Defense: Abominations (First-Person Survival Turret Chaos)
You know, when I first caught some pics of Defense: Abominations I expected an entry-level first-person shooter (FPS) effort from some Eastern European cyberflunk who can barely hack his own email. What I found was more of a mid-grade network spy who can almost hack this site’s email but gives up because he’s in the middle of programming games or watching anime. The programmer/publisher, Ominous Entertainment, has a few games already out there, but this is the first I’ve played. Curious about the others, because stuff like this is why I love Steam. It’s a huge mess of an indie community with programmers working all alone god knows where, but probably out of some rotting basement in Bulgaria, just to make something for the sheer enjoyment of the activity alone. Sometimes, you get a decent game out of it.
Defense: Abominations couldn’t be simpler. The title itself is bizarre, like what’s the reason for the colon exactly? But it clearly indicates you will be defending yourself from abominations so welcome into your home old-school PC FPS biological freaks, zombies, and you know, WTF, dinosaurs. I mean who doesn’t feel like they need to shoot down bio-freaks, the undead, and dinosaurs in the same game at the same time? I know I didn’t, before this game at least. So you shoot stuff and survive, that’s the game. You currently have four guns you can unlock, but the real key to how this game works is the goddamn turrets. Check out some in this gameplay vid:
Guns use ammo, turrets resources. You start with an extremely basic, average-speed, single-shot cannon, but as you reach higher levels you unlock things like the chain gun, flamethrower, and the currently all-powerful (relatively speaking) missile battery. I’m sure I’ve got the names wrong, but it doesn’t matter, trust me, because boy does it feel good. What Defense: Abominations is about is pure survival and strategy. It feels in structure like an older game because of its sheer simplicity, yet looks modern, though graphically it’s about 8 years behind the times. This is passable, though, because you’re not playing this like a date, this is just for the sex.
The sex here is wave after wave of abominable targets, bullets, and artillery. After you’ve unlocked all the current content you can advance much further, because the waves of creatures start to come in larger numbers and at faster rates (note my screencap above when I was swarmed). Safety is found in a variety of item spawn locations in the two currently available play settings, but there is no glitching this as far as I’ve found. You’ll find safety at first, but by the upper levels, around 20 or so, it becomes clear you must pay attention to hold your ground. With a leaderboard built into the game as part of the “I am king” style of this one, it’s too simple to hate. But the soundtrack is almost comical at times and strangely the only sound effects are guns and turrets. There are no death or gore sounds whatsoever; a very odd choice because it would certainly benefit from it. I want to hear those dinos scream for their birth mothers is what I’m saying. For what it is, which is simple, addicting slaughter you can use to satisfy your urge to prove yourself against nameless players, Defense: Abominations is quite sufficient.
Defense: Abominations Official Steam Page
Written Stanley, Devourer of Souls
Defense: Abominations
Ominous Entertainment (developer, publisher)
3.9 / 5
