Mystic Gate Review

Mystic Gate, developed by Zoo Corporation, is a bullet hell roguelite exploration game that will test your reflexes. You will explore procedurally generated dungeons that are full of enemy hordes and will keep you guessing for each run. Just because you knew where the boss's lair was located last time doesn't mean anything the next time you play! Will this roguelite bullet hell game be fun and addicting, or will it end up being frustrating and repetitive?

Once you select how much of a challenge you want, the story opens with a mysterious gate appearing on Earth. This gate leads to a dungeon full of deadly enemies, and it is said that if you are willing to test yourself and successfully complete the challenges that await within, you will be rewarded with a granted wish of your choice. However, this will be no easy task: the village is marked with red pillars and gravestones of those who tried to conquer the dungeon but died or went missing from their attempt. 

You take on the role of a wanderer and his robot companion. They decide to test themselves and challenge the tests in the dungeon. A mysterious hooded figure warns you of the dangers that you are facing. They also know a lot of information about your character, like how you are a twin who wished for eternal life 200 years ago. But, because of that wish, there was a price to pay, causing your sibling to suffer a cruel fate. This means that once your character "dies", he's not actually dead but will come back to life and will have to rechallenge the dungeon over and over again.

To complete each of the challenges, you will have to explore the dungeon and find three keys; these are needed to open the door to face the boss. You won't always be facing the same boss, in the first challenge, there were four different bosses that I had to face. Once, I was able to defeat consistently, but the others were incredibly challenging, so when I walked into that room, and they showed up, I was fairly certain I was screwed. However, a lot of this will be determined by the weapon you are equipped with.

Mystic Gate has a huge selection of weapons that you can acquire. There are 77 different ones that you can find and equip yourself with. When you start, you are equipped with a random weapon like an old revolver or sometimes something totally different like a sword. The blade is strong, but I always find it harder to use since you have to be so close to the enemy to hit them that you put yourself in danger of being hit by their projectiles. As you explore the rooms of the dungeon, you will find large boxes that look like coffins. Inside is usually a new weapon that you can equip yourself with. If you have a firearm that you already like (such as a rocket launcher), chances are you don't want to switch to a sword. You don't have to; just make sure you don't walk over the weapon that is lying there.

When you walk into a room, if there are enemies to fight, the door will slam shut behind you until you defeat every single one of them. Before they appear in a room, a red circle will show to let you know where they will spawn so you can get ready to attack or just get out of the way to avoid being hit. Your little robot buddy will help you fight these foes, and I'm pretty sure they are indestructible, as they were never destroyed on any of my runs. There are a lot of places you can hide and take cover, as there are a lot of walls you can sneak behind to avoid the endless onslaught of bullets coming towards you. But beware of water and other pits because if you fall in, you will take damage!

Be sure to smash all the pots and vases that you come across. Sometimes, they are empty, but other times, they may be holding gold or other useful items like potions. The dungeon always has a store that will appear, but make sure that you break the huge number of pots first before buying anything as they may give you extra money to spend or health so that you don't need to waste money buying any. On each run, the store will have three different weapons that you can purchase. If you are a bit short on cash, go explore some other rooms and defeat some enemies to get some extra funds to buy the cool guns that you want. However, keep an eye out on the rounds the guns can fire per minute, as some of the bigger guns fire slower, which may leave you exposed at times. 

When you die in the dungeon — trust me, this will happen a lot — you are presented with your stats that tell you how much gold you have collected, how long your run was, the amount of enemies you killed, and your cause of death. It's pretty embarrassing to see that you died because you fell into a hole! From here you can either try again or head back to your base camp. There are multiple services here run by the local villagers that you should take advantage of. One lady will pay you for information that you found while exploring the dungeon, so every time you go back to camp, be sure to visit as she will give you gems. You can also visit the Adventurer's Association where you can view the different rewards that you have completed on your run — like completing the tutorial or defeating enemies with certain weapons — that you will earn gems for. These gems can be spent with the Skill Instructor, where you can learn new skills that you will keep and not lose when you die. There's a large variety of skills you can acquire, each costing a different amount of gems, so in the beginning, chances are you will learn things like improving your weapon accuracy by 20% or Narrow Escape where you have a 20% chance of avoiding enemy attacks when your health is down to one heart. These are sure to make your future runs a bit easier!

Mystic Gate has a great retro pixel look to it. The dungeon's look changes every time you get to a new challenge. Along with that, the music will also change from the song that you were previously hearing. Chances are you may get a little tired of the music from the First Trial in the Ancient Ruins as you will start from the very beginning a lot. Though it is super catchy and has a spy/espionage feel with lots of bass. Not that you are doing a lot of sneaking around, but it was cool because you don't usually hear music like that. 

Control-wise Mystic Gate is quite simple, I was playing on the Xbox, so I was using a controller. To perform an action (like shooting, throwing a grenade, or swinging a sword), you use the RB button. All of your guns have infinite ammo, so you can shoot as much as you want and never have to worry about finding more bullets for your firearm. To dash, you will use the left bumper, helping you avoid all the enemies coming at you and the storm of bullets. You do have a short invincibility time when you dash that will allow you to completely avoid attacks and can be used to jump over holes that are in your way. To see a map of the areas of the dungeon that you have discovered on this run so far, just go into the pause menu. This map is extremely helpful when you are trying to find the door to the boss that you couldn't access before since you didn't find the three keys. 

I died a lot! Most of the time, it was because I got careless and got hit by stray bullets or enemies sneaking up on me, or when I was facing a boss who had filled the screen with a barrage of bullets. For the first Trial, I was able to find the keys and get to the boss within nine minutes. The random boss that showed up usually determined if I would survive and move on to the next area or if I would be obliterated. If it was the Mirage Dragon, I knew that if I was careful, I had a good chance of being victorious. But if it was one of the other three, it all depended on the weapon I had. At least it wouldn't take too long to get back to the boss room if I did die; it gave me a chance to go back to camp and learn some new skills if I acquired enough gems. I really appreciated that the skills that I learned while in the camp stayed and weren't lost when I died! Mystic Gate does have the option to play local co-op, with the other player taking on the role of the robot. I haven't had a chance to check this out with anyone yet, but I am curious to see how I would play with some human help.

Even though I died a lot, I never got so frustrated that I didn't want to play anymore. It was quite addictive, and I kept coming back for more, plus I wanted to learn more about the lead character's backstory. If you are a fan of bullet hell roguelite titles that will challenge your reflexes, Mystic Gate is a title you may want to check out. Plus, who doesn't love having a chance of getting one of the cool weapons, like a grenade launcher, from a huge selection of firearms!