The human race has taken to the stars, and in an endless effort to map out the cosmos, ran into a parasitic species called the lesion, who destroy planets by spreading their corruption. As most of the galaxy is infected, an unlikely ally appears in the form of the voidlings, small creatures with endless evolutionary potential, serving as the only weapon against such an overwhelming enemy.
Voidling Bound is a fun twist on the creature collector genre, allowing the player to directly control and evolve each new species of voidling encountered, taking on missions to clean up the galaxy one planet at a time. Each stage has you holding your own against waves of corrupted enemies and clearing out corrupted debris to open the path to a massive boss fight.
Endless Evolution
The game’s creatures, the voidlings, each have their own evolutionary tree, as well as a species-wide set of enhancements, allowing for a lot of customization. On top of being able to pick between multiple elemental alignments, you can also evolve each voidling to shoot different projectiles and gain new skills, prioritizing what you believe to be the best evolutionary path. These modifications are directly reflected in each voidling’s appearance, changing their color, body shape, and even giving them carapaces, spikes, extra appendages, and more.
As you progress through the game, you’ll also encounter voidling eggs, which can be taken back to your hub area to hatch, and depending on their rarity, might even reward you with a fully upgraded voidling. Some voidlings can also hatch with exceptional stats, which give them a boost in one of the five attribute categories, creating an incentive to always explore each mission area in search of hidden eggs and other collectibles.
This system goes even further as you unlock selective breeding and gene splicing, which allow you to introduce perks from other species onto your selected voidling. The game really opens up once that mechanic becomes available, as you’ll now be looking for potential in all other voidlings to create the perfect specimen.
Cleansing the Planet
The game’s mission structure is pretty simple, as you go to a planet, kill a bunch of lesion or lesion-infested enemies, and then fight a big boss. This repetition sets in pretty early, as the game doesn’t have much in terms of mid-run upgrades or randomization, but you do unlock a lot of meta upgrades as you climb through the game’s wrangler ranks, which provide a satisfying feeling of progression.
After defeating the final boss, a new game mode unlocks in the abyss region, serving as endless runs where you risk all the resources you acquired to tackle a series of increasingly-difficult randomized stages. This game mode really benefits from the game’s short-form mission structure, especially when you have an upgraded voidling who can tear through enemies easily, even if the bosses do have invincibility phases so you can’t kill them too fast.
Final Thoughts
Voidling Bound is a smooth third-person shooter that allows for a good bit of customization through its evolution system. The game’s regular mission structure is somewhat repetitive due to the lack of difficulty and limited objective types, but the Abyss helps give it a second wind thanks to its challenging modifiers and enemies that scale into higher levels.
Even though it features a somewhat small cast, Voidling Bound does a great job as a creature collector, providing a lot of meaningful ways to make progress without locking you behind long grinds or shoehorned roguelike mechanics. It’s pretty refreshing to play a game that’s basically feature-complete with nothing in place to stall your progress simply for the sake of extending its runtime, while also bringing in a lot of novelty thanks to the deep amount of customization it possesses.
Looking for more reviews to read? Be sure to visit this page and discover a wide range of informative and insightful reviews. Don’t miss out on the opportunity to gain valuable insights and make informed decisions.
