A.R.E.S. Extinction Agenda EX

[quote]Just saying, but I do have a curator page. If you somehow like my remarks about games, you can find more of them here: https://store.steampowered.com/curator/44130985-TDP%27s-Gaming-Escapades [/quote]

A.R.E.S. Extinction Agenda EX is one of my longest owned games. I remember buying it, playing it for an hour or two and then just putting it aside. As I was going through my backlog, I wondered "Why not revisit this game as well?". But I don't think I was expecting to be literally clueless after playing it. And not because it's a bad game, but because it feels so normal. So I implore you to read on as I really need to explain the "Not Recommended" rating.

One thing I have to address is that prior to reviewing this game, I had no knowledge of the major changes the devs made, going from the original to the EX version. I would have loved to get the previous version and cover the differences between the two; However, as I do not currently have the means to do that, I need to postpone it to the future and update this review if I ever decide to play the other one as well.

Mega Man X8? Is that you?

Just your usual 2D action game...

It does have issues though...

TL;DR

The game's like... alright
Bosses are ok, visuals are a bit bland and the game is nothing new if you played any sidescrollers in the past 20 or so years

Music fuckin' slaps tho

The soundtrack is nice but the sound balance is flawed. The game has some pretty bad bounding boxes for jumping so you often get stuck on something. The platforming is forgiving and unrefined, and you'll often died to places in which you expect to progress downward only to find a bottomless pit. Did I mention the knockback you get from damaging pushes you into these? It tries to be a Megaman X8 game without switchable characters and lacklustre weapons and upgrades. Often the upgrades that 'solved puzzles' felt largely useless out of combat. Speaking of combat enemies generally had annoying behaviours such as sending a projectile at you after self destruction or damaging you on touch. Bosses had 'no tell' to their attacks but you can tank everything with healing. I often felt I was playing a watered down and worse experience of games made in the 90s and 2000s... The character design, story, and dialogue felt uninspired.

I reinstalled to confirmed why I stopped playing back in 2014. As of 2022 its been added to my do not play pile.

I LOVE THIS GAME. I have so much to say and I can't even share all of it or my review will become even longer than it already is. Anyway, on to the review:

Characters: Okay, so my favorite characters here are the playable characters Ares and Tarus. (I love their character designs; I want to draw fan art of them someday.) There wasn't much official artwork for the original version of this game, so in regard to the re-design for both Ares and Tarus for A.R.E.S. Extinction Agenda EX, I think they both look more awesome here in the dialogue scenes. Both are combat androids but have very different personalities, which makes things interesting when playing through either campaign. Ares really behaves like a robot in dialogue scenes, like saying the word "Query" before asking a question, and making precise calculations of probabilities to the hundredth of a percentage. I think it's cute; I love that robot-y stuff! I wasn't sure about Tarus at first, but one third through Ares' story, I grew fond of Tarus after observing how mysterious and stoic he can be. He's so cool. I had to start playing his campaign immediately after finishing Ares' story. And I ship them, but that's just me. (Yes I know they are androids, but still, I just do.) And I can really see this as an anime. Oh, if only! But for now, that is what fan fiction is for…

In my opinion, Valkyl and Dr. Carson's re-designs are not bad and I won't complain. A remake is a remake. Both these characters have more personality in this game than the original version, so I thought that was an improvement. No word on what happened with the United Earth Chairman, who was mentioned only in the original game.

Characters I give 10/10, mainly because I love the playable android characters Ares and Tarus.

Story: The story is on the About This Game section of this game's Store Page, so I won't go into that here, but personally I thought the story was interesting enough to play to the end… I mean, it was the playable characters, the music, and the gameplay that made me buy the game. For me, the story is more of a bonus here, the context for which Ares and Tarus have the motivation to go through each stage. I wanted to know more about this zytron gas, and you'll find out more how zytron affects robots and machines as you play more of the game.

