Project Downfall Review – A Night Of Blood & Pixels (Switch)

After playing numerous shooters over the years, one that’s always stayed rent-free in my mind is Hotline Miami. The top-down high-octane shooter provided hours of brutal entertainment with its visuals and epic soundtrack. One thought I had back then was, what if Hotline Miami had a first-person perspective, would it be as good? Well now it’s 2024 and I’ve finally got my answer, Project Downfall.

Developed by MGP Studio, Project Downfall is a first-person shooter set in a dystopian cyberpunk-esque city full of people who want to kill you. Players take on the role of a protagonist who resembles John Wick, navigating intense gunfights that demand quick reflexes and strategic prowess. Project Downfall’s style of gameplay is entertaining alongside damage effects though some gameplay mechanics, lighting issues and a lackluster narrative, do hold it back from being the ultimate thrill ride of adrenaline action. 

Project Downfall is available for Nintendo Switch, PC (Early Access), Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.

Story – Not As Focused As Your Aim

Project Downfall‘s narrative is said by the developers to be mainly inspired by movies Falling Down (starring Michael Douglas), Hardcore Henry, and of course John Wick. The game stars a character that resembles John Wick, though depending on how much damage you take, he won’t look like him for long. Play as the unnamed protagonist who has descended into madness due to his daily corporate routine and self-medication. By day a respectable citizen, living well off with his girlfriend Olga. An ambitious employee at a government-sanctioned corporation. However, by night he becomes a crimson dealer of justice, taking on criminals of every level in society. 

Explore the first mega city of Europe: Crimson Tide where everything seems to be against you

The plot for Project Downfall chooses to use a nonlinear path, allowing you to make not-so-obvious choices that can affect the ending. This is mostly done with the self-medication the character goes through since pills are used to help with gameplay. But in the narrative, it’s suggested to try and avoid taking these due to the harm to the character’s psyche. In my playthrough I wasn’t aware of it till over halfway through the game, this was due to its choice to not hold your hand in regards to telling the player how to play.

This is how most of the narrative is told via news reports, magazines, and random characters you can miss from not exploring enough. When I did approach story elements, I never felt like I was truly part of it unless something odd would occur. Most levels felt the same, go here, kill these criminals, go home, repeat. It gets old pretty quickly and without the fun gameplay, this might not have worked.

Gameplay – Pill Popping Chaos

Project Downfall, is a fast reflex-based first-person shooter, that has a mix of thrills and spills. Taking place in over 21 levels, the nonlinear shooter offers quite the challenge with its varying difficulties, alternate paths, and stylish and rewarding ways of completing levels. Each level is split into multiple short stages that can be beaten in whatever means of combat you choose. Whether you want to go guns blazing, pull out your fists, or give everyone a good kicking. There are risks though since enemies can kill you in one shot depending on what weapon they have. That’s where the pills come in, these grant bullet time and allow you to perform superkicks that instantly kill enemies. However, using them will affect the Clear Mind bonus given at the end of levels which goes towards the plot as the game progresses. 

Use pills to turn on Bullet Time to take out enemies with finesse

Going back to the pills, there are other ones you can use that have similar abilities. I mostly used the chain and blue pills. The chain pill allowed me more speed and slow down time with every kill. The blue pill pretty much just turned me into One Punch Man which was great for crowd clearing. When it comes to the guns in the game, they can range from pistols, shotguns, rifles, SMGs, and my favourite miniguns. Each one of them was great to use when in a pinch and the ability to throw them helped portray the John Wick style of fighting. 

Rip and Tear with the Mighty Vulcan!!!

Exploration Is Key

Alongside the violent stages, there will be short breaks between where you can explore. You can talk to some oddball characters offering lore of this world and play some minigames on the arcade machines. Alongside this, there are also bonus missions to go after that are time-sensitive, so make sure to look and explore if you want the best experience. Some of these missions are available in the apartment like playing as different characters from media like Neo from The Matrix. 

