Serious Sam: The Random Encounter Critic Reviews

At $5.00, Serious Sam: The Random Encounter is a steal.

The Random Encounter makes for a short game, but an extremely enjoyable one, the two-hour campaign providing you with plenty of hectic victories and glorious defeats. It also leaves you with an Endless Mode, some lovely pixelated memories, and that warm feeling that only comes from seeing something very new built from ideas that are very, very old.

It's a fun novelty that you'll want to spend an hour with. Yet, at its end, I didn't want any more and I didn't care to revisit the game's Endless Mode. I enjoyed The Random Encounter for the hour or so it lasted, but the fact that I don't want any more pretty much says it all.

Sure, it's not very deep from an RPG-elements perspective, nor does it have the kind of story that's going to make you go "Hm!", but it will entertain you and help whet your appetite for the monster-stomping extravaganza that will be Serious Sam 3.

Serious Sam: The Random Encounter is a fun, albeit short game that delivers where Serious Sam games try too, with shallow but dumb fun. The humor is great, graphics are nice and the game is fun while it lasts. TRE doesn't do a whole lot, but what it does is fun and I would say that that fun is well worthy of a purchase especially if you're already a fan of Sam.

The transition from polished first-person console shooter to 16-bit RPG is a smooth one on the visual front, thanks to Vlambeer's excellent pixel art and attention to minute details. It's just a bummer that the gameplay itself isn't quite as absorbing past the first world or so.

Interesting retro action with a satirical touch is damaged by rapidly emerging stereotypical playability.

While the game itself isn't bad so to speak, it does get repetitive kind of quickly. It's an interesting concept, and I am a huge fan of 16-bit games, especially RPGs, but the short length of the game and the repetitiveness of the battles is kind of a let down for me.

Well, I certainly had a better time with it than with Serious Sam: Double D (an indie title, like this one, commissioned by Croteam to help promote Serious Sam 3), but the game doesn't quite live up to the potential of its premise.

There is some charm to this little indie game. It's bright, it's colorful and it's unique amongst RPG's with a stylized combat system that manages to successfully replicate the series of games it is based on. The foundation, however, is weak, boring and repetitive. The only incentive to survive its repetitive battles is that you won't have to attempt them a second time.

The Random Encounter is just, well, bad. Seeing our favorite enemies rendered in 16 bits is really just not worth even the very small amount of time or money you'll spend playing this game - particularly when there are other worthwhile demakes or Flash games available for free.