Story I give 7/10. It's not perfect, or completely original, but for me it was certainly memorable.

Gameplay: The gameplay is much easier in this remake than it was in A.R.E.S.: Extinction Agenda. Some abilities are less complicated to execute, such as a particular air boost ability that Ares later acquires. Also, the gameplay is faster because instead of pausing to create repair kits, you use 100 Material credits to heal your robot. Materials come from the robot enemies you destroy, and you can use these to either heal your robot or upgrade a weapon or skill/ability. The repair ability does take time to recharge, so use it wisely, but that shouldn't be hard. Just make sure that you plan ahead before whichever weapon or ability you upgrade, because for boss fights you might want to keep at least 1,000-2,000 credits in your collection at all times for healing during those boss fights. Also each time you upgrade a weapon or ability, the next level of upgrade will cost more than the previous version of that weapon or ability. Some grinding/mining will be necessary, I will admit. The best stages to grind for Materials will depend on your preference to stage layout and foes. But in later stages the zytron-infected robots drop more quantities of materials, so that is something to consider.

There are 7 Chapters for both Ares and Tarus. They go through the same stages but they have different stories, different personalities, and yes, even different endings, which you'll have to play the game to find out. So if you want to learn more of the story (or learn more about the mysterious and stoic Tarus) then I recommend playing as Tarus too. After you play as Ares you will notice how different each campaign is, if not the stages.

Ares's combat involves more precision (not precise necessarily, just generally aiming at the enemy robots) whereas Tarus' combat style emphasizes destructive power rather than precision. They both have ways of increasing their defense, and you'll see that the more you level up either robot's abilities. Both combat androids share the same type of weapons but the weapons behave differently depending on if it's Ares or Tarus (you can see a sneak-peak of this in the trailer on the Store Page). Just try it! Try the game… you'll see. I recommend playing this game with a controller rather than a keyboard, but use whatever you're most comfortable with playing.

Gameplay I give 9/10.

Navigation/UI: Much better here! An improvement from A.R.E.S.: Extinction Agenda. All the upgrading + viewing of abilities is on one screen. You can learn which button you press to do each attack or ability on this page at the bottom of its description when highlighted. For controllers, the Select/Back button is for the upgrades, using the front buttons to switch to viewing Data Cubes (brief, informative reading materials regarding characters and foes ) and Chapter Select. Chapter Select is handy when you want to grind/mine for Materials at your favorite stage. The Start Button is the main menu for the game itself with help and options, achievements and so on.

Navigation I give 9/10.

Music/Soundtrack: Most of the tracks from A.R.E.S.: Extinction Agenda, with music by Hyperduck Soundworks, are used in their respective stages for Ares. For the new stages and Tarus campaign, the music used was composed by Charlie Parra del Riego. I think his music fits very well with Tarus' character and style. My favorite Tarus track was in his Chapter 1, and I think of that one as his theme music. There are some catchy tunes in this game that may get stuck playing in your head and become a favorite. (That's what happened to me, and it still happens!) I was however disappointed that the Hyperduck Soundworks track "The Subtle Knife" wasn't used in this game as it was in the original version, but maybe the mood and timing wasn’t right for the re-worked ending.

Music/Soundtrack I give 21/10. (Yes I just did that.) Thank you Hyperduck Soundworks and Charlie Parra del Riego, you guys are awesome musicians!

Overall Score out of 10: I might be biased because it's my favorite game now but it's an 11/10 from me. This score is based on my own experience with the game. But you have to try A.R.E.S. EA EX out to judge it for yourself. I got this game on sale, so I suggest that you put it on your Wishlist and then look out for when it goes on sale, especially during the Winter or Summer sales. A.R.E.S. Extinction Agenda EX is a gem that should NOT be overlooked.

