Honourable mentions also go to the bartering system (Basically your PMC does illegal stuff and because of that they cant trade with corporations, which makes no sense because first: The world is anarcho capitalist. PMCs are openly hired to do stuff so everyone knows that corporations pay people to do illegal stuff. Also ever heard of cash? Nearly untracable but im diverging) so you need to barter items (the stuff we painstakingly grabbed during missions with our very small inventory) to semi-gambling to hope that they give us the stuff we want. Not how bartering works but alright. Its not entirely random but a lot of it is random. Could be done better but will probably not impact anyone that much because of the exchange rates. Your stuff is nearly worthless and everything has pretty big fees (50% additional cost is normal on game start) so bartering is really just your last ditch effort if you REALLY need something and want to trade bad RNG to semi-bad RNG. And lastly the combat system. Mostly good. But then you get to absolute comedy moments like your chainsaw missing a target four times in a row and then you die because of that. Very infuriating when it happens with extraction mode on, annoying inconvienience without. With all that said: Its still a fun game. Slightly repetitive but it has a good concept and we have options. If you want pain, gambling and masochism: It has that. If you want gambling and fun: It has that too. Good choice for giving us the option to customize how fun the game should be. Some people enjoy the game as it is, others like me enjoy it less frustrating. Good job devs, much apprechiated, something more games should do that Also getting a big handcannon and 9mm explosive ammo from a contract turns the game to instant easy mode becausee 9mm exp is cracked. Very nice. You can make... most of the stuff you get work. Very nice

I've been playing this game for quite a while, since I'm a fan of pixel and rpg and hardcore. Recently, I've found a mission I couldn't go through after countles tries and I think it is bugged or something. It's called "Ghoul ship" or something like that. First of all, I've prepared for hours for this mission - got the necessary upgrades and went through hell to get everything I need. I've packed tons of ammo, weapon, turrets, etc. After the refuiling was done, the "bug" started. By bug, I mean repetivity: I kill 30-40 men, the boss spawns, I kill the boss, more men spawns, most of them dies from natural reasons, more quasimorphs spawn, and boss again. Due to dodging I was able to run around, gathering ammo and weapons from corpses after everything I've brought ended. I killed "The boss" 4 or 5 times and went through this process 4 of 5 times at which point my most veteran clone died. The objective of the mission was clear at the beginning "Fuel the ship and GTFO", but after the ship was fueled I was told to have fun and I didn't. Can someone explain, whether it is a bug or did I miss something?

A really great game that isn't for everyone. Quasimorph is simultaneously addictive and very abusive. You will feel the highest highs looting your first buffalo and evacuating the mission with a backpack full of goods... Only to be brought crashing down when you start the next mission, open a door, and eat a face full of lasers, dying instantly. You curse, alt+f4 the game... and then open it again 30 seconds later. It rewards careful planning and the occasional risky gamble and can eat up hours of your time just playing mission after mission. The universe and aesthetic is really neat and well implemented. If you enjoy games which reward finding and exploiting a steady gameplay loop, or if you just enjoy being a cannibalistic loot goblin, Quasimorph provides hours of enjoyment. But... There's a high probability this game isn't for you. If you don't enjoy: -Very punishing games which can kill you before you realize what happened -Having to constantly monitor several different resources and understand how to properly use them (food, health, ammo, etc) -Having to regularly lose and restart hours of progress, from either wiping or updates (every time the game is updated you generally need to delete your old save and start a new one. It's super annoying) -Playing a very steady gameplay loop (in the late game, you will tend to play most missions the same way once you understand how resistances and combat works, meaning that there isn't a lot of variety besides the big faction missions) Then the game isn't for you. You won't enjoy it, it'll seem overly difficult and grindy. However, if any part of it appeals to you, I reccomend giving it a try. The game is frequently updated and the devs seem to listen, hopefully one day it'll receive a proper full release!

