- Publisher: Voidmaw , Acclaim, Inc.
- Release Date: Sep 10, 2025
- Critic score
- Publication
- By date
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Sep 16, 2025With light-speed combat, oodles of customisation, and slick presentation, this is one of those “just one more run” games that will consume all your time before you realise it.
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Oct 15, 2025While it’s not going to blow you away, Katanaut manages to surpass expectations, and it stands right there with some of the best in the genre. The gameplay and combat are very good, the visual style is stunning, and I am a huge fan of how you can easily customize every run. Katanaut feels very fulfilling, and there’s plenty of fun to be had, even if it’s not a long game.
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Sep 11, 2025Katanaut throws you into a cosmic bloodbath where every swing of your blade feels both desperate and exhilarating. It’s punishing, stylish, and a little grindy, but alongside Dunjungle, it’s one of the more gripping action roguelites out there.
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Sep 19, 2025Nothing about Katanaut screams originality, but the game’s particular combination of familiar elements comes together in an addictive package. There are a few minor annoyances, but nothing rises to the level of real frustration. Fans of side-scrolling Metroidvanias, retro-themed action games, and roguelites should have a great time with Katanaut.
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Sep 11, 2025Katanaut is an action roguelite that focuses heavily on the katana: quick and brutal slashes deliver great impact, with the ability to reload your firearm only by striking in melee, creating an aggressive and satisfying gameplay cycle. Melee weapons are complemented by laser rifles, railguns, and grenade launchers that diversify the runs. The extensive perk and power-up system offers spectacular synergies, but some cooldowns are too short, making certain builds overly powerful. The experience is penalized by procedural generation, which offers linear corridors or empty areas, aggravated by enemy AI. Visually polished, it's fun but remains imperfect.
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Sep 19, 2025It's not the most original game in the world, but it has a clear identity, and if it gets the right platform and the public can understand it, it could make its way into a particularly crowded indie game market. It's fun, immediate, and works, even if it doesn't bring anything new or innovative.
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Sep 11, 2025Katanaut is a perfectly fun but ultimately rather forgettable Dead Cells-style title. It's perfectly competent at what it sets out to do, and the strong presentation goes a long way, but at the end of the day, it doesn't manage to carve out its own identity. It's absolutely worth a shot if you're burned out on similar games, but don't expect quite as much replay value.
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Oct 10, 2025Katanaut is fast-paced, good-looking, and pretty fun despite its overall sci-fi horror tone.
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Sep 16, 2025Dripping with style and weird, mutated human entrails, Katanaut has a lot of promise in its great designs, but there's definite clunkiness in the combat.
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Sep 11, 2025Katanaut is a stylish, bloody, and fast-paced roguelike with a strong identity and straightforward mechanics. While its visual and audio flair excites, the game can feel held back by readability issues and an adherence to the Metroidvania format, which emphasizes backtracking in a game that otherwise wants to feel fast.
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Oct 9, 2025Katanaut looks good and has potential, and honestly, it’s getting better by the day. The developer has been dropping frequent updates that offer additions and enhancements that weren’t there when I first started playing, and the push and pull of going between melee and ranged during the action feels on point. However, there’s a lot of competition in the roguelike genre right now, and in order to succeed, Katanaut‘s going to need better handling of its story and adjustments to the grindy nature of the meta-progression. As it stands today, it didn’t land with me and I haven’t stuck with it, but that could change in the future with a few more patches and upgrades.
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Sep 15, 2025Katanaut delivers a stylish cosmic horror atmosphere and hints at an intriguing story inside a space station full of mutated horrors, but those elements never get enough room to grow thanks to the game’s relentless, fast-paced combat. While swordplay and gunfights are satisfying, the speed and constant action kill any sense of tension or dread that the setting tries to build. Players looking for scares or deeper lore may wish the game was slowed down to explore its world, but fans of quick, action-heavy roguelikes will find the mechanics solid and replayable. It’s a technically impressive indie with promise, though its horror gets overshadowed by non-stop adrenaline, making it a slightly above average experience in general.