Do I Want a Sequel? I am waiting for a proper sequel. I won't hold my breath however, because sadly there is not enough demand for a sequel at the moment. I wouldn't mind being an Early Access tester of the sequel to help make it possible. This has the potential to become a series like Mega Man X, of which I am also a fan. After 7 years (10 years if you count the original game), A.R.E.S. has only 1.5 games in its title. Sadly yet again, there may be plenty of fans of this game who have moved on and forgot that they wanted a sequel, so they are not verbal about wanting one.

TL:DR I recommend this game if you're a fan of sci-fi video games or series like Mega Man X and Mega Man Zero, or anything like side-scrolling platformers that feature androids as main characters and getting awesome power-ups along the way. Oh, and cool music. Awesome robots and cool music.

This is a fairly fun game. it's a bit like metroid meets contra. basically a twinstick shooter that pretends it's not one. you really want to get used to jump being mapped to a shoulder button so you can take full advantage of the twin stick gameplay.

Jumping though, is very finicky. if you try to jump from a ledge, your character 8/10 times won't jump and you'll just stupidly fall to your death. This version of the game added a bunch more insta-death challenges to frustrate you beyond comprehension. like in the first game, there's a green robot that chases you destroying platforms as you go up, platforms that you can't jump from the edges of, even though you really need to, and some characters don't fit where they obviously should, so you're gonna die a lot.

They added another stage full of insta-death, like an elevator that rises and breaks platforms, if you happen to be touching the bottom of a platform when it breaks, regardless of whether it would crush you or not, you die, and, lovely enough, at the final part of the elevator, it requires that you jump quickly to avoid being crushed... but guess what conveniently never works at that time? that's right, jumping! you just sort of twitch in place and have an even smaller window to try to jump out of there. Jumping is a major issue in this game.

That aside, if you want to play this casually, it's pretty fun, the achievement though all require perfection, which is pretty hard when you don't know when a jump won't work, or your hover will just stop as soon as you start it.

To make matters worse, hitboxes are a LOT bigger than you'd think, and you'll take hits from little parts of the boss you didn't think were close enough to do damage.

The game is very rough around the edges, but is still a lot of fun. a more refined version of this gameplay would be great.

While the game is alright, it never really is able to get past just 'alright'.

Boss fights often feel more annoying than they do challenging as they last way too long while you deal little to no damage, often having moments of dealing none as the enemy gets to use a 'super' move (Multiple times a battle) that is often capable of doing at least half your health with no realistic ability to dodge... Or not having a legitimate safe zone during phases (Whether it be due to the boss attack being unavoidable, or badly designed areas where the boss clips through the environment to damage you)

Enemies often feel poorly designed due to their ability to stun lock you out of your abilities, especially abilities that are required to even damage some of them.

Abilities often feel pointless with low damage output, very little situational purpose, and long wind up times that can and will be interrupted. Combining that with a cool down, abilities were rarely used or even relied on. Abilities like healing, which has a rather steep cost, only make this game feel needlessly grindy (Why this game even makes you feel you need to grind is bonkers to me) especially when dying in a fight does not reset the currency, forcing you to restart the level just to have enough saved up to possibly make it to the end of a fight (Or hoping the healing is even up).

Upgrades only make it feel worse, as they are just useless enough to encourage grinding to make them slightly more useful (Healing to close the RNG gap and cool down, but not cost, mega attack to hit more targets with a little more damage, however no way to force it to attack through bosses often and annoying no-damage super attacks).

End of the day, the game just doesn't feel recommendable. I am aware of it's age, and even when it originally came out, the many illogical design choices would not have been acceptable then.

Initially I gave this game a thumbs up but after playing it for 1.5 hours I noticed that it's trying to sell itself as something that it isn't. It's actually a pretty bad game trying to look like a pretty good one.

I've played Megaman games and finished the whole Zero series, Super Metroid, Castlevania games, got a robot named fight in my library, finished that too. So in terms of those type of games I know what I'm talking about.

What are the problems with this one?

