Game Review: CROSSBOW: Bloodnight (Xbox Series X)

Sometimes the simplest ideas are the best and CROSSBOW: Bloodnight is a very simple game. Giving the player a high-powered crossbow, putting you in a circular arena, and throwing waves of enemies at you. The goal? Survive as long as you can. It’s as straight-forward as that.

It’s the epitome of an arcade shooter, and developer Hyperstrange has worked hard to perfect what it offers here. Which isn’t much, but it is satisfying. Especially as the weapon you have is no normal crossbow.

It has several different modes of fire – rapid, spread, and explosive, and to stave off the hordes of beasties rampaging towards you, you’re going to have to learn to use each effectively and in timely manner. The latter is so important as the enemies are varied, and as the timer ticks away, tougher and tougher variants arrive. Thankfully, if it all starts to feel like it’s getting too much, a special attack that reloads every 45-seconds can get you out of bother, albeit briefly.

Briefly because CROSSBOW: Bloodnight wants to kill you and it will, eventually. Especially as each enemy has different attacks and should you let the arena fill up too much, you will be caught by one of them. Be it the standard zombie shuffling about, the werewolf dashing around, the mass of flesh spitting out flying monstrosities, and more. That pretty much every enemy kills you in one hit makes death all the more likely.

You will die… a lot, but each time, you will survive for that little bit longer and that’s what keeps you coming back for more. The experience, while limited, is incredibly morish and you’ll just want to have one more go.

The gameplay does impress, but it’s not alone as the gothic visuals of both arenas look good and the enemy design is suitably horrifying. The game runs really well too, and even at its busiest (enemy wise) there is no drop in performance. In fact, from all the technical aspects, the only thing lacking is the music which doesn’t fit the frantic and desperate fight to survive that is this game.

It won’t last long, a couple of hours at most if you’re achievement hunting, but for the price and the addictive fun factor, it’s well worth playing.