Galactic Glitch preview

Shoot! Grab! Throw! Dodge!

There’s a decent chance that you already have a roguelike, twin-stick shooter in your Steam library. Between titles like Nuclear Throne, Enter the Gungeon, and The Binding of Isaac, Valve’s storefront certainly has no shortage of them. With its characteristic accumulation of perks, permanent upgrades, and a procedurally generated network of battlefields, Galactic Glitch follows the genre’s blueprints pretty closely. But the incorporation of a grab-and-throw mechanic adds just enough distinction.

Just in case you haven’t played a dozen other entries, Glitch’s succinct tutorial guides you through the fundamentals. Expectedly, your plucky little spaceship can fire its main gun, a meter-driven power-shot, and dodge – with the latter having a mercifully brief cooldown period. And you’ll need proficiency at each of these abilities, as the game’s globular arenas are fairly small and tend to be filled with floating debris.

But your ship also has access to a Grav Gun. This device allows you to pull in small objects. After a grab, you can effortlessly aim and fling them around. Typically, grabbing rocks or mines and lobbing them at foes does more damage than using your primary weapon. And since you can grab small enemies and their missiles, the Grav Gun lets you turn the tables.

Mercifully, developer Crunchy Leaf Games doesn’t force you to use the mechanic. So, you can play Glitch like a traditional twin-stick shooter if you like, taking cover behind bits of space-junk. Another smart design decision sees enemies damaging each other. Narrowly evading an AOE attack and seeing a pursuing adversary get killed by the blast is perpetually pleasing. And while it’s technically possible to rebound objects off the sides of the arena, those types of trick shots are impractical when multiple opponents are in hot pursuit.

As you make your way through each stage and kill the waves of enemies found in each room, you’ll earn two types of currencies. Orbs are rarer and are uses for unlocks and permanent upgrades, earning goodies like new guns and providing access to perks that extend your health or increase throwing damage. On the other hand, Shards are more plentiful and allow you to purchase enhancements that only last for your current run.

While Galactic Glitch will be in Steam’s Early Access program for another six to twelve months, the title already has some solid foundations. Weapon variety is commendable, extending selections like a hard-hitting railrun, speedy twin-blasters, or the Stabilized Quantum Beam, which lashes foes like a giant, electric whip.

Beyond providing the game with about thirty percent more content, the current build does exhibit a few issues. At present, the in-game store on every map doesn’t provide much variety, and you’ll sporadically see duplicate items. But the more nagging issue is the game’s power-up hubs, which are arranged much like a stage’s connected arenas. While this provides aesthetic consistency, moving between the different rooms is cumbersome. When shopping for perks, let me see everything for sale.

Galactic Glitch’s neon-hued, anomaly-filled environments are moderately detailed, helping you keep track of things on every busy battlefield. The other upside to this choice is that the game performs satisfactorily on portables like the Steam Deck. There’s a bit of infrequent judder, but otherwise the framerate stays solid. Agreeably, many of the larger enemy attacks are visually telegraphed, so ‘reading’ the screen isn’t too demanding.

Even if your Steam library is saturated with twin-stick shooters, Galactic Glitch is shaping up to be a solid contender that’s worth a look. The inclusion of grabbing and throwing might sound like a gimmick, but damage is weighted, allowing you to take down large enemies with a few, well-aimed tosses. What’s best about Glitch is the feeling of autonomy, with the title letting you select between different weapons and perks, and letting you favor either shooting or throwing as your offensive preference.