1. The controls are very clunky and unpolished, you know that feeling when you play one of those "First attempt at 3D" type of games that had platforming in it's gameplay but was horribly ill equipped to put that into practice? These guys somehow managed to have that problem in their 2D game. This kind of game needs fluid control ability, not this chunky clunky mess that makes it difficult to jump from platform to platform. You'l find yourself dying due to not being able to make a simple jump from A to B which gets even worse when you get boost.

2. Claustrophobic level design. Now I got to chapter 3 and up until now the levels felt like going through a very narrow tube. There is barely any space. There are literally rooms that get flooded with 3 enemies at once and they're at point blank range with hardly any to no room to navigate. Couple that with very clunky controls and platforming which by the way gets us to manufactured difficulty. You'l have instances where it's not the enemies or the skillrequirement that will get you killed but bad level design trying to pass itself as challenging.

3. So your character is orange, the level is orange, and some enemies like turrets on the ceiling which also has a bunch of cables hanging everywhere are also orange. That makes taking in what you're looking at quite difficult.

I got this game for 2$ and I'm getting a refund.

Rage inducing.

This is a sad thing for me. I have to leave a negative review for a game that really wasn't that bad except for one BIG rage inducing mechanic that has made me decide to leave this one alone until I feel like being curb stomped.

The graphics are great, the controls are fairly solid, the story is ok, and the combat is ok.
So, what is it that makes me want to throw my controller? It's the same sort of problem that old NES games used to pull.

There are doors that are timed, and once you shoot the device to open the doors you have to jump/hover across platforms to get through them in time. So this by itself and with the little flying enemies are not a problem, but you have way too frequent downpour of garbage that not only damages you but pushes you.

Yes, Knockback and pushing. This game's biggest flaw. It killed it for me.

I can't reccomend this game. It just has too many annoying little pieces of bad game design. Stuff like puzzlws that were obviously designed with only one of the characters in mind, parts where the forground images block your view of enemies, jumps where it's way too hard to avoid hitting the platform hanging slightly above your head.

It's not all bad, but I found myself getting annoyed instead of just having fun.

Not a bad game, especially for the price, but it's definitely got some iffy parts to it and some bits that reek of a lack of comprehension of what the term "difficulty" means.

There's a bit of engrish translation errors, but nothing too bad - they're pretty rare and it's easy to understand what's being said.

Most of my issues have more to do with things like foreground objects that can kill you but which look like part of the background and your weapons pass through making it seem like it's safe until you run into the hazard. Leaps of faith into bottomless pits, spotty controls, forced maneuvering in one section with both the top and bottom of the screen locked down but no indication this is the case on top, and other such design choices which led to a consistent feeling that any time I've died, it wasn't my fault nor in my control to prevent because I couldn't have known it was a problem until it was too late.

In in the middle of the fifth level and a clear example of this came to light - you're walking along a train and it's fine, no hazards at all. Then it suddenly shifts to having these low ceiling obstacles appear out of nowhere, but they move quite quickly and look like they're part of the background at first glance. In the rest of the game, you can move freely left and right without issue. Here, you're walking to the right, same as normal, and the first of these obstacles comes flying out of nowhere just at the right timing that, if you're moving at a normal pace, will squish you against the left side of the screen which now can't move to the left anymore and will instantly kill you without warning. At no point did this feel like I could have reasonably known that I would have died in this situation, that it was an instant kill, that I could be crushed against literally nothing because I'd just been standing in that spot two seconds earlier and there's no obstacles to my left and the screen hasn't locked in that way before, nor that I could have realized that it wasn't part of the background. The penalty for this death was to just get teleported back a few screens and have to start that section over, and once it was clear what was going on, it was easy to avoid the obstacles since they come at a regular pace and are predictable - easy to avoid once you know the problem's there, but almost guaranteed a cheap death the first time you encounter such.

