Risk of Rain was a game that was recommended to me ages ago, and as someone who prefers physical games, I was happy to see that it came as a two-pack game for Switch along with its sequel. It turns out that only the sequel is on the game card and the first game is downloadable, but I guess that's better than both of them being digital.
Anyway, the person who recommended the game to me told me it was a roguelike, which I'm not really into, but he also told me that the game's sequel translates everything from the original game's 2D world into a 3D one, which I found intriguing. Since that conversation I've gone on to play a number of roguelikes, such as The Binding of Isaac, and although it's still not my favorite genre I can still enjoy them overall.
Risk of Rain turns out to be basically a run and gun game with mild platforming elements. The first you can't help but avoiding is how tiny all the sprites are. This is only initially off-putting, since even a few minutes in it becomes clear why the camera is so zoomed out: because once the enemies start to pile in and the bullets start to fly, the screen gets insanely full and bigger sprites would have just killed the frame rate. The game's levels don't feel completely random as I think sections must get stitched together, but chests and shops are probably randomly placed and a good item could completely make your run. I also enjoyed the unique game mechanic where the difficulty increases as time passes.
The first character you get is a typical gunner, and although it took a little time, I was able to see the credits with him with a little luck and without too much pain. There aren't a ton of unique enemies, but there's a good variety in the ones that are there. Similarly, there aren't a huge number of locales, but the awesome music help make them feel distinct. I enjoyed dipping in and trying the other characters I had unlocked, but although their mechanics varied, in general the strategy of distancing yourself from your enemies while mowing them down remained essentially the same. It may very well be that when I come back to this game and get a chance to experiment with the other characters that the game may rise on my master list of games I've played. I'm especially looking forward to getting to revisit the local co-op mode, which I've tried a bit of, and I can already see how some characters will have more viability as a partner than when going it alone.
I found Risk of Rain to be a solid title, and I was really looking forward to seeing how its mechanics would translate to its sequel. More on that soon...