CULTIC

Really good retro shooter. Satisfying guns, spooky atmosphere. Bit on the shorter side of playtime but still worth.

Very smooth retro FPS that draws a lot of very obvious inspiration from a lot of classic games from the mid 90s to early 2000. Most obviously Blood of course. And the look and feel of the original Blood is remarkably close, here.
The levels are big. Very big. Taking exploration and at least some survival tactics into consideration most levels can take up to 40 minutes or longer on the first playthrough.
Gore and blood effects are satisfyingly squishy.

Also it is VERY worth mentioning: This game is a solo project.
An. Entire. Solo. Project. I mean ... what are you waiting for, here?
For 10 bucks this is a must buy for any retro FPS fan. Don't wait for a sale.

Really awesome.
The atmosphere, the music and the enemies are all fitting and well put together, especially with the graphics!
Strongly recommended

I think the sound effects (sometimes) and the screams of the enemies could be better but it´s still a very very good game. Especialy for Blood fans!

great finally outside !! mega graphic sound and and
-hope fps drops sometimes get better but it's really only rarely
- and please a German language patch

Absolutes gutes Spiel, vom Movement bis zu den Schießeinlagen ist alles super in Szene gesetzt und lässt sich super spielen. Headshots und Dynamit in einen Haufen Kultisten bzw. Zombies oder was auch immer zu werfen fühlt sich einfach super an. Soundtrack passt auch wunderbar zum Gameplay und passt sich auch dem aktuellen Kampfgeschehen an.

Ganz klare Kaufempfehlung, das ist ein Ein-Mann-Projekt also unterstützt so eine grandiose Arbeit!

Ein wirklich packender Shooter ! Eine liebevoll gestaltete Welt, die eine gute Atmosphäre verbreitet ! Die Waffen fühlen sich alle gut an, dazu sind die Feinde passen zur Atmosphäre sehr düster gehalten. In jedem Level gibt es Zahlreiche Verstecke zu erkunden. Dieses Spiel bietet für seinen Preis sehr gute Unterhaltung!

Ich kann es jeden ans Herz legen , der auf die guten alten Old-School Spiele, wie Doom, Quake etc. steht !
Es ist rundum ein gelungenes Spiel und bietet einige Stunden Spielspaß und Herausforderung ! :)

Für mich ist Cultic jetzt schon eine unbekannte Perle.

Ich hatte nur kurz zuvor von Cultic gehört und mir mal die Demo angeschaut.
Diese war solide und gut gemacht.

Ebenso ist das Spiel voll und ganz empfehlenswert ... für einen Spot-Preis von nur 10 Euro.
10 Level (also pro Level 1 Euro) für den Preis finde ich vollends gerechtfertigt.
Bisher habe ich erst zwei Level vollendet und habe schon 100 Minuten "Verlust".
Dabei habe ich diverse Secrets nicht gefunden bzw. auch nicht gerade lange danach gesucht.
Ansonsten kann man sicher auch länger als rund 50 Minuten Pro Level verweilen.
Also ein mehr als fairer Preis für das Spiel.

Die Grafik ist total Pixel-Retro und liebevoll gemacht ... wenn auch eigenwillig in dem Schlamm-Farben-Design ... aber gerade deswegen hat es auch wiederum ein Alleinstellungsmerkmal.
Die Steuerung ist wie in klassischen Shootern einfach gehalten und gut gemacht.
Die Musik und die Sounds finde ich ebenso gut und stimmig.
Auch die Idee mit den Waffen bzw. diese mittels Upgrade-Tischen aufzuwerten hat was individuelles.

Was mich aber stört (vielleicht altbacken aber eben meine Meinung) ist eine fehlende Map zur Orientierung ... wie in Doom oder Duke Nukem oder ähnlichen Old-School-FPS.
Finde ich schade das dies nicht den Weg ins Spiel gefunden hat.

Ansonsten ist es aber ein Spiel das denjenigen anspricht der auf klare und klassische FPS steht.
Dieser Personenkreis wird bestens bedient mit Cultic.
Daher von mir her einen klaren Daumen hoch.

I freaking love it! Perfect and fluid gameplay/music etc.
This game was made with passion and you can feel that.
A big ... towards AAA gaming... Support \m/

Cultic is a FPS, inspired clerly by shooters like BLOOD.

While the game is fun, and has a lot of solid and even good moments, after finishing this game on Normal difficulty, it still felt very easy and afraid to actually challenge me. This was due to how little the game dared to execute the old setup, anticipation and execution reward sheme (1) with players, poor enemy placement (2)and lack of lack of ressources (3) aswell as weapons/upgrade choices(4).

