Danger Gazers

Review

It’s post-Apocalypse; the world is no longer what is used to be, and you’ve lost everything apart from your caravan (that’s what you get for being an avid camper). In view of the circumstances and what’s left of this world, it’s no so bad, I guess! Nonetheless, it is a dangerous world and every time you step out of your caravan, you’ll be fighting to stay alive another day. The question is, how long will you survive, in Dangers Gazers?

Danger Gazers is a top-down shooter, developed and self-published by ShotX Studio on the 3^rd of January 2020 on Steam.

As you start your first run, you’ll need to choose one of three characters available to you. There are another 4 characters to unlock as you progress through the game, each of whom has a specific skill, making all your playthroughs different. Below the characters, you’ll have nine hidden relics or masks which you also need to unlock during your playthroughs. I have unlocked 4 so far. You can choose up to three of these relics to make your next run either easier or more difficult than the previous one.

From here, the fun begins! I can’t really tell you how many levels there are, because I seem to keep dying on the third level; the Mountain Dream.  And that’s after selecting the relics which give me extra health, skill recharge and more companions!

So, when you start, you’ll need to complete the first stage of the level, of which there are four. You’ll start the stage from your caravan and your goal is to eliminate all the enemies before you can return to your home sweet home. The first couple of stages will be fairly short and the enemies are not too aggressive, but that will change rather quickly. As you kill your enemies, they will drop blue crystals. Some might drop ammunition, and/or health packs and if you fight an elite group level, the big red turtle with spikes might drop a relic. You’ll find blue and orange chests within the stages. The blue chests have weapons while the orange chests have items that will either help you or diminish your character’s skills. Some items will give you more ammunition, while others might slow your character down, or even take a few health points from him/her for good measure.

When you manage to complete a stage, you’ll be prompted to choose between two or three paths as an interim between each of the stages.   The paths may lead you to the store, where you can buy new items if you have collected enough blue crystals.  Or maybe the stash, which is very helpful if you’re running low on health and ammunition.  The cave, which is a slightly difficult stage, has either plenty of blue crystals to collect or has golden cards.  Random will give good or bad items, or even weapons and ammunition.  The last possibility is the rotten elder, from whom you can either run away by paying crystals, or get a golden card for half your current health.  The golden cards are very important in this game as they increase your character’s skills, so seeing the rotten elder can be a blessing in disguise (but you will lose half your health). The other way to find one of these cards is in the cave or on the stage four of the level, where you will be facing a boss.

One thing to bear in mind is that you might collect a large number of blue crystals and in some cases, you’ll choose not to spend them at the shop for one reason or another, in which case you can carry them to your next playthrough. But don’t worry, on the first stage from the second level, you’ll be able to melt blue crystals into green gems with the cauldron next to your caravan. These green gems are saved and can be used in your next playthrough to unlock new weapons or items.

Great artwork, and the soundtrack is an absolute cracker! You even might fancy a bit of a dance between stages. In my opinion, here is a developer who managed to combine all the important elements to make a fabulous game. It would be sacrilege not to have this game in your library - it’s entertaining in all aspects!