Absolum Review: Absolutely everything to please
, by Enzo
In a gaming landscape where indie titles compete with boldness to stand out, Absolum emerges as an intriguing offering. The game makes its ambitions clear: to offer a journey that’s at once beautiful, dynamic, and vibrant. Studio Dotemu continues its mission to revitalize challenging genres, having brilliantly reimagined beat ’em ups and arcade games in recent years.
This time, it’s tackling the roguelite genre: one that’s already overrun with all kinds of proposals, yet still fertile ground for those who can bring a strong identity to it. And let’s say it right off the bat: Absolum doesn’t just follow the trend; it seeks to impose its own vision, blending fast-paced action, methodical progression, and a dark world. But behind this alluring facade, does the experience truly live up to its promises?
Hypnotic Art Direction
The first thing that strikes you about Absolum is its unique and striking visual identity. From the very first moments, you find yourself immersed in an extraordinary world that you’re already eager to explore from end to end. The game features a hand-drawn graphic style with thick outlines, reminiscent of certain modern indie game standards while retaining its own distinct personality. The environments range from dark fantasy to mystical ruins, with a deliberately high-contrast color palette. Each area seems to be designed as a living tableau.
The biomes each have their own distinct atmosphere: corrupted forests, ruined citadels, organic caverns… The whole experience is enhanced by meticulous work on lighting effects and particles. Added to this is a particularly well-crafted soundtrack, paired with impactful sound design that perfectly complements the exploration. Even a simple action like striking an enemy feels almost satisfying thanks to all the sounds that accompany it.
The game also stands out for its high level of accessibility, with a wide range of customizable settings. For example, you can display outlines around players for better visibility during combat, desaturate the environment to make your character stand out, or even adjust the difficulty level for each day of the game.
Very good and enjoyable gameplay, albeit streamlined
In terms of gameplay, Absolum focuses on simplicity, perhaps a bit too much. The player moves freely through side-scrolling levels with a certain degree of depth, interacts with certain elements, and triggers events that change the environment. The game features a gameplay loop typical of roguelites: exploration, combat, death, upgrading, and starting over. But where the game really stands out is in the fast-paced nature of its battles. The combat is fast-paced, generally easy to follow, and requires a certain level of skill.
Players have a varied arsenal at their disposal: basic attacks, special abilities, dodges, and temporary powers picked up during the run. Each run thus becomes a unique combination of abilities, encouraging players to experiment with different strategies. The feel of the attacks is particularly well-executed, with satisfying impacts.
The difficulty remains relatively manageable, despite a few tough encounters. Every mistake is punished, but it’s also understandable. Contrary to expectations, two-player co-op makes the game harder than playing solo. You gradually learn enemy patterns, timing, and the synergies between skills. This progression in the player’s skill is one of the game’s main driving forces.
Progression, Content, and Replayability
At its core, Absolum doesn’t revolutionize the roguelite formula: between each attempt, the player can permanently improve their character by increasing stats, unlocking new skills, and gaining access to passive bonuses. This system prevents the frustration of repeated failures by providing a constant sense of progress. Even after a defeat, something has been gained. The game thus manages to maintain player engagement over the long term.
We also appreciate the variety of builds and upgrades available, although it’s quite difficult to fully specialize in a single combat style. This diversity encourages replayability and allows each player to adopt a style that suits them. The cooperative aspect is also well-executed through a “world fusion” system that allows two players to always base their progress on the lower story progression of the two, while retaining their respective character progress.
In terms of progression, the game features room-by-room advancement, branching paths, random events, and area-end bosses. It’s a tried-and-true structure, but one that’s executed with precision here. The levels are well-paced, alternating between intense combat phases and calmer moments. Special events add a bit of variety, though some may feel repetitive after several hours. Certain bosses, meanwhile, can present real spikes in difficulty.
Areas for improvement
While Absolum truly stands out thanks to its strengths, the game isn’t perfect by any means. From a technical standpoint, we’re disappointed by unexplained slowdowns, character animations running at very low frame rates, somewhat limited visibility during intense combat, and resolution that isn’t always optimal in certain areas, particularly the map.
As for gameplay, a certain repetitiveness sets in fairly quickly during the first half of runs: builds aren’t very varied at this stage yet, and despite random events, this is a fairly long phase of the game that’s very often similar from one playthrough to the next. During this phase, you generally just end up spamming the standard attack button, as that’s enough to get through most fights. There’s a noticeable lack of combos or chain attacks.
In terms of balance, it must be said that some bosses present a major hurdle, while others can be killed relatively easily with a single hit and a bit of luck. Some mobs also have a surprisingly long range—especially in the area around them—which is quite difficult to anticipate due to the unusual depth of the environments. Otherwise, not all of each character’s arcane abilities are equal: some seem far more powerful than others.
Tested on PC. See our rating policy here.
9/10
With Absolum, Dotemu delivers a solid roguelite, driven by captivating art direction and challenging gameplay. While it lacks a bit of boldness and depth to be one of the best of the genre, it’s still a compelling and addictive experience. If you crave some action and challenges, you can't go wrong with this!
- + Unique and striking art style
- + Highly satisfying gameplay
- + Great sound design
- + Interesting content and replay value
- - Some animations have low FPS
- - There is the occasional slowdown
- - Certain bosses in the game are too big a difficulty spike