• Price: $29.99 USD (digital); $34.99 (physical via Limited Run Games; $124.99 for the physical collector’s edition)
• Developer: 13AM Games
• Publisher: WayForward
• Release Date: March 15, 2022

A review code was kindly provided by WayForward on behalf of 13AM Games. We thank them for being able to cover something they’ve worked so hard on.

Dawn of the Monsters (DotM) has you confront “Nephilim,” frightening kaiju monsters that have taken over cities and forced the citizens to flee. The game opens with a news report on a group of “Nephilim” that have broken through the walls protecting the city of New Toronto. A response team from the Defense Alliance Worldwide Network (DAWN) must defend the city using their own “colossal combatant” monsters.

DotM features the work of many prominent voice actors, including AmaLee (Attack on Titan), Cristina Valenzuela (Shantae, RWBY), Xander Mobus (Persona 5), and Patrick Seitz (JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure). Additionally, the game includes art from Shiji Nishikawa and Matt Frank (both involved with Godzilla) as well as EJ Su (Transformers and Rise of Ultraman). The start menu includes a gallery of art from these impressive contributors!

They designed four different kaiju for you to control; two are the more heavyweight monsters, while the other two are less bulky and more humanoid. I preferred to use one of the humanoid options, Aegis Prime. Fortunately, the game does not force you to use specific monsters for certain missions. You can use any of them for any stage.

Each character has a light attack, a heavy attack, and a dash attack. Then you have rage attacks, which use energy you’ve accumulated from damaging enemies and being damaged yourself. There are three different kinds of rage attacks for each monster. Finally, there are the cataclysm attacks, which is the strongest attack option available; you build up the cataclysm meter by using your rage attacks.

The manual for the game explains how to use different abilities, and even has short clips showing how things work in the manual’s window. There’s an instant kill ability that can be triggered, which can restore HP. You can also pick up buildings or active power lines and use them to bash your opponents (apparently, as the areas have been evacuated, we can go wild with property damage to destroy the Nephilim 😮).

When you return to base after each stage, you can use DNA Augments to give your monsters additional abilities and traits. Each augment can be equipped by multiple Nephilim at the same time. You can “reroll” the augment stats using the funds you’ve earned, but you need to be careful because rerolling can also worsen the augment’s stats. As the game autosaves, rerolling may require you to go grind for additional funds in order to fix the now worsened stats. I do wish we could save manually instead so we could save time on fixing augments.

You also need to be careful in terms of what augments you use. The third mission in Cairo saw me losing over and over and over again to the last two enemies there. While it was a difficult level in the first place, it was made even more difficult by the “Glass Fangs” augment I had equipped, which increased one stat while decreasing my defense by 50%!!! Once I changed that, it was a bit easier. Some of my favorite augments were the ones that resulted in defeated enemies or destroyed buildings occasionally providing you with healing items for your HP, rage meter, or cataclysm meter.

You can repeat stages to get a better ranking, as well as to grind for more funds to help improve your Nephilim. Completing the stages again will allow you to choose additional augments as rewards. Unfortunately, there aren’t different difficulty settings; you need to earn the S+ ranking for a stage in order to get bonus color scheme options for your Nephilim.

Some enemies have the ability to summon and strengthen additional enemies. There are also environmental dangers such as tidal waves, lightning, and lava that you need to avoid. Dodging is a huge part of combat in later stages that have swarms of enemies surrounding you. This is not a game where you can rely on button mashing; it gets more and more difficult to earn higher rankings as you progress through the game. You need to learn the game mechanics (and learn them well) in order to succeed.

Thankfully, there are several checkpoints in each level. I had to use those checkpoints often in later stages when I was (frequently) defeated. Some areas have healing capsules for you to use, and the execution/instant kills do restore HP as well. I do wish we could have purchased items from R&D that would let us heal HP, restore the Rage meter, and add to the Cataclysm meter as well. I also wish there were more upgrades for stats compared to the large amount of Nephilim color swaps (which were pretty awesome).

I really liked the artistic quality of DotM; the artists who contributed to the game did an amazing job. The designs for the kaiju, human characters, and even the backgrounds were all fantastic. I especially loved the gallery art. The game also provides you with additional background information through DAWN’s Archives, which you must fill in yourself after a researcher went missing and the contents were mysteriously deleted.

Some unlocked archive entries will also trigger conversations in the Chat section, where you can get to know the characters better. The voice acting for the characters, while occasionally too quiet, was well done. The voices suited the characters well; Eiji was my favorite character based on his design, personality, and voice acting.

There is a plot behind Dawn of the Monsters, and there are scenes with voiced dialogue before and after each stage. (These scenes unfortunately do not replay when you repeat a stage. I would have liked the option to experience them again with the ability to skip them if desired.) Some aspects of the story were a little predictable for me personally, but it didn’t detract from the game. There were some really interesting elements to the plot that were supported by the archive entries. I was pretty pleased with the story’s ending after completing 37 missions across multiple continents.

Switch it ON or Switch it OFF? Dawn of the Monsters is a unique 2.5D side scrolling “beat ‘em up” game with creative kaiju combat. Excellent art direction resulted in an appropriately somber world full of chaos and destruction. Ability augments and color customization allow players to take more control of their experience. Combat is engaging, although it can be fairly difficult. A lack of difficulty options is disappointing, but if I could manage, you should be able to become “King of the Kaiju Killers” too! 😂 8/10