Sometimes I like to take a chance on games I’m not certain I’ll like at shows, and that was certainly the case with The Riftbreaker. All I knew was that it involved a giant mech suit and being stuck on an alien planet. I hadn’t done a deep dive other than that, so I decided to roll the dice. Thankfully, I quickly learned that not only was The Riftbreaker my type of game, it quickly planted itself on my radar of great upcoming titles.

The story of the game goes thus. You play Captain Ashley S. Nowak, the titular Riftbreaker. You’re a scientist and an elite commando in one bad ass package. Part of that bad assery comes from your massive Mech-Suit you ride around in. A one way portal has stranded you on Galatea 37, at the distant end of the Milky Way. Your goal is to use tools you find and to build a base that gets you back home to Earth.

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The demo broke down into two main components – building and combat. In between these you explore the alien planet looking for resources. It’s almost a hybrid of tower defense with ARPG, and it works surprisingly well. I had a lot of fun wandering around, getting into fights with alien monsters and generally making a mess of things. I found the combat incredibly fluid and just fun, swinging around giant blades and firing clip after clip of ammunition into throngs of foes.

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On the opposite side is the construction / tower defense, where you build various facilities to help and defend yourself. It was very intuitive and easy to understand. By the very end of the demo, I thought I was well situated, and instead got completely overrun by a swarm of alien beasts.

I had a lot of fun demoing The Riftbreaker at E3 2019. While I wasn’t that familiar with EXOR Studios before, they’ll certainly be on my radar from now on. If you think this looks interesting, you’ll be pleased that it’s coming to PC, PS4 and XBOX 1 sometime in 2020.