This is what I've found throughout the entire game so far - it's not really difficult at all, but occasionally you'll just flop over dead without rhyme nor reason as a new mechanic is introduced without a proper introduction to how it works. The level design could introduce these elements significantly better than it does, but it's fairly uninspired and bland for what the levels do. There's also a fair bit of unintuitive backtracking, such as areas in the first and second level which can't be accessed until you've gained abilities from later levels. If this were a metroidvania style game where there's a single, connected map which you return to certain areas occasionally, that'd make sense, but these are discrete, fairly linear levels for the most part and once you've cleared a level, the only reason to go back to it is to get a better score or to pick up items you couldn't get the first time you went through it.

The controls are mostly responsive, though there are some oddities like your air dash only being able to go straight up or horizontally, no diagonals, much less aiming where your mouse is like how your primary weapon works. Again, it mostly works, but it feels bare-bones and lacking for both depth and quality.

This is kind of just how the whole game plays so far - it's not bad, but it's kinda mediocre in a lot of ways. Minor nuisances, bland presentation and design decisions that really aren't that well thought out are everywhere. You can definitely get some enjoyment out of it, and I'd recommend playing it, especially if it's on sale, but the fact of the matter is that you probably shouldn't go into it with particularly high expectations. A.R.E.S. Extinction Agenda EX has a pretty reasonable core game to it, but it doesn't really stand out as being particularly polished in any way. It's a rough product and it doesn't feel like it was ever really play tested - probably because it wasn't. The QA team is literally listed in the credits as just being the people who made the game in the first place. There's no indication they even showed it to friends or family to get thoughts on it.

For what it is, it's not bad, it's worth a try, especially on sale for $2.29 canadian like I got it for. I'd recommend giving it a try, but don't look to ARES as being on par with other games in the genre. Sure, it's better than Mighty No. 9, but really, that isn't a high bar to overcome. Really, I just can't give this a glowing review, but I can't say it hasn't been fun either. I just can't say it has been something which I feel like I would recommend going out of your way to get.

It's a game. It passes time. It's moderately enjoyable. It doesn't do anything particularly well, but it doesn't do anything particularly badly, either. If you want to kill 5-10 hours of your life, it will do that for you, it just won't be particularly memorable nor high quality is all. I dunno... it feels like I can't really put what I want to say into words properly for it. It's above average in all categories, and is enjoyable... it just doesn't stand out anywhere and is absolutely riddled with minor problems all over. No major issues, just little things that keep it from ever being great in any way. I don't hate it, I actually kind of like it, but it just feels like it should have been something more than it is. There's a lot more potential here than was put to use, and I think that's the bit that disappoints me most. It definitely deserves a recommendation and is worth playing through once, but I don't think I could give it a glowing recommendation or a second playthrough.

This is one of those occasions where the thumbs up or thumbs down system is ineffective in actually articulating how I feel about the game.

A.R.E.S. Extinction Agenda EX is indeed a Mega Man clone that does enough to such that lacks the jank one might expect form a small Thailand-based company, in addition to including enough polish to distinguish it from a "mobile" game, though with its animations and graphical assets, I'm certain it could be ported to Android/iOS.

If you are a fan of Mega Man and just can't get enough of games of this type, you won't be upset by dropping $10 here, especially if you enjoy rock-and-roll music. It does not do anything special; it does just enough to be above average.

More or less megaman, but it's a good game with some interesting weapons and upgrades and 2 differnt heros that have differnt weapons and playstyles.

This game was released nearly 3 years ago at the time of my writing this and I wish they had a sequel out at this point. A.R.E.S EX is an amazing game and definatly worth it. I got the game on sale for a grand £1.60 instead of it's base £6.99. This game is a remake of the A.R.E.S Extinction Agenda and isn't just that, they added in a new character with their own story and ending, along with 2 new levels not seen in the origional AEA. Tarus, the new character added, uses the same base weapons as Ares, yet he is, in my eyes, more of a beef-y character, with his first gun you start the game with working as Ares' once you upgrade it once. His design is significantly different to Ares aswell, showning the plit between the two. This game is a 2.5d platforming shooter in the vein of Mega Man and Metroid from back in the 8-bit era. This game is so much more of a tribute to Mega Man than Mighty No. 9, with more challenging game design and bosses. It doesn however work in a linear story, with upgrades seen through the game and backtracking allowed to unlock everything you miss while going through the game.

