Minishoot' Adventures on Steam Deck: A Fun and Challenging Metroidvania Experience

I want to talk about a game I played on the Steam Deck called Minishoot’ Adventures. I experienced the entire game on the Steam Deck, and it feels perfectly suited for the platform. It is a Metroidvania with a mix of bullet hell, where you control a small ship in a world populated entirely by ships. Your goal is to free this world from a spreading corruption by exploring, upgrading your ship, unlocking new abilities, and gradually opening up the map. That is the core premise of the game.

From the start, Minishoot Adventures feels light and comfortable to play. The visuals are simple, but the art direction is charming and cohesive. It is not trying to impress with technical complexity, but it knows exactly what it wants to be. I spent around 13 to 14 hours with the game, completing almost everything in pursuit of 100 percent of the achievements. The only remaining challenge for me is the Boss Rush mode that unlocks after finishing the game, where you face multiple bosses across several stages and must clear them while maintaining at least five life points.

In terms of gameplay, the inspiration is clear. It blends the exploration and progression of Metroid with the dungeon structure and light puzzle elements of classic Zelda, all wrapped in a bullet hell combat system. You move the ship with the left stick and aim and shoot with the right stick. As you progress, you unlock new abilities and powers that expand how you move, fight, and explore the world.

I found the game genuinely fun, especially on the Steam Deck. It is not very long. On average, you can finish it in 8 to 10 hours if you are not focused on collecting everything. I chose to play on the hardest difficulty, which meant dying often and retrying bosses and difficult encounters multiple times. That challenge is a big part of the experience if you enjoy pushing yourself.

The progression structure is straightforward and effective. You begin in a starting area with weaker enemies and gradually unlock new regions and finding map fragments for those regions. Each area usually introduces some new enemy types. While the overall enemy variety is not massive, it is well balanced for the scope of the game and provides consistent challenge throughout.

As expected from a Metroidvania, backtracking plays a big role. You frequently unlock new abilities that allow you to return to previous areas and access paths that were blocked before. Personally, I am not a huge fan of backtracking, but it never became a serious issue. It is simply part of the design, especially if you want to unlock every power and secret.

Your ship grows stronger in a few different ways. You can upgrade your damage, firing rate, and other combat-related stats as you level up. There are also passive abilities hidden around the map. On top of that, you can find hearts that increase your maximum life. You start with three hearts and can reach up to ten. This is extremely important on higher difficulties, because more life gives you room to survive intense encounters. Once you reach around six or seven hearts, the most complex fights become much more manageable.

One feature I really appreciated is how the game supports completionists. At a certain point, you can buy an upgrade that shows whether a cave or dungeon is fully completed, marked with a check. Later on, you can unlock another upgrade that highlights locations on the map where items or secrets are still missing. This second option is expensive, but it removes the frustration of blindly searching and makes 100 percent completion far more enjoyable.

The moment-to-moment gameplay feels great. The ship is smooth, responsive, and easy to control. You explore the map, clear dungeons, solve light puzzles, and fight bosses. There are around five or six regions in total, each with its own boss. Defeating all of them is necessary to unlock the final boss, which serves as the main objective of the game.

All of the systems work together nicely. The dungeon design balances puzzles and combat, with a strong emphasis on fighting. On the hardest difficulty, the combat can be extremely intense. There are moments when the screen fills with enemies and projectiles, and dodging everything feels nearly impossible. In some of these locked-room encounters, the sheer volume of bullets makes success feel more dependent on luck than skill. These moments can be frustrating, especially when you take unavoidable damage.

Even so, the overall experience remains very positive. Progression feels rewarding, secrets are satisfying to uncover, and the game respects the player’s curiosity. Most hidden items are fair to find, although there is at least one that is extremely well hidden and genuinely difficult to discover.

Story is not the focus here. The narrative is minimal and mostly serves as context for the gameplay. There is a civilization of ships, a corruption spreading through the world, and your actions slowly free areas and characters. As you progress, rescued ships return to a central hub that functions as a village. There, you can heal, buy upgrades, and later interact with an NPC that helps reveal missing elements on the map. It is simple, but it works.

Visually, the game is clean and consistent. The art style is modest but well defined, and it fits the scope and price of the game, which is around 10 to 15 dollars. The soundtrack is another highlight. You spend many hours listening to it, and it never becomes repetitive or annoying. Sound effects are solid, and there is no voice acting, which makes sense given the minimal narrative.

I did not encounter any bugs during my playthrough. The game feels polished and runs flawlessly on the Steam Deck. It also feels clearly designed for controller play. Since movement and shooting are handled by separate sticks, I imagine it would be a bit awkward on mouse and keyboard.

Overall, Minishoot’ Adventures is a very enjoyable game. It has some downsides, like heavy backtracking and occasional chaotic combat encounters where taking damage feels unavoidable, but these do not overshadow its strengths. For fans of Metroidvania games, classic Zelda like A Link to the Past, and bullet hell mechanics, this combination works extremely well. If you enjoy a good challenge, higher difficulties make the game genuinely demanding. I definitely recommend it, and I would rate it around an 8.5 out of 10.