Honestly, every update they make seems to just make this game more painful to play. As though they're designing it for the top 1% of players, balancing for some kind of insane hyper-competitive style. This is a single player game. It doesn't need to be insanely lethal to the point the only way to play is to go hyper-meta. It doesn't need to have every single move 100% perfectly planned out in advance, to the point where a single level, let alone a single mission, takes a full two hours. Meds no longer work, and so nothing you bring into mission really matters. You're practically speaking better off running naked with nothing but the emergency kit you get whenever a character dies, because at least then you lose nothing of value. You're going to get shot and take constant wounds that are just impossible to heal any more. Your limted inventory space means, even if you did have the meds necessary somehow to cover the myriad of wounds you get, you wouldn't be able to loot a single object in the game where that's the entire point. And this is something that isn't even new. This was an issue before. It was managable because at least you could use bandages and healing items to recover 'health' while primarily using cloth for the chance to bandage a bleed or a fracture. Now? That chance has been massively nerfed, and you're just as likely to get an infection. And, hey, that wouldn't be an issue... If every mission didn't have massive swarms of enemies, that outnumber you any time you step into a room. Enemies, thanks to the constant death, who inevitably have better equipment than you, and for that matter if you play at all further into the late game, better training than you. Which means, more wounds, which means, more burning through your meds, which means, you guessed it, more deaths. The devs seem hellbent on making this game as miserable to play as possible. Used to be really fun. Old versions were pretty reasonable, with a good balance across the board between what you, the player, could dish out, and what you could recover from. Can't recommend it any more. As unfortunately common with Early Access games, the issue isn't so much unfulfilled promises, as the devs inevitably making a good game terrible.

So yeah, we're having this conversation again. Is difficulty good? Because of the nature of videogame discussion, we can't just let people decide for themselves. We enter the discussion with loaded opinions and sweeping statements, and any attempt to have a discussion strands. One side will argue that the game was perfect because it was hard, even though there's a good chance they didn't find it all that hard. The other side will say that they found the game too hard and it sucked. Not to be biased or anything, but I think that second group is correct and the first is in the wrong. If a product doesn't meet your expectations as a consumer, if you didn't have fun, complaining is the right thing to do! So let's talk about Quasimorph. I'd summarize the game like this: do you want to carry food? Or do you want to carry an extra clip of ammo, so you can shoot more people and eat their dismembered limbs instead? Quasimorph is one of those games known primarily for being difficult, Nintendo Hard. But the difficulty quickly becomes manageable with proper planning and understanding of the mechanics. I seriously question whether the people applauding the game for being hard really had a hard time, or whether they're applauding the game for giving them a sense of accomplishment. That's not the same thing. The game is also a roguelike. Like Rogue, it's a turn based dungeon diving game where any item you find has the potential to save your life and win your mission, and anything you carried with you when you died is lost forever. Quasimorph is a game that rewards calculated gambling, whereas small oversights or bad rolls will potentially catch players in an death spiral. There's a dozen or more status effects, most of them will kill you if left untreated, and there's usually no treatment available for anything more exotic than a fracture or a laceration. Is that fun? Well, you have to learn which risks are associated with which enemies, environments and weapons. Mars is different from Earth is different from Venus, etc. Plan accordingly. The missions are also marathons, with multiple floors, seemingly endless hordes of enemies and enough supplies to maybe deal with half of that. The other half you have to scavenge. It makes a big difference whether you're going to be in a mission for 300 turns or 1000 turns, or even 2000 turns, and the game gives little indication which one to prepare for. Sometimes you just get lucky with an elevator spawn. I'm ambivalent on this. On one hand I think calculated gambling requires the player have information to calculate. On the other hand, I've had several long missions where I escaped with barely 10 turns left to live. Running out of supplies isn't fun, but expending all you have left to clutch the win is fun. One mission, I was able to climb into the elevator with a fatal wound. The mission after that, after securing the objective, I had to sprint away from an unstoppable death tide of enemies, desperately blasting my shotgun in all directions as I fled. These were the most memorable moments of the game for me. While the game can often boil down to a diceroll, I think the gameplay, graphics, sound design and UI do an admirable job creating an atmosphere to contextualize that diceroll and make it interesting. With that in mind, I give Quasimorph a cautious recommendation.