A good friend of mine recommended this game to me, so I checked it out.

This game best reminds me of Mega Man X8 on the PS2(PlayStation 2). Both playable characters in this game are a unique mix of all 3 main characters in Mega Man X8 (X, Zero, and Axl). With Axl's 360 degree firing ability, Zero's ability to double jump, and X's ability to upgrade himself.

The game can be challenging at times, but it's never so difficult that it seems impossible to complete.

There are a lot of hidden items and secrets to find and a few alternate routs.

I used an Xbox Once controller with this game with no problems since it had a pre-setup profile for the controller built into the game right from the start.

Overall I've found this game to be a great game, and a good example of how to do a Mega Man X game right!

If your a fan of the Mega Man X series, or just a fan of the Mega Man franchise in general, then you can't go wrong with picking this one up. And that's my 2 cents.

As i didn't play the original version before this, this review is disregarding any comparison to that version.

A.R.E.S. Extinction Agenda EX is a side-scrolling mecha shooter game, safely to say a Megaman clone.

You have 2 mechs to choose from Ares and Tarus, similar to the roles how X and Zero in Megaman series.
Each has different set of weapons and abilities and both have different storyline, though same levels and objectives.

The game technically and visually is good, however the soundtrack doesn't fit and really boring.

The story in general is generic, although it has few cool twists. But it's nothing special at all. You go on levels, destroy bots to save humankind. That's it.

You have also a human female as an assistant that communicate with you throughout your mission and develop new upgrades for you suit.

During the levels there are database cubes and upgrade units to collect, the former for expanding game lore to read and the later allow you to upgrade weapons and abilities.

Each character has 7 levels, which are exactly the same but different dialogues.
And you can beat the entire game in few hours (took me 5 hours).

Let's switch to the cons:

- Level designs: Some areas can be really frustrating, designed to hinder your movements limits to your demise.
- Unskippale scenes: This really made me mad, because checkpoints happen before a hard part, which forcing me to watch the same scene over and over and over until I successfully pass the area. Boss Battles has the same problem.
- Checkpoints sometimes are set far from each other, again due to some areas being frustrating, having to run through many rooms/traps/enemies before you getting to a new checkpoint isn't really a nice idea if you want to put a challenge in the way. I really don't like repeating the same steps for 5~10 times before I figure out a solution.
- The Ending (both endings), although are good, end abruptly. It would be better to see at least a glimpse of the aftermath.

6.5/10

I picked up this game at a considerable discount, thanks to the developer's decision to "celebrate" the release of Mighty No. 9. I played the original version of this game some years ago, but didn't get around to playing this version until today.

At the end of my run as ARES, I was ready to give Extinction Agenda EX a thumbs down, and maybe I still should: It's one of the jankiest run-and-gun games I have ever played. Asthetically, it's fine: The music is excellent and the sprite work fairly appealing. Aiming and shooting is just fine thanks to the mouse, but the jumping controls are uniquely unresponsive and occasionally just fail to work at all. ARES' air dash move is especially difficult to use properly. I must have wasted an hour of the two hours it took to finish the game just falling into pits. It's also rather difficult to avoid damage, and if not for the in-built repair ability, I probably would not have gotten anywhere. I imagine I had a similar experience playing the first version of this game, but that was back in 2011 so I don't remember for sure. Nostalgia makes every game seem better I guess, because I gave that game a positive review just yesterday. But playing it again was not nearly as fun.

