Pickle Pete is a reverse bullet-hell roguelike that combines the over-the-top chaotic gameplay of Brotato with the permanent character progression of Archero for a surprisingly fun gameplay experience. The objective is to survive 10 time-limited waves of enemy attacks, return home, and then continue to the next chapter. During each wave, we control our pickle character with a large joystick while it auto-shoots at any enemies in range. After every wave, we get to first pick one of three random stat-boosts if we leveled up during the wave, and then spend the pickles we’ve collected on buying weapons and items. Just like in Brotato, we can equip six weapons at a time, which quickly makes the gameplay chaotically fun. If we get two of the same item, we can even merge them to increase the rarity, which makes it a lot stronger. I found the weapons to be decently diverse, and it’s entertaining to experiment with everything from snipers to magic wands, anvils, turrets, and drones. After defeating the boss in wave 10, we receive gold and permanent items. In-between runs, we equip and upgrade these items to grow stronger, and buy stat boosts. All this permanent progression makes the game feel slightly more rewarding than Brotato. The game used to have an energy, which has since been removed. It also features a daily mission game mode, a competitive endless mode, and several challenge modes that are almost entire games on their own. The art and animations are silly but neat, and I found it particularly nice that we can see where an enemy is about to spawn. Pickle Pete monetizes via incentivized ads to revive, receive extra gold, or refresh the shop. There are also iAPs for items and a paid battle pass, but none of this is needed to progress at a decent pace.

Ultra Blade is a fun Vampire Survivors/Magic Survival-like reverse bullet-hell roguelike game from the developers of Immortal Rogue.Just like in the many other recent reverse bullet-hell games, we move our character around using a big joystick while it auto-attacks any enemies that get within range. However, we also fire a special attack when we release our finger, which adds a fun new aspect to the combat.Enemies storm at us from all sides, and the goal is to survive each chapter all the way to the end in one sitting without dying. We start each run with a weak standard attack that differs depending on the hero we’ve selected and then pick one of three random abilities every time we level up.Each hero, which the game calls “blades”, has different weapons and attacks. There’s a total of 15 blades, and some are better suited for certain chapters, which makes experimenting fun. We also unlock permanent upgrades and new abilities for each blade the more we use it, making the game easier over time. These abilities can thereafter be selected by all blades, which means we’re incentivized to try every blade to unlock all abilities.The gameplay is fun and challenging, with lots of cool monsters, interesting environments for each chapter, and some very unique bosses. It feels different enough from other games in the same genre to warrant a play-through.The pixel art-style is good, but it’s sometimes a bit unclear where the enemy hit-boxes are, which is the game’s biggest downside.Ultra Blade is a $2.99 premium game without ads or iAPs. On Android, there’s also a separate free version with ads and a few iAPs.

Vampire Survivors is an incredibly popular reverse bullet-hell roguelike inspired by Magic Survival.Like other games in the genre, Vampire Survivors has us move our character around a large map using a single joystick, while thousands of enemies storm at us from all sides. Our character automatically attacks enemies in range, and every time we level up, we get to pick one of three random new abilities that fire at certain intervals.The further we get into each run, the more existing things get, with stronger enemies, tough bosses, and lots of powerful abilities firing all over the place.After we eventually die, we get to spend any gold we’ve collected on lots of permanent power-ups that make the next run easier, such as more life, more attack power, or a doubling of all bullets. We can also unlock several new characters with different stats and starting attacks. The abilities are interesting and powerful, and at the end of a run, we can even see which has dealt the most damage, allowing us to strategize which to focus on next time. As we progress, new maps also unlock. Together with the many challenging achievements, these help keep the game interesting.The touch controls work well, there’s Bluetooth controller support, and the simple art-style means we can have hundreds of enemies on the screen at the same time. The biggest downside is the black bars showing on wide-screen phones when playing in landscape.Vampire Survivors monetizes via incentivized ads to revive and receive extra gold. Unfortunately, there’s no way to pay to remove these ads. Cross-platform sync between PC and mobile is said to be coming soon.Overall, its polished and fun gameplay make this a must-try for anyone who enjoys the genre.