"It's brilliantly effective, but it succeeds by adding complexity"

A new genre works its way back to an old one in HALLS OF TORMENT

- ROBIN VALENTINE

One of the most surprising success stories of the last few years in PC gaming has been the rise of both Vampire Survivors and its genre of copycats. So nascent we don’t even have a proper name for it yet – survivors-likes? Bullet heaven? Auto-shooters?

Whatever you call them, they’re a phenomenon. Because they don’t call for complex animation or level design, thrive on repetition, and can be built out of very simple assets or even ones already created for another project, they’re relatively quick and easy to make. That’s led to an explosion of different games, each rapidly evolving the genre. The funny thing is, some of the best and boldest examples of that iteration are really just working backwards.

Halls of Torment is my latest obsession. It combines the core formula of