One Btn Bosses review

One Btn Bosses review

As someone who’s been gaming since the days of Pong and Pac-Man, I can confidently say that One Btn Bosses has managed to captivate me like no other game this year. The simplicity of its gameplay, combined with the sheer challenge of its boss fights, is a breath of fresh air in an industry often bogged down by complexity.


Over time, video games have evolved to become more intricate than they were three decades ago. Often, I find myself returning to a game after a while, only to struggle remembering how to play due to the increased complexity, ending up awkwardly pressing random buttons. But fear not if you’re seeking simplicity! One Btn Bosses offers fast-paced action and challenging boss fights, all controlled with just one button.

In this game, One Btn Bosses, you navigate a character on a circular track surrounding each boss. As you move along the track, your speed increases automatically and this results in more bullets being fired. However, the bosses don’t take damage easily and they retaliate by shooting bullets, bombs, and other shapes at you. To dodge these attacks, you have a single button that changes your direction. The gameplay is simple, but it has been surprisingly addictive this year, making it one of my favorites to play.

One Btn Bosses review

Much of this gameplay is largely due to the stunningly impressive boss designs. Each boss will follow a distinct attack pattern, varying from generating sweeping barriers that pursue you across the track, to launching explosive missiles with a wide blast radius. Figuring out how to evade these attacks effectively while maintaining high speed for optimal damage is immediately captivating, even after multiple attempts. This pursuit of mastery leads to striving for higher completion speeds or even aiming for the top spot on online leaderboards.

In just a short while, you’ll discover numerous strategies for navigating One Btn Bosses, each significantly altering the gameplay. For instance, one such strategy is exchanging the function to rotate with the ability to dash rapidly without taking damage, enabling you to dodge bullets by perfecting your timing. There’s also a reverse move that seems to blend both actions into a direction-changing dash. Feel free to select and utilize the abilities that suit you best in each level, and remember, it’s perfectly fine to stick with what you’re comfortable with.

In addition to diverse skills, you’ll also gain access to various weapons throughout your journey in the campaign. Some of these aren’t overly complex, such as the laser that grows stronger when you gather sparks scattered across the track. Others, however, are challenging to control and can inflict massive damage, like the juggler weapon where you must circle the track to catch balls you throw at the enemy for additional damage. Managing all these weapons proved too much for me, but there are players who will undoubtedly use them to perform amazing feats.

One Btn Bosses review

The campaign of One Btn Bosses is a wonderful way to learn how the game works while getting beaten up by the titular bosses, but for replayability you’ll probably go back to the Roguelike mode more. In this mode you’ll get to choose your route through a web of nodes to fight different bosses, which when defeated will give you a choice between various upgrades based on your chosen starter weapon. With limited health and randomised bosses which gain more attack types as you progress, this mode is always fun and adds an extra layer of thoughtful decision making to the twitchy shooting and dodging.

In the game One Btn Bosses, you’ll be rewarded with grind points (as the entire game is set in a bizarre robot capitalist dystopia). You can accumulate these points and use them to unlock a multitude of items. This includes weapons, abilities, and an array of color schemes that you can change at your leisure. Many of these color schemes are inspired by different LGBTQ+ flags, creating visually stunning effects and resonating with my proud queer spirit.

What stood out to me most about One Btn Bosses is that it turned something I usually find tedious into an enjoyable experience – repeatedly battling boss fights when I typically give up after multiple failed attempts. However, the satisfaction of mastering a strategy and anticipating their attack patterns makes it all worthwhile. The feature that displays the exact percentage of health you’ve depleted following each attempt is particularly helpful because it allows me to track my progress. On rare occasions, though, when I saw 98% remaining after an attempt, I couldn’t help but let out a frustrated yell.

One Btn Bosses review

One Btn Bosses is an outstanding game, and it’s hard to find much criticism for it. Some of the weapons and abilities felt somewhat intricate to use effectively, and with some mandatory tutorial levels, I might have appreciated their value more. Additionally, there are a few color schemes that make the game difficult to perceive, but that’s a minor complaint in terms of negatives.

1 Button Bandit is an exceptionally clever game that demonstrates the power of simplicity. Its gameplay, while incredibly intense, is remarkably gripping, and it can easily consume hours of your time without you realizing it. This game is almost dangerously captivating in its appeal. The fact that a game that uses only one button for controls has made it to my top games of the year list is truly astonishing, but that’s how impressive this game is.

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2024-08-07 00:16