Imagine waking up in the morning and finding out there’s a brand new FPS from the creators of trippy skull-obsessed shooter Devil Daggers. Well, that’s exactly what’s happened for some of us today. Hyper Demon seems to be all about the disembodied, infernal craniums too, but don’t call it a sequel. Brace yourself as you watch the nightmarish trailer below. It’s a wild one.
Devs Sorath say Hyper Demon’s about aiming to reach the end as quickly as possible. That’s different from Devil Daggers, which you had to survive in for as long as you could. However, slaying baddies in Hyper Demon makes them spawn faster, which naturally ups the difficult somewhat. You’re free to blow them away more slowly, of course, but that won’t net you many points now, will it? Wonderfully, there’s a par scoring system telling you how many monsters you should be slaying, so I fully intend to don my Pringle jumper while dodging ethereal tentacles.
Sorath say they wanted it to look like a “dream from the future” now that we’re living in an age of retro-style shooters. I think the game’s spherical projection resembles a 90s hip-hop music video stripped of Sean Combs and Missy Elliott, instead populated with ululating malevolence from beyond space, time and our ken. I’m here for it. Don’t think I’ll survive all the demons for too long, like, but I’m here for it. It has a super-move called “laser storm” so how could I not be?
Sorath’s previous game, Devil Daggers, has been a long-time favourite in the RPS Treehouse. When Adam (RPS in peace) reviewed the game back in 2016, he said: “In case it isn’t clear, I’ll come right out and say that Devil Daggers is a brilliant game. It’s small but perfectly formed, tough but rewarding, and it reminds me of my favourite elements of nineties first-person shooters without mimicking their structure. It’s like the final battle, when every boss you faced through the game’s running time appears in the same room and raises hell.”
Hyper Demon is out now, and it’s on Steam for £11/$15/€13. I’m fully expecting it to haunt whatever sleep I can get after seeing that trailer. Alice0 will also be writing up some impressions very soon, so watch out for those too.