Then, I played Tarus, the new playable character to this version of the game. And let me tell you, playing Tarus is like playing a different game entirely, and a better one at that. ARES' unwieldy air-dash is replaced with a much simpler to use mid-air hover move, which allows you to fly around for a short duration. At least once jump segment that gave me no end of trouble with ARES can be bypassed using Tarus entirely: Though Tarus' cutscenes differ from ARES, the levels do not. His "limit break"-type move, instead of a smart bomb like ARES, is a invulnerability shield. His weapons, while shorter-ranged and slower then ARES', do considerably more damage. All this meant that my run as Tarus took about half the time, give or take a few minutes. I've never seen a disparity between two characters in the same game this huge before. If you get this game, get it on sale like I did, and don't even bother playing as ARES- Tarus is your bot.

Having played through the first ARES, this does seem a bit superfluous, but I'll accept it, as it has some new content.

+ Two new levels
+ A new playable character and story
+ Slight improvements to original
+ As usual, rockin' soundtrack
- If you're using a keyboard like the plebe I am, it may be difficult.

+ Not a disappointment like Mighty No. 9.

This game is a lot of fun! I really like the combat system. Being able to move with the left stick and aim/shoot with the right is really, really nice. The combo system is a nice extra touch, too. The bosses are tough at first, but once you figure out how to beat them they're no problem, which is really satisfying. Looks great to boot.

Definitely an upgrade over the original. More levels, even more awesome music, better presentation, and a new character all make it very worth it to upgrade to this version over the original (for cheap, might I add!).

"It's kind of like a Mega Man crossed with a run-and-gun game. Not that long and not that hard even on the hardest difficulty unless you're trying for optional things like high ranks, but if it's cheap and the short blurb sounds interesting to you, you'll likely find this an enjoyable game."

That's what I said about the original A.R.E.S. Extinction Agenda. That pretty much holds true for EX, but it seemed somewhat more difficult (or I was just being bad at it) and has been reworked to be a good bit longer, with two extra levels, more cutscenes, and a second character with different abilities who you can choose to play through the game with instead. So, basically it fixed all of my complaints.

Given that they're the same original asking price, I would obviously recommend picking this one up instead if you don't have either. About all this game is missing is the goofy skins and the Berserker weapon, and skins are just cosmetics and the Berserker weapon was kind of overpowered anyway! If you do have the original, I think it's still worth it given the discount...!

When I heard about a new version of ARES I figured what I'd get to play improved on the game I knew and had a like/hate relationship with, it was 60% off and since i owned the original I figured what the heck.

Gameplay: They've moved to 1 currency, essentially everything is now 1, so you have 1 higher cost instead of trying to farm a particular resource for your upgrades. Thats a positive... you now have to find unlocks to unlock your upgrades, thats a second plus... You get a new character thats like a heavy class/tank compared to the original character, and he plays... kinda meh. His special is a shield that uses up energy vs health...

Other changes is that you have infinite bombs/electrical blasts and they are on a CD. Repair kits are also on cooldown and have a 100 resource cost. All can be upgraded.

Graphics: Uh, I don't like what they did with the supporting cast, the characters and bosses look just as great, but what did they do to the women... its like they changed how they wanted them to look and they look awful. The gameplay is still as crisp and looks similar if not better than the original.

Controls: Yup, did you hate Ares, you'll hate this... love it... you'll love this... its not changed, and its still as wonky as when I played it the first time, jumping off the ends of ledges... good luck and do it early.

So that I've writen this game, if you haven't played the original, you may like what you see, if you have... I'd avoid this for awhile, its in a kinda crashy state in which you have to launch the game again nearly every level I think the changes they put forth are positive for the game, but the new levels aren't really impressive, and the new character while plays slightly different, continues to be similar to what you've done before.

Verdict: Pass, and if you want to get a version get the original for now... I might review once they patch all the crashy bugs... but I cannot honestly reccommend as of 10/4/14