Furi Onnamusha (v1.7.224g)

Even though Furi stars the Stranger, a sci-fi samurai, busting out of a celestial prison with the aid of an omnipresent angry man dressed as a purple rabbit, I never felt like I was playing a ridiculous game. Furi counters its ludicrous premise, strenuous combat, loud neon synth jams, and saturated color palette with a surprising amount of restraint. It’s simply a series of top-down bullet hell, hack-and-slash boss fights that aren’t infinite anime escalations of power, but fair and challenging one-on-one encounters. You have as much power at the beginning as you do in the end—it’s only your skill that changes. But getting good can be quite the test of patience. Rare bugs and a few poorly telegraphed boss phases will be Furi’s Achilles’ heel for some, no matter how meditative and satisfying the combat is. Furi’s combat is shallow, and I mean that as a compliment. All you can do is observe, react, and punish. It’s advanced Bop-It, a lighting quick series of rock-paper-scissors, the Grand Finals in fly-swatting—Furi exercises the hell out of a very small set of abilities until they feel like they were always there.