Beyond Citadel is a great retro FPS that I want to recommend to everybody and nobody
Beyond Citadel is a great indie FPS, and one I played through start to finish in just a couple days. It’s a game that I’d love to recommend to everybody, but also nobody. I feel it’s important to preface even a passing mention of this game with a colossal content warning: Beyond Citadel is a game by and for perverts. Both of the kind that want to be able to hold back the bolt on a sniper rifle and manually load in ammo, bypassing the magazine, and the kind that is deeply curious what those very same .50 caliber rounds can do to the barely-clad bodies of anime girls.
Beyond Citadel is FPS outsider art. Developed by solo Japanese dev Doekuramori, it’s the sequel to 2020’s The Citadel and feels like someone coming at a familiar genre with a truly fresh perspective. With similar understanding of the fundamentals (the developer has cited Bungie’s classic Marathon series as a key influence), but with clear mechanical obsessions and roots in extreme, transgressive anime art. While there are toggles to reduce the violence and the technical gun-handling elements, just be aware that those are part of the intended experience.
But for those wanting something raw, intense and a bit unsettling, there’s nothing else like it. The thrill of chewing through armies of enemies while having to juggle blood oxygen levels and whether the magazine you just quick-dropped on the ground mid-fight broke, then wading through a field of shattered bones and unraveled intestines is a one-of-a-kind ride. You might just need to be a little sicko to enjoy it fully.
Neon genesis
Beyond Citadel’s setting is an interesting one. Mankind is almost extinct. Primarily wiped out by an invading force of ‘demons’ that started punishing the sinful by turning them into pillars of salt. Then further wiped out by all of mankind’s cyborg soldiers being mind-controlled. It’s grim stuff, made more dreamlike through its almost Wolfenstein-esque blocky architecture, stark palette of greys and blues with red highlights, and the fact that most of its maps are semi-abstract structures floating in an endless void. This game has a vibe going on, elevated further by a moody and well-chosen soundtrack and a drip-feed of lore and dialogue with often uncomfortable implications.
There’s a lot going on mechanically here too. By default, weapons have pseudo-realistic handling rules, with separate buttons to cock your weapons and eject magazines to store them in your (mercifully auto-restocking) backpack before you can even think of reloading. Weapons have their own ballistic properties, armor penetration and bullet drop, and the maps and enemies are varied enough to force you to use your entire (massive) arsenal.
While early levels feel like claustrophobic Wolfenstein-style tunnel crawls, some later stages are open battlefields with enormous sight-lines, and enemy fire can come from any direction, and in many forms, thanks to a good range of human soldiers, robot units and an assortment of demonic monsters keeping the roster of targets fresh. And in a few levels, you get to really tear things up using mechs, tanks and a VTOL gunship. There is little limit to your capacity for violence.
As you progress through the campaign (a lengthy eight episodes, each with around six levels and a boss), you gradually unlock more abilities, like air-dashing and ledge-mantling that greatly increase mobility, and alternate weapons to fill each of the slots, so navigating those big spaces becomes a joy rather than a chore. While things strain a bit in the final stretches as the game hits the limits of its systems (the final episode introduces a whole new set of platforming-centric movement mechanics, and some late game enemies are very tanky), this is a game that has sights to show you. If you can stomach its depths.
The way of all flesh
I really cannot emphasise enough that Beyond Citadel is a game horny for violence. Yes, the protagonist wears little more than a helmet, tactical sports bra and a single strategically placed leather strap. Yes, you can find pin-up art of her in secret areas. And yes, you can see both her chest, legs and crotch if you crouch and look down in-game. And yet that’s secondary to the violence. Or at least inescapably tied to it. Even outside of combat, you sometimes find statues of her body, headless and split open like anatomical models, internal organs lovingly rendered in stone, throat and veins open to peer into.
In combat, the violence you visit upon your enemies is both clinical and laviscious. Wounded enemies will slump to their knees, panting heavily, eyes rolled back and tongues hanging out, waiting for you to finish the job. Skulls split open, limbs are sent flying. They can return the favour as well—if you die, you remain in first person until you respawn (your character uses expendable clone bodies as extra lives) to witness what happens to your own corpse as they pile more bullets into you. It is very explicit. This game is preoccupied with flesh, both in the good-touch sense, and the ‘we are all made of fragile meat’ sense, and I don’t think it draws much distinction between the two extremes.
Even Beyond Citadel’s healing system seems more aware of the human body than most games. While you can’t suffer locational damage, you restock your health in an emergency with (instantly activated) blood packs which leave you woozy, your aim swaying. A hit of oxygen will clear that up, while eating food stabilises both, albeit slower and allows for both to naturally regenerate faster. This is a game that, whether enthralled or repulsed by its aesthetic and thematic excesses, will give you something to think about in those quiet moments between the brutal hyperviolence. The fact that it’s able to balance twitchy, high-agility retro FPS combat with tactical detail and still leave room for ero-guro adjacent art is an impressive feat.
Beyond Citadel is a meaty (in every sense) game I greatly enjoyed, and will probably be chewing through in New Game Plus for a while. If my praise has left you more curious than repulsed, you might want to give it a look for yourself. Just don’t say you weren’t warned. Do not expect any punches pulled. Beyond Citadel is out now on Steam for £12.79/$14.99. Although for story’s sake (and it is an interesting one, minus a rough-edged translation), you might want to check out the original game first.
