Do you play shooter games and have a knack for handling colorful balls? With the game Gun Chain you get both!

I’ve never played a game like this before. I’m typically not much for shooter games or matching games, but the devs asked for a review so I thought I’d give this one a try. The idea is to shoot the orbs and make combos of three or more to remove them from a long, preordained path that leads to an explosion and the end of the universe. Don’t lose, all of space and time is counting on you! For what? No idea.

Mechanics are simple. Only a few commands for shooting and gun swapping and so forth. There are different levels of difficulty and boss stages. The boss fights aren’t really explained, but after a few tries one can figure that color-matching is basically to key to all of them as is the theme of the game.

I’m not sure if they’re going for a practice shooter or a puzzle game. It’s as if they wanted both and tried to hybrid, but I’m not sure how successful it was. I ran into a lot of glitches. A particularly annoying one was where the sniper gun mode wouldn’t leave zoom even after I was no longer using zoom or the sniper gun and that really limited your vision for doing much of anything. I tried restarting the level, nothing changed. Ended up having to close the entire game. I had the game fully crash on me at least once. Rather than release this game, I feel like the game should have been tested more putting it on the steam market. I will say I’ve noticed a lot of updates since my acquisition and I’d assume the developers are hard at work correcting many of these glitches. [But sniper mode was fun—when it worked.]

My main complaint is the game doesn’t really make sense to me. There was an attempt at some sort of “motivational story” or something with the end of the world death message business, but it simply confused me, and I personally found the music wanting. I was also disappointed when I fell into a trench and couldn’t get out. Do not go swimming.

I wish I could have given this a better review. I think this is a good start on a game, but rather than push to release it, the game should have been tested and further polished. The price is steep with the number of glitches I encountered. As it stands currently though, I would not recommend spending money on this game without a discount.

Achievement Hunter’s Note: Glance over the achievements to have a general idea where to be on the lookout for.
Achievement Acquisition Difficulty: Easy+

This game was received for free via the VR curator program from this lovely group >HERE<. It was played on the Valve Index HMD & controllers (and briefly on desktop - I was curious, typical me!)

Right out of the gate I have to say that unfortunately the game just doesnt feel finished, with missing options, bugs, and a general lack of QA.

Performance was a surprise. First session was using 120Hz and 180SS, in game settings can be seen here -> https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2086495249 These were the default, everything on and set to High. The only thing I changed was "Detail Distance" from "0" to "X4"
The result was approximately 40% of my time was spent at 60fps. I found it playable, but a surprise that the game required so much power. I tried briefly on desktop, but the game would not save my resolution of 4K, sticking to 1080p. With the same settings shown, I was getting 300fps.
A second session in VR was tried using the default SS of 150%, and default in game settings. This kept me at 120fps 97% of the time. Bottom line, the game needs quite a lot of power to run, but the settings make a strong impact.
I am shocked at the CPU usage! Typical desktop gaming can see an average of 25% usage, VR 33%, VR physics heavy games in the 40%s. This game was bouncing between 50% & 80%!! Mildly OC'd 2080ti and 9700K. The store page does not have VR requirements, I think entry level hardware (GTX970/1060) will need lower settings on 1st gen hardware (*90Hz). I would recommend something stronger if you are past 1st gen HMD. As for the CPU, i7-4970K or better (Anything Ryzen5 and up)

Gameplay - The mechanics and goal of this game are good at times. Think Puzzle bobble in 3D with guns! The truth is, when I play a bad VR game I am often pining to get a review over with and turn it off, but I did find some enjoyment here, with more of a feeling of annoyance that this really could be a decent game with some more development time. As you get into the game more, you unlock more guns and you get introduced to enemies. Shooting an enemy with a like colour bullet with get you a fireball powerup that lets you destroy a bunch of orbs (or damage a boss). I am not sold on the assault rifle which just has you burn ammo firing to destroy orbs - rather than trying to match up colours to chain destroy them.

Bugs are sprinkled all around. You might aim your gun down while at the menu only to have the pointer disappear. Teleporting can lead you in get into some odd places, such as inside a structure. When I was trying this game in desktop mode it wouldnt save my resolution setting - there is no apply button, so even though it did change to 4K, as soon as I backed out of the menu it reverted to 1080p.

Other negatives include the lack of loco options. Its teleport and snap turn only. They do have quick teleport locations in levels to assist you getting around, but adding full free loco would have been so much better.
I found the gun was angled wrong, see here -> https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2086493120 Holding the gun as I would normally had the gun tilted maybe 30 degrees towards the ground.

The fact is, there is a good game in here. It might be worth checking the notes if you are reading this review at a later date for updates/patches, because if the issues I came across are fixed I would say this game should be considered and a fair price too.

