Dread Templar is one of those games that, for the first hour or so, feels like pure bliss. Refreshing ideas are being dropped in left and right, enemy variety and challenge feels just right, and the whole thing is wrapped together with satisfying gameplay. However, the more you play it beyond that, the more the cracks start to show. Some of the initial praise still holds true, but much of it quickly deteriorates until you're left with a game that, by the end, you just want to be over.

Credit where it's due, the visuals are the strongest point by far. They're this weird mix between Quake and Blood West, though in a way that helps it feel both distinct and at times beautiful. Environments are wholly unique, and each episode has a very distinct style that, for the first few episodes, feels like a natural progression. The later episodes can feel like serious tonal shifts for reasons I'll explain more soon, but they're still beautiful in their own right.

The sound design is also very well done. The weapons each sound quite punchy with some heavy bass accompanied by impact, and of course there's a "HUH" on every jump as all boomer shooters should have. The soundtrack is also excellent, with the relatively unknown John S Weekley showing off some serious skill.

...However, the game doesn't quite do his soundtrack justice. While the tracks themselves are great, most tracks are used as the only background audio (and constant background audio, may I add) for two straight missions... which each last 10-20 minutes. This means that, best case scenario, you're listening to the same constant song for 20 minutes straight. By that point, the song just becomes grating. I get that the budget for music may have been tight, but having the music be constant rather than used sparingly was a deliberate choice that seriously harmed the audio.

Gameplay also quickly devolves into the same process over and over again. Enemies work off either spawning of through line of sight detection, and most run straight at you with a mad sprint. This means every fight goes the same way. You run into the room, spawn or aggro all enemies, then consistently walk backward while firing into the group till all are dead. From there, you head through that room, head into the next, and repeat the process. There are a couple times where this wasn't the case, but these were the exception rather than the standard. It caused the game to become very, very repetitive which is already a common problem with games like this.

For what it's worth, there is quite a lot of side content combined with an upgrade system that genuinely rewards exploration. Each weapon gets two upgrade slots along with a super upgrade slot of sorts, completely changing the function of that weapon. These require certain items and to physically find the upgrades which does feel welcome, especially when I can completely transform something like the super shotgun into a crowd deleter. I do wish the stat boosts were more impactful, but you take the good with the bad.

The cherry on top, and again a common problem with boomer shooters, is the length. The first three episodes feel fairly cohesive despite outstanding issues, though it's clearly obvious that they saw these initial outings took 4-5 hours and scrambled to get more content in. Episodes 4 and 5 feel grossly disjointed from the rest of the game, with more random locales compared to the first three episodes. Again, the visual fidelity is there, but something's lost in the progression. Instead of being some welcome additional content, it ends up only drawing more attention to the glaring flaws of Dread Templar, and ended up dragging down my score.

I still enjoyed my time with Dread Templar since the gunplay is genuinely satisfying and again, the game is beautiful. However, it leaves a lot to be desired and could've been a much better game with some changes in key areas. Instead, it's an experience I'll mostly forget ever happened.