Another day, another much appreciated bullet heaven shooter makes the transition from PC to consoles. This time, it’s the spectacular Norse-themed Jotunnslayer: Hordes of Hel, finally reaching its 1.0 version after 8 months or so of Early Access on PC, with consoles finally joining in on the fun as well. Having already played a good bunch on Steam before, it’s time to check out the game’s full release – this time, on Xbox Series X. This is the XboxEra review for Jotunnslayer: Hordes of Hel!
Here we survive again
In my gargantuan review for Soulstone Survivors, also coincidentally hitting Xbox this very year after a PC-only Early Access phase, I yapped a bit about how, at one point, the bullet heaven genre (or survivors-like, arena shooter, you name it), at one point, lacked a high profile game of sorts. One with high production values, that is – spectacular 3D graphics and polish not unlike what we’d expect from big studios. In 2025, this is hardly an issue anymore, as this insanely crowded genre has countless visually striking and highly refined titles already. There’s always room for one more, though, especially if it has a couple new tricks up its sleeve. And Jotunnslayer: Hordes of Hel has gods by its side.
If you ever played a game like this before, you already know what to expect in terms of base gameplay loop. A top-down roguelike arena shooter of sorts where you start off weak, then get increasingly strong via new weapons (which are then shot automatically at the same time), skills and perks, as murdering the countless enemies sent against you nets you XP. Leveling up doesn’t take long, and each time you do there’s a choice between random upgrades, making you stronger and stronger each time. If you win, you unlock new and new content, but even losing ain’t too bad, as the permanent progression means you can power up many of your stats in a way that affects all your future runs as well. Needless to say, all these core elements of the genre can be found here.
By the gods!
The game is based on Norse characters, visuals and gods, and thus, the very powers our warriors can use against the increasingly powerful monsters come from the very gods. The generally electricity-based powers of Thor, the mischievous tricks of Loki, the ice-based skills of Skadi. Before selecting an active weapon or a passive perk, the player gets to choose which god is to grant them a new power, which in turn offers various cool options. Synergy between powers is important, though it’s possible to create mighty powerful builds either by diversifying or by sticking to a central theme.
The game’s levels take us through all sorts of areas, such as Helheim and Midgard, each with their own set of challenges and enemy types. Unlike most bullet heaven titles, it’s not only about surviving until the clock reaches the time limit – the player, in fact, has to complete a certain amount of challenges to progress. These can range from collecting mushrooms across the map, all the way down to closing demonic portals or surviving a devilish effect that slows us down, limits our visibility, then showers us with powerful enemies and area-based attacks. The harder the challenge you get, the more gold you receive in case of success, with then all the permanent upgrades you can apply to each characters’ skill tree, with even global effects and new powers via god trees as well.
Okay, but…
The game plays well, the 3D graphics are nice, and so is the epic soundtrack. Some of the animation on the enemies feels a little choppy, but the core gameplay loop is solid. Not very innovative, but as someone who loves this genre immensely, I’m more than satisfied with it, and it’s certainly one of the most fun games of this kind on Xbox right now. It has to be said, however, that it’s quite slim in terms of content, compared to many of its contemporaries. Even without comparing it to the golden standards of the genre, such as the aforementioned Soulstone Survivors and the iconic Vampire Survivors, there’s just not a lot of meat. Only a couple classes and levels, with then increased difficulties and endless modes, but there’s no alternate modes, co-op options or anything fancy. A few cool boss battles break up the pace a bit, but that’s about it.
The other issue, and it’s a larger one, is that this is supposedly the much stable and very complete 1.0 version of the game – but my experience on Xbox Series X was anything but. Nevermind the choppy animations, you’ll encounter frequent framerate drops and freezes during gameplay. The character selection screen glitched out every time I tried to play two matches in a single session, forcing me to constantly reboot the game. Lastly, it is one of these very reboots that left me in awe, as after 5+ hours in which I completed most of what the game had the offer, bar the highest difficulty challenges, the game decided to start up once with my save completely wiped. Gone was all my progress, and along with it, a good chunk of my enthusiasm.
An enjoyable, good-looking, but not very original or polished experience
In a vacuum, Jotunnslayer: Hordes of Hel can be quite a blast. It’s just mighty satisfying to just sit down, put a podcast in your ear, then start mowing down countless monsters. The combat is fast, the controls snappy, the visuals cool and the sounds satisfying. There’s a solid build variety, the idea of having various Gods dictating different playstyles is very sound. It is, however, not a very peculiar game, with not many new ideas and without the depth of various other bullet heaven titles on the market. Add to that the fact there’s all sorts of technical issues: from the not too egregious framerate drops, to the much more devastating issue of my save getting wiped, and you can understand my relative disappointment with the shape of a supposed 1.0 launch.
If you’re a big fan of bullet heaven shooters, do keep an eye out for Jotunnslayer: Hordes of Hel, though perhaps it’s not quite an essential buy just yet.
Jotunnslayer: Hordes of Hel
Played on
Xbox Series X, PC
PROS
- Looks great
- Tight gameplay
- The Norse god theme is cool
CONS
- Not very original
- Limited variety and content
- A lot of technical issues, including one that wiped my save
