It takes a little bit of bravery and a whole lot of guts to make a game that so openly evokes Mega Man X as one of its primary inspirations. The second that a game references Capcom’s legendary 1993 SNES spin-off (and its many sequels), its developers are inviting comparisons to one of the most beloved and legendary action-platformers ever made. And, occasionally, those comparisons are less than flattering. After all, try as it might, how could another game stack up to the likes of Mega Man X? Most games that attempt to recapture its brilliance understand the aesthetics but don’t quite hit the mark when it comes to the actual mechanics and gameplay. Ultimately, it’s the satisfyingly kinetic rhythm to Mega Man X that makes it one of the best games ever made, and miraculously, it’s something that Super Alloy Crush seems to understand.
Coming from indie developer Alloy Mushroom, Super Alloy Crush is a roguelite action-platformer that wears its love for Mega Man X loud and proud on its sleeve. And after spending a good deal of time with it in its current Early Access launch, I’m happy to report that it sits right alongside similar games like 30XX as an endlessly replayable action-platformer that bears plenty of resemblance to the best parts of Capcom’s 16-bit Mega Man X games, but also does enough on its own to not end up as a derivative carbon copy. Most surprising is how well Super Alloy Crush blends the sensibilities of a modern beat ’em up with the swift movement and fluidity of the Mega Man series, all while layering in the roguelite progression and structure that give it the classic “just one more run” feeling the best games in the genre have.
Combat is Where Super Alloy Crush Punches Up
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When booting up Super Alloy Crush for the first time, the combat is something that immediately stands out and is the first thing to “click”, offering up a supremely satisfying mix of fluid, swift movement, ranged attacks, and crunchy, beat ’em up-inspired melee fighting. Splitting up the action between two playable characters, each with their own ability suites and combat sandbox, goes a long way toward making each run feel unique, and that they both already feel fun to play as (and are surprisingly different from one another) is a great sign for Super Alloy Crush‘s future development while it’s in Early Access. Like the games that so clearly inspired it, Super Alloy Crush‘s moment-to-moment gameplay emphasises speed and aggression, but there’s a controlled nature to all the chaos unfolding on screen that makes each encounter feel simultaneously exhilarating and tactical.
Doubly so for boss encounters, which, as you’d expect in a spectacle fighter, are where Super Alloy Crush shines brightest and gives players plenty of opportunity for skill expression. Notably, though, they do serve to highlight one of the more noticeable issues with Super Alloy Crush in its current Early Access state, which is its somewhat skewed balancing. The regular cannon-fodder enemies that players encounter in each stage can be torn through like tissue paper, even in your first few runs, while bosses are downright damage sponges. Thankfully, though, some simple tweaks to enemy health on the part of developer Alloy Mushroom is all it would take to correct course on something like that, which is honestly one of the only gripes I currently have about the game’s encounter design.
Super Alloy Crush’s Visuals and Performance Hit Their Mark
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If Super Alloy Crush gets a solid B+/A- on its report card in terms of being able to capture the “feel” of a game like Mega Man X, it gets a glowing A+ on its visuals and presentation. Right from the get-go, Super Alloy Crush jumps off the screen — both on desktop and on Steam Deck — with some incredible pixel art that really goes above and beyond what its $12 price point might suggest, and its soundtrack is no slouch either. That it all runs flawlessly, regardless of where you’re playing it, is the icing on the cake. There’s also the expected settings that players can tweak when firing up Super Alloy Crush for the first time, like the ability to turn on a CRT filter and curve the screen, to give it an even more authentically “old-school” appearance.
Of course, all of this would be for naught if Super Alloy Crush‘s art direction were phoned in. Thankfully, that’s not the case. While there are plenty of genre tropes to be found here as an anime-inspired beat ’em up roguelite (grating, pixie-adjacent heroines, giant robots, anthropomorphic animal threats), they’re all executed to such an impressive degree that you can forgive the use of some pretty well-tread tropes because of how good the game looks when it’s in action. This is one where the screenshots, as good as they look, really don’t do Super Alloy Crush justice in terms of what the moment-to-moment action looks like when it’s unfolding in front of your eyes.
In Early Access, There’s a Lot of Content to Tackle, Even if Balance Issues Persist
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If Super Alloy Crush were already a pretty decent hybrid between something like Mega Man X and Final Fight, it only ratchets up the fun and replayability by tossing in a compelling roguelike structure and meta-progression. There’s a story here, to be sure, but it’s mostly throwaway anime-inspired sci-fi nonsense that ultimately goes nowhere and doesn’t add anything inherently valuable to the experience. Instead, Super Alloy Crush is a game that lives and dies by its moment-to-moment gameplay, and that it incentivizes players to continue pushing through challenging bits by dangling some persistent and rewarding upgrades and enhancements to your combat sandbox (all of which can be used on subsequent runs) makes it hard to put down.
Of course, this is still an Early Access title, and there are some caveats that players should be aware of at this stage in the game’s development and release. Most of the regular enemies are, again, easily dispatched, but Super Alloy Crush adjusts their difficulty in later areas not by introducing new tactics or different enemy types, but by simply throwing more of them at you. The amount of visual clutter on-screen and difficulty of pinpointing your position can occasionally be overwhelming, especially with all the other visual effects that are firing off during combat. Additionally, boss enemies see their difficulty adjusted in an arguably worse, but equally as arbitrary way: via HP increases. As fun as the boss fights are, some of them can be downright damage sponges, which is neither challenging nor enjoyable to have to endure.
Retro Game Enthusiasts Should Give Super Alloy Crush a Shot
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Some players can be turned off by the “Early Access” label, whether that be from having been previously burned by an unfinished project or simply wanting to wait until a game is in a more complete, 1.0 launch to experience what it has to offer. Super Alloy Crush succeeds as an Early Access title that’s already delivering plenty of worthwhile content, even if it does have some time left in the oven and small tweaks necessary to bring it to a more finely-tuned state. Where Super Alloy Crush shines is in its willingness to push beyond being mere nostalgia bait, delivering an experience that’s mechanically satisfying and fun to play beneath all of its obvious Mega Man X inspiration.
If Alloy Mushroom continues to polish the experience by fine-tuning the balance, expanding content offerings, and making some subtle refinements to the pacing and progression loop, Super Alloy Crush will become as essential a Mega Man X roguelike as 30XX. And if any of that sounds appealing, you can support the project now by jumping in during Early Access and likely have a ton of fun doing so.