While rough around the edges, this game surprised me.

I played for almost an hour and a half on 1 "sitting" i kept saying "ok one last level" and i ended up playing like 10 of them!

The game mechanics are easy to understand. You have a pistol that shoots colored balls, a series of balls are slowly advancing, if you send a ball and it links with +2 balls of the same color, then those balls pop.

Your end goal is to pop all the balls before they reach the Goal.

So basically its like the ZUMA games. Except this in 1st person, you have to move around the levels to get a better view of the balls and have an easier time aiming. And you also get a rifle that can shoots balls and destroy them, this tool is great because you can easily destroy balls that are in your way and setup combos.

I got this game with a hefty discount, and i was more than surprised.

While the game could use some polish (specifically better map design, clearer tutorial, polishing menus and storyline, water reflections looked horrible, and some other small details) the price i (~$0.50 is an absolute steal.

I didnt find game breaking bugs, but the game does feel clunky at times, fortunately not that much during gameplay. It is an indie endeavor and it shows, but the game WORKS, and personally i found its downsides being not that important.

Recommended for anyone that enjoy the ZUMA kind of games. It really is a simple game and its price when on sale is really worth it.

I really want to like this game... But it really disappointed me. I love the concept, but the execution is what makes it come crumbling down. The game needs loads of polish to really justify the $14.99 price tag. The fireball doesn't even make a sound when launched, and the "Fireball ready" voice just cuts off. The worst part is the fact that it feels like a Unity asset flip. The text elements weren't even replaced. This doesn't say that it is in Early Access, when it really should be. I love marble shooters, and I was hyped for this one... I can't' believe you released it in this unfinished state.

Gun Chain is an unusual attempt at making a VR orientated 3D rendered ripoff of Puzzle Bobble (copyright Taito, 1994). The developers did not acknowledge Taito in the game credits. Gameplay consists of shooting coloured balls at other coloured balls. Match-3 and they disappear, helping you protect your mission goal as you jump around on platforms and play Puzzle Bobble in 3D.

The game is made from a bunch of stock Unity assets (and a Unity FPS engine) and a large number of unattributed audio clips, and as usual where "developers" take the work of other, actual, real, competent developers and pretend that it's their own, this is plagiarism and is unethical and dishonest.

The concept has some legs but the copyright infringing implementation, low poly graphics, and cash grab tactics from the developer make this utterly unrecommendable.

The guns point up to the ceiling and then wanders aimlessly like it has a mind of its own. No matter what I tried I couldn't get it to play properly. (Not that I put in all that much time)

A novel idea, but it could use more polish. Having to move around can be annoying at times, but it allows you to change your vantage point, the lack of which has often annoyed me in games like the old Zuma. The enemies and powerups are also a welcome addition. The worlds are quite pretty but the gun shot sounds are pretty awful. The music also does not match some of the levels and is very generic. I did get the bug where you get stuck with the scope field, and the lobby gets very choppy, so be mindful of cranking up the settings. But I got what I expected and paid for, so I'm satisfied.

The main game is fun..... BUT
- My gun points down for some reason, while teleport points forward. To shoot I aim to the skies, which is very awkward and tiring.
- It has some special stages where you shoot little demons that fly at you slowly. These are not fun at all and you can just unload on them until the right color appears.
- the menu works correctly every other full moon. One of the following will usually happen: no guns, no pointers, no pointers only when you need to point, gun frozen in front of me.
- Loading screen is a black square that follows your face and covers things that are closer to it. Looks very untested.

I put up with the jank in the easier levels, but there are good VR games out there now, so there's no reason to play this anymore.

This game is pretty good. It takes one of my favorite genres and turns it into a 3d FPS.

There are some orb enemies that you must shoot (Pretty creative)
and the visuals of a chain of orbs just coming over the forest you're in is just amazing.

There seems to be so much good, but there are several things I dislike about this, and that is it seems rushed just a little bit.

Although it has improved over the past few days since release, there a still a few problems, and one of the big ones is that you cannot progress past the tank boss.

This feels like an Early Access game, but it's not.
There are many small bugs that hinder the experience a bit.

Edit:
Coming back a few years later and I see the price slashed by more than 90% ($1 at time of edit)
This game is now pretty under priced despite the bugs. In its current state I'd probably value it at $5-$6 If this game had more polish and optimization, it would certainly be worth $10 at least.

Some more details I noticed after coming back to the game is the music sometimes not looping, and the camera snapping to the end of a chain after you finish it is way more jarring than I remember.
The critical ball system is also more annoying than helpful, as it seems near random when you get one.
Speaking of random, it feels completely random what weapon you get ammo for when you pick up ammo.