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Chaos Node Review

Chaos Node is a mixture of gameplay styles, there is a bit of shooter with twin stick firing, puzzle elements come into play and even a bit a survival style gameplay.

You control a Chaos Node which remains at the centre of the screen. Every number of seconds your node will pulse, indicating the next wave in the survival aspect of the game, and change colour. You must shoot as many of the particles on the screen which match your node’s colour before it changes in the following pulse. When you successfully hit a particle it will suck in any nearby particles of the same colour and starts a chain which adds to your score.

There are four colours of particles to attack or defend against; Red, Green, Blue and Pink. The particles use a physics based system so they bounce off other particles and non matching shots from your node. Your node has a number of lives, called hits, which are reduced when a matching particle hits your node. You have a shield which is controlled with the left stick and can be rotated 360° to deflect any incoming particles. If the particles start to get too fast for your liking you also have a Static Field which is charged up by shot particles and can be deployed to temporarily stop them.

A number of special effects are available to pick up by shooting them, including bombs which pull particles away from you, multiple shots to fire more than once at a time and field resets which restore some order to the particles. There is a good variety of power ups but they can be hard to shoot as there are often many particles in the way.

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There is just the one mode available to play which can be played with up to three other friends in co-op. The game is basically infinite in length, the pulse will get more difficult as you progress and it can be very challenging to keep the particles away from your node. The gameplay does keep you on your toes thanks to the short time between pulses. You always feel like there is something to do unlike other survival games where you can be left waiting for the next wave or trying to kill a single remaining enemy. I would have liked to have seen an extra game mode to give a little variety. For example a Time Attack mode which you have to score as high as possible within a time limit.

Presentation is done fairly well, the menus are a little basic but work fine. The tutorial (which I recommend playing) is done well, but the help windows can get in the way of the game at times, it is only a minor annoyance though. Graphically the game is average, the sprites look a little amateurish or out of place compared to the effects used in the game. Music is done well with a techno style track, again I am not quite sure if it really suits the game but it none the less sounds good. Sound effects are present but they can be a little tricky to hear over the music, as a result it does not much provide feedback on the game such as when you hit a particle which I think would have really helped give the game more style.

Chaos Node costs 80 :MSPoints: which is fairly good value for money compared to others in this price range. Although the game is infinite in length, it is more suited for 30 to 60 minute blasts every now and again. Having a different mode or two would have helped with the replayability and lifespan of the game. Chaos Node is an interesting mix of game styles, it is not quite perfect but is worth checking out the trial at least.

More information on Chaos Node can be found on the Marketplace here.

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