Find numerous weapons scattered around levels to aid you in the carnage

You will also use these parts of the game to travel to your doctor to fulfil that chosen narrative path. Other notable locations to visit are the gun shop, allowing you to use guns for either chaos in the streets or to use the shooting range. Another place to visit is the local pharmacy, providing drugs to you that can assist with the story. They also provide items called Life Hacks that allow you to change up the game’s rhythm. Some allow you to gain increased speed and mobility at the cost of your health. Others allow you to keep whatever weapons you find in a stage but you won’t be able to reclaim any health. 

Enemy Types

So the enemies of the game don’t vary much. A lot of the differences between the different factions of criminals you fight are either character design or what weapons they have. Most enemies look like round bulky thugs who either have guns or melee weapons. Sometimes a taller thinner enemy will be around with a tiny bit more health than others. Later in the game, they started to bring in tougher enemies that required more hits. Later levels included enemies who wore armour that required more damage to reveal weak points to kill them. From my playthrough, I fought only one battle that resembled a boss. It succeeded in providing a thrilling battle though I would have liked more fights like it spread throughout the game. 

Fight bulky brutes like this fella (generally the best fight in the game)

Simple AI and Frustrating Hit Detection

When it comes to enemy AI, It lacks the adaptiveness a high-octane shooter should have. It has basic rules, “if an enemy sees you they shoot”, “if you are in a specific area enemies will then begin to track you down”. There isn’t anything too intelligent regarding what actions you take. An example of this was during the free roam I came across some thugs in the alley. They chose to try and kill me so I remembered a cop was nearby and went towards thinking they’d help. Oh was I wrong, as soon as the enemies went past him, the cop began to assist them in killing me. I guess they were corrupt. Alongside this encounter, you can abuse the AI by peeking around corners or simply by seeing enemies from afar and killing them before they even react. 

There are also issues with the hit detection with both guns and melee weapons. Most of my deaths in harder levels were due to enemies surviving hits that seemed like they had died. Melee can be 50/50 at times, hitting someone up close can miss while enemies can melee a few steps away. One annoying feature is the kick move, running up to an enemy and using the kick can be life and death. Having to restart the level for the 20th time due to a missed kick by a millimetre can lead me to not own a working Switch. 

Graphics & Audio – A Retro World Full of Action Packed Sound

The high notes of Project Downfall, are the retro-stylised visuals combined with modern effects, physics and shading. The overall look sold me on the game before playing and kept me going throughout my playthrough. The environment is a breathtaking pixel take on a dystopian city full of neon billboards and urban areas to explore. The indoor environments take you to a bunch of different areas like nightclubs and mob hideouts that look impressive. However, what’s annoying is that some environments suffer from lighting issues. Sometimes it’s too dark which hides enemies or the condition they are in. Other times a light is blinding an area of the stage stopping me from knowing where to go. Some of my frustrating deaths in crucial parts of stages where dying would take me to the beginning were caused by these issues. 

The damage physics in Project Downfall have been some of the goriest I’ve seen in a retro styled shooter.

Character Design & Animations

Luckily it was somewhat forgiven thanks to the wonderful Wolfenstein 3D-styled character design of all the enemies. The developers did a fantastic job of bringing the 2D enemies of old to modern shooters. The character animations for when you do any damage to enemies are perfection. Whether it’s an exploding headshot, shooting holes into them and watching pixelated blood gushing out, or exploding them with a superkick. There are so many fun ways to take out enemies in Project Downfall. 

A Soundtrack That Doesn’t Miss 

Out of everything in Project Downfall, the soundtrack is the golden child that never makes a mistake. Every level has either some lovely sci-fi ambience or a thrilling tune matching the momentum of the current combat scenario. It’s a selection of brilliant tracks that livens up the sometimes depressing world Project Downfall portrays. I couldn’t imagine the game being as enjoyable without this quality soundtrack. 

Project Downfall was reviewed on the Nintendo Switch with a key provided by pr-outreach.com