After several hours in this game, I have come mainly to one conclusion. I feel bad for the money I spent. The game is basically a mediocre shooter with mobile style controls (you autoaim nonstop with almost no control over where to aim) and there is a horrible grind to it.

The graphics are servicable, the sound is servicable, nothing breathtaking. It's not technically *bad*. It just makes you wonder after paying 15 bucks what you paid for.

The writing in the game contains errors after you switch to english, typos or even words leftover in french. There are no mouse controls but the game has buttons...? Why?

Furthermore, the biggest challenge in the game is either being overwhelmed by enemies because you didn't grind enough to get better weapons, of which there are only 3 main weapons locked to shiptypes, minus the skills you use, OR the fact that some enemies can simply outright murder you without you having any chance to fight back. Some basic enemies can oneshot you with insanely fast missiles and they don't fire a single one, no, they fire several. Also they can and will fire from offscreen and they fly faster than anything else in this game, making dodging impossible.

So you die randomly.

Then you grind so you don't die. And even after that you still die. <- this is the non fun part

The grind consists of running the same missions over and over again on easy mode, because there is literally no point in going for medium or hard since you get the same payout. And then you make like... in the beginning about 300 stars maybe? Middle game 700? depends where you grind and how good you are. And then you have upgrades that give you tiny advantages that cost you like 3000+ stars.

Grind. Die. Repeat.

Eventually you progress, which is not something you can really enjoy because all the game does is throw more enemies at you. I rarely had a moment where I can say "I got here because of skill, not luck". This is what pains me. The bossfights are decent, those are actually fun. They are not random. The bosses don't use unreasonable weapons to artificially make the game hard. The rest of the game is just a slog.

For 12,49€... yeah, I should have gotten something better. The quality is not there and the game is ultimately not motivating.

I can't say I recommend it. It's a top down shooter where enemies spawn in waves, it might have been good if it was released 25 years ago but it doesn't really compete with similar modern offerings. It's very short and repetitive at 15$, and there's a pretty big lack of polish, like no in-game volume controls or control mappings, and I had to set the default language. For length, has "difficulty is content" as a mechanic, and I got to the "Epilogue" in 4 hours.
The graphics are okay for this kind of game
The music is good but repetitive
The gameplay is mediocre, but the difficulty is decent challenge
There are other games with similar gameplay that are just better.

Unlike other reviewers for this game, I don't mind the grindiness of the title. There's enough upgrades and such that it makes it worth it for a player like me whose a fan of shmups, particularly games like Sky Force, which I find this title to be very reminiscent of. I play this while I've got lengthy youtube playlists rolling on my other monitor. It's a good pick up and play space shmup. I also think the price point is just right for the length and replayability.

Only cons are that sometimes the autoaim can become a hinderance when you're trying to take down a larger ship that's spawning endless swarms of tiny ones. Tends to go for the swarm rather than the spawning mechanism... later on you can unlock black holes that can aid in pulling the swarm away enough to hit the spawner, but it feels a bit cumbersome.

The other con.. and I don't know if this is just me because I havent seen anyone else bring this up, but I can't make this game 1920x1080. Even in full screen, it looks like the resolution is at half that with a giant black border... so I end up playing in windowed mode. The game options are no help in this department as there are NO video setting options. Probably a deal breaker for some.

Top down spaceship shooter, enemies look cool and come in waves. Lots of upgrades, but definitely will take a good grindy while to get - repeat missions for more currency and shump your way to Victory
https://youtu.be/mOnXyOT97cM

I don't get the negative reviews.
This game is exactly as advertised.
Nice action, very nice visuals and really good sound design.
The upgrade system and resource collecting adds good motivation.

*Got a key from a Giveaway*

Early time with Space Avenger is pretty good. It started out a little slow but once you get some upgrades and get going it is pretty fun. It is all about the upgrades in this one. You will be repeating missions to earn more currency to buy more upgrades which will allow you to get further into the game. There seems to be quite a lot of missions here and a casual story to keep things moving.

Only draw back so for is keyboard only controls. (not sure about a controllers) but no mouse controls what so ever. This game could be even more fun with the classic "wasd" movement and mouse shooting. Because it is keyboard only there is an auto targeting system and a lot of times it will target an enemy your are not necessarily shooting for. I have not been able to figure out how to change targets manually. I really hope they will add mouse controls.

