Fusion Paradox from Sometimes You and Nikolai Usachev is a top-down twin-stick roguelike on PlayStation 5. Learn more about it in our Fusion Paradox review!

Fusion Paradox from Sometimes You and Nikolai Usachev is a top-down twin-stick roguelike on PlayStation 5. As you start your journey, a hologram of what seems to be a scientist tells you that you might be suffering from temporal amnesia. His name is Dr. Gilt, and he’s an artificial intelligence. Oh, and that you’re in the lab of the Supernatural Threat Reduction Agency. Why? Because a year ago, archeologists discovered a peculiar sarcophagus on the East bank of the Jordan River that made all devices start acting weird, while affecting the minds of those near it. The sarcophagus had an essence that radiated two kinds of energy. One vibrated at a frequency that was the same as our world. The other had the opposite frequency.

The woman inside the sarcophagus looked as if she was alive and well and could wake up from her slumber at any moment. She was named Anat, after the mythical Goddess of Warr, due to the spear she was found holding tightly in her hands. Once the sarcophagus was delivered to the Agency, weird things started to happen. Some otherworldly objects and essences started to materialize, activating centuries-old objects. Magical spells could even be conjured! Unfortunately, one day there was a huge energy spike that made the Agency’s equipment malfunction… and Anat finally opened her eyes! One by one the staff began to lose their minds.

In order for you to be able to preserve your sanity, the Agency exposed you to Anat’s energy. Thanks to this, you’re the only sane person left in the entire facility, and are tasked with neutralizing Anat before she gets too powerful to be contained. While the FBI and the police were called into action due to the Agency’s code red, the security system recognized them as a threat and immediately blocked access. On top of being made from a bullet-proof material, the Agency’s doors are also protected by a magical forcefield.

You’ll be shown the ropes by Sam, who will act as the trainer. With this one being a twin-stick shooter, your character will move around each area with the left analog stick while you aim with the right one. Dashing is mapped to the Circle and L1 buttons. This is a very important ability, since you’re going to be invincible while dashing. You can dash through obstacles of the opposite color to avoid any damage, or you can change color and move through obstacles of your same color.

Once you have a weapon, you’ll fire it with the R1 button. You can reload with the Square button, or wait for the game to automatically reload for you once you’ve run out of bullets. Switch between weapons by using the D-Pad, pressing left and right as needed. You can change colors between yellow and blue by pressing the R2 button. This is important not only for avoiding obstacles, but also for staying alive! Each of your colors has its own energy count, which will act as your hit points. Keep this in mind because if you collect a healing heart with the color that has full HP, this won’t heal the other color! You will also need to change colors to defeat enemies that vibrate on the same frequency of the yellow and blue energies.

As you explore the Agency’s building, you will end up finding guardian statues. These will act as portals to secret rooms with keys. To activate each of the guardians statues you run into, you’ll have to find and destroy the rune in the room with that particular guardian statue. Each floor will have large chests with magic knowledge, for which you’ll have to find a magic key of the matching color. Spells that come from a yellow chest will be active when you’re in a yellow state. As expected, spells from a blue chest will be active when you’re in a blue state. There are also red ones that will always work.}

These spells change for each run, so you won’t know what you’re going to be rewarded with. You might find a red spell that boosts your max ammo, which can come in handy when dealing with some of the more crowded rooms. Open a yellow chest, and you could be rewarded with a fireproof suit that will completely protect you against fire damage. Or you could open up a blue chest and find a cold strike, which has a 3% chance of freezing the enemy when dealing damage. And if you find a permanent boost to your health, speed, damage, or dash… run and grab it!

The coins that you collect during your run can be used at the special shop room you can find along the way. The more coins you obtain, the better your odds of buying the best available gear to defeat the possessed and the bosses you’ll find in each area. You could add some armor to protect your character from damage. You could buy some ammo for your weapons. You could even buy way more powerful weapons that will certainly pack a punch!

Fusion Paradox has a full trophy list with a Platinum trophy waiting for you. The list includes 2 Bronze trophies, 2 Silver trophies, and 10 Gold trophies for you to work on. The first trophy to pop will be for completing your training. After that, the objectives to complete for the Platinum trophy include changing your color 50 times, breaking 10 crystals, eliminating 500 possessed, defeating the boss at each area for the first time, unlocking a portal to a secret room, finding a key for a spell chest, opening a spell chest, opening 15 spell chests, finding Anat, and defeating Anat.

Fusion Paradox from Sometimes You and Nikolai Usachev is a top-down twin-stick roguelike in which you’ll need to defeat the evil Anat before she consumes everything everyone at the Supernatural Threat Reduction Agency. As the last sane person at the Agency who didn’t fall under Arat’s control, you’ll have to collect weapons to defeat enemies and bosses, complete secret puzzle rooms to obtain keys to open chests that grant you spells for that run, and even collect permanent upgrades to be able to stand a chance. Fusion Paradox is out on PlayStation 5 with a $9.99 asking price. There’s also a PlayStation 4 version of the game available as a separate purchase for the same price.

Disclaimer
This Fusion Paradox review is based on a PlayStation 5 copy provided by Sometimes You.