Developer/Publisher: Deadleaf Games || Overall: 7.5/10

Overview:

Nom Nom Apocalypse is a shooter roguelite. It tries to mimic some titles that came before it, such as Nuclear Throne, Enter the Gungeon, and others. However, unlike the superior examples in this genre, Nom Nom Apocalypse comes up a bit short in the excitement factor.

Graphics:

There are a lot of food-themed monsters and the art is actually pretty charming at times. The bosses are all very unique, like a stack of pancakes that shoots butter bombs, a bacon monster, and what I guess is a very mutated pile of mashed potatoes. There is a lot of imagination when it comes to the enemy design and most of the player characters give you a “50’s diner” feel, although there are things like a Sushi chef that feel more contemporary. The levels are nicely detailed and aren’t boring to look at.

Sound:

The sound is ok. The gun effects are nice, but the music is basically the same couple of tracks over and over as you’ll be hitting up the same levels over and over. The first level is always the same, but there seems to be some randomness in which order you progress from there.

Gameplay:

The goal is to get through five different areas for a complete run. You’ll find a multitude of diversely themed weapons along the way, many of which kind of do the same thing as each other or have no appreciably noticeable perk that affects your actual monster-killing. At times the fighting can get pretty hectic and you’ll need to use the terrain well enough to avoid damage.

The levels seem to be a combination of procedural and randomized. There are some rooms that look constructed and never change (such as boss rooms and vending machine rooms), but it feels like the other normal levels change the objects enough so it doesn’t often feel like you’ve seen that exact layout previously.

Crappiest Part:

The rooms are too big for what goes on in the game; they should have been reduced considerably. On top of that, most guns are too weak/take too many shots to kill enemies. If they tightened up these two mechanics in the game, it could have been less frustrating for me.

There will often be times where there is one enemy left and you can’t find them in the large room. It especially sucks when you have to run around for ten seconds AFTER you clear the room to get to the next room, and sometimes its hard to find the right way to go because the minimap is zoomed in and doesn’t show the whole room. The minimap isn’t as useful as it could be as a result.

Conclusion:

Nom Nom Apocalypse ends up being an okay game with great enemy design. The developers really took the food concept as far as it could go in many aspects, so props there. There’s also 4 player co-op available, which is a nice feature for when you’ve got your great-grandma, great-grandpa, and great-great-grandma over, because they love video games.