If you enjoy the grind and space shooters there is enough quality here to enjoy your time with it. There are side missions also to change things up. Pew pew upgrade repeat. A tried and true formula I do enjoy, if you do give it a go!

Code supplied by the developer free of charge.

THIS IS NOT A REVIEW, THIS IS A FIRST IMPRESSIONS TAKE ON THE FIRST HOUR OR SO OF THE GAME. I have a video version of my impressions here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHvSCOkdJeY
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Space Avenger - Empire of Nexx is a top-down spaceship arena shooter.

And it’s not very good.

So the game is described as a “rogue arena shooter”, which implies roguelike, except only by the loosest definition can I possibly consider this a roguelike/lite. There isn't any synchronous turn-based combat (enemies and the player moving at the same time), procedural generation, or perma-death. Instead, you're just strafing around relatively small, empty arenas (other than a few asteroids you can blow up for items) through a linear mission system collecting stars for currency and then retaining said currency after you die. Stars are used to upgrade your ship, which is necessary to make your gameplay experience more tolerable rather than fun since the ship you start with is painfully weak and enemies are bullet sponges that can kill you within seconds, more on that later.

The game seems like a twin-stick shooter based on Steam screenshots, and why wouldn't it be, it is a top-down shmup in space with free movement. But it isn't a twin-stick. In fact, there is no right stick or mouse support at all! Upon clicking a profile to play when I launched the game - the language also started in French for some reason - it tabbed me out of the game entirely. Clearly the game is unfinished, what with its numerous script typos and translation mistakes throughout the English version. Even in the damn press release, there were typos. No rebindable keys, (ESDF instead of WASD), little in terms of options like resolution (there is none) and the option to turn off the music doesn’t even work!

Oh my god, we’re not even done yet, I still haven’t talked about the gameplay. The game uses a lock-on system to make up for (not really) not having as much control as you would in a twin-stick. You lock onto a target as soon as it appears on screen but you can’t disable the lock, you can only change to other targets. So if you’re in the middle of blowing up asteroids - which for some reason takes ages to destroy - and enemies spawn on screen, your ship will get flipped around to engage the enemies. Another problem is that the lock-on only works with the camera, not your shooting, so it’s completely pointless to have. Mouse or right-stick control would’ve been nicer. Worse, if an enemy repeatedly enters and exits your screen, it will cycle the lock-on. Meaning you will be doing 360 turns because the game removes total control from you when this happens, completely throwing you off.

It doesn’t even end there, one of the other worst parts about the game is the no-hit invincibility. When you take damage, you don’t get immunity to the next immediate shot. Now, imagine a single enemy firing 3 shots at once in a volley that can do 1-2 damage each with a life bar that can only take 6-8 damage (depending on upgrades early on) and now imagine multiple enemies attacking in sync at once starting at level one. Within a single second if you get caught in a volley you will die, even at full health. Meaning that one simple mistake will force a restart and since some levels have such slow spawning for the enemies, it just preys on your patience. You can’t zombie out and play the game for its simple mechanics because of stuff like this even though the game is super bare-bones and simplistic. On keyboard, it is downright unplayable. This also limits gameplay because now you can’t have too many enemy types or enemies on screen in fear of unbalanced difficulty. It’s a total mess.

The game doesn’t have the depth nor simplicity to enjoy in any scenario. It’s frustratingly boring and it’s shocking to me this game has a publisher. I remember when that used to mean something.

The translation is bad, but I could overlook that if the gameplay were any good. Unfortunately, the keyboard control scheme is awful and the game doesn't support key remapping. I assume this game was a minimal-effort port of the Switch version, with no real effort to make it playable via keyboard.

Movement controls are bound to the arrow keys, so you're out of luck if you happen to prefer WASD. On top of that, secondary controls are mapped to ESDF instead of WASD, so if your fingers naturally fall to WASD while gaming, you'll continually feel like your fingers are in the wrong place.

The soundtrack is pretty good.
Shooting feels a little wonky due to the auto-targeting.
Enemies are pretty interesting.
The upgrade system is solid but it definitely emphasizes the grind.
Probably a little pricey.
Wish I could give it a thumb sideways.

https://youtu.be/J0ZVMewGnXA

you have to grind a little, but fun :)