By Todd Russell
In 2017, legendary game designer Eugene Jarvis (Robotron, Defender, Smash TV, NARC, Crusin’ series, Raw Thrills, etc) was the creative consultant for a twin stick shooter successor to Robotron on Steam called Nex Machina (https://store.steampowered.com/app/404540/Nex_Machina/). This game is bullet hell crazy fun and played it the entire (NO) Blue Monday episode #17.
This was my #GameADayChallenge back on February 2, 2022 when it was on sale for $7.99. Regular price is $19.99, which I would recommend holding out until you see it dip beneath $10, ideally in the $5 range. You can check the alt markets (see: Yes, there are risks buying from Gray Steam Key Resellers like Kinguin). The game hasn’t had any updates on Steam in 90 months, so dev on this is pretty much done, or so it seems, but it’s a fun, extremely challenging shooter.
There are 5 stages with 15 levels in each with 5 different bosses. Personally, I think the stage 4 boss is the most challenging with the stage 5 boss being somewhat easier to get past. You get unlimited continues on the easiest level, so you can play it all the way through there to see every boss as I did on Monday’s live stream. It will take something like 45 minutes to beat the entire game, a little less or potentially much longer depending on how many continues are required.
PGM member and Twitch moderator Vader4633 did some digging and found a way to get this “unsupported” game running on the Steam Deck and says it runs good. Here’s what else you need to do, per his Discord post:
Have you checked out Nex Machina, readers? Adding to your Steam wish list? Let us know your feelings on this game in the comments.
This game looked really fun on your stream yesterday. I am definitely going to pick it up next sale.