So let me adress these:

1. There are a few level parts, where this is done very nicely. The beginning has the introduction of a chainsaw wielding butcher, that leads you into a dark cave, hanging corpses, music fitting to this, and you find a key at the end of the cave, that upon pick up triggers the butcher to smash through the walls. This was very effective, since it trusted into my sense as a player to feel scared and anticipate, that there was a dangerous and bad thing coming my way. Once pulling up the key, the corpses, fell to the ground, walking around while the butcher made his entrance. This was very chaotic and hectic, and as the music suddenly spiked, a great payoff moment. The game does this once of twice, but as the episode goes on, either shys away from this, or repeats the same thing, which will not be as scary anymore with other enemys. The game seems afraid to actually scare me here, and needs to allow itself to be more creative with monster closets and creatures appearing, which leads to:

2. Monster placement sometimes is very poor, combined with the sometimes lackluster aggression/path finding leads to me picking off creatures from afar with a pistol/lever action rifle/fg42. I often can see vast sways of a map part and have no problem killing enemys from far off. The FG42 is given late in the game, still ramps this up so much more if you are a decent shot. It also never aswell happens that monsters appear behind you or spawn after certain triggers in a map. A nice thing would be to pick up an iteam, after battling through the location it was hidden in, and clearing the monsters and not picking them off, one by one from afar, since a zombie giant I can snipe with a flamethrower from across half a map is not dangerous nor scary. After picking up the item and executing the attack of big enemy (chainsaw butcher, big zombie, flamethrower cultists etc.) it would also be nice to find new enemys on the way back. Doesnt matter where they come from, the player will find an excuse and it would be nice to not feel safe while zooming through empty levels. Also, the game seems to be scared to spawn enemys behind you for some reason, which is a way to really keep a player on the edge, if they fear that the hallways might send some nasty presents their way, after going through. Some enemys like the living armorsuits are also woefully predictable, and not very fun or distinct to fight. It would have helped to make the player pass a few normal suits of armor and then have them find a room with a mix of them, to come alive not all at the same time let them be rather slow and though, not like a zombie with a bit of extra hp. Late game, the cultist seem to have a buff that also spawns a red orb above their head. This makes it so easy to spot most of the cultists across a map or even behind walls/obstruction and pick them off with dynamite. One of the greatest things in blood was the reward you feld, when you tossed a bundle of dynamite around a corner and heard the gleeful and mad cackle of Caleb while some gibs of creatures you had blown out of the anbush waiting for you around the corner, flew past your field of view. Cultic seems to be afraid of this, and very often doesnt have these moments due to not respawning enemys and it would benefit the game if the cultist would act to be more clever even if it was scripted by preparing ambushes for the player.

3. The lack of a lack of ressources
When finishing the game, the only thing I was missing was the upgrade parts, I usually never had a problem being above 50% health, as the game has a great way of many enemys just dropping simple health pick ups, that can be used directly or stored at half the amount for later use in your first aid kit. This system is very nice and good addition. Ammo was rarely in short supply, and if, rather forced you to fight in a less conftable way, than to actually thing about carefully aiming. I used the shotgun and sten only for the fact that I was full on ammo for them for example. Secrets where often also rather easy to find, and seemed like to not want to challenge me at all. I hate to do this comparison, but in Blood you often found yourself dangerously low on supplies and every won battle without expanding to much hp or ammo was a small victory in itself, but also, by having challenging to find/reach secrets, that didnt involve trial and error, rather you observing how to reach spots you felt great when finding a pickup of ammo, armor or hp that would give you an edge for the next fight. Cultic seems to do this in a good way at the start, but otherwise could use some help here. If a player find himeself never struggling to muster enough supplies for the next fight, there will never be a build up of tension going into the fight.

4. Weapons/Upgrades
In my opinion the FG42 should replace the Sten, since with getting the Sten, the pistol basically becomes useless, and all the upgrades into it, wasted. Also the fact that some of the later weapons have cheaper upgrades than the early ones, made this very apperant. Rather the pistol should be able to become a 20 shot machine pistol with full auto and a stock for extra stability and the FG should be a mid range AR with the option to mount a scope and a 30rd magazine, instead of having a semi auto 10rd rifle. For sniping there could be a bolt action rilfe. Also mad props for including the FG42, it is a real cool weapon and was very fun to use. I would incline the game to more often have me fight with enemys that dont drop their weapons, cultists that have stens way earlier and the same for flamers. The double barrel shotgun is nice, but very lackluster with the upgrades. The reload speed needs to be higher and the a bit spread smaller. A pump action shotgun would benefit this game very well, as the chinalake is already a very cool weapon that shows how good the devs can animate a punp action weapon.

What is great about Cultic: The colour palett maanges to keep the game vibrant yet drab, the levels often oozze a lot of atmosphere and the music is also very nice. I would have wished for more occoult enemys and teasing, aswell as more enemy variety. Still for 10€ Cultic is a great game and a lot of fun to play.

Very enjoyable game, if you like the so called "boomer shooters" (i don´t like that name, i prefer classic shooter or whatever) it´s a must have/play.

The choice of weapons is pretty well thought out, some of the weapons just get a bit too low amount of ammo spawned (rifle and fg42 for example). The idea of adding upgrade options to the weapons is also pretty nice and makes none of them really useless even if you progress into later levels. Enemies counter act and react if you shoot them as expected, the different versions seem to fit the overall style pretty well and give diversion on how you attack/choose your weapons.

The levels is something where i am a bit split. On the first look they seem pretty well designed and thought through but on the second look a lot of the areas are way too big and end up heavy sniping related (shooting blocks over relative big distances - you kill "block" 1, another "block" starts shooting at you, you shoot the "block" back and so on). Less big areas and more corridors (like the asylum itself for example, that one was great, just a bit short) would definatly feel and play better.

Overall the positives weight out the negatives but there is still room for improvement.

My only hope for episode 2 is that we don´t end up in some weird textured type of hell or parallel dimension, please let the game stay in the normal world.