Black Beacon: The Rising Star in Gacha Gaming

Black Beacon has just landed on mobile devices, but it found us a little sooner than most! We’ve been fortunate enough to get hands-on with the Mythic Sci-Fi Action RPG, and we’re eager to let you know what we think about it.

Black Beacon is an action RPG that emphasizes fast, fluid combat, seamlessly integrating character-swapping into the gameplay.

Shh! This Is A Library!

The game starts in the Library of Babel, a vast and enigmatic structure inspired by both the biblical Tower of Babel, built by men to reach heaven, and the Jorge Luis Borges short story, where it is a library containing every possible combination of letters, thus hiding every book ever written within its shelves.

You awaken in this mysterious place, with little memory of how you arrived, alongside a group of colorful characters who are equally puzzled. It seems you’re all destined for something great.

However, there’s a twist: everyone has just twenty-four hours before a giant spinning orb threatens to obliterate them. Welcome to your first day as a Seer! We hope you enjoy bookshelves.

Joking aside, the setting and story have a delightfully wild charm. A library filled with nonsensical books, time travel, and numerous mythological references (we won’t spoil them, but that bird is definitely suspicious). The game throws you into the deep end of its narrative, and if you’re confused, that’s exactly the intended effect.

But what about the gameplay?

Send Me In, Coach

Black Beacon’s moment-to-moment experience is akin to an ARPG dungeon crawler, offering a customizable camera viewpoint. You can opt for a top-down perspective or a free camera setup, adjusting the view with your other hand. We preferred the latter, though it’s largely a matter of personal taste.

As you navigate the Library’s corridors, you progress towards your objectives. The story unfolds in short, episodic sections, each containing several maps. Accessing these sections requires energy, though the game was quite generous with how much playtime it allowed us.

Your journey involves exploring areas, solving puzzles, hunting for hidden treasure chests, and battling enemies—distorted entities that are supposedly remnants of individuals the Library has not fully ‘digested’. Yikes.

Combat is engaging, fast-paced, and somewhat button-mashy, yet it remains challenging enough to keep you on your toes. Timing is crucial; executing a perfect dodge grants you a period of invincibility, while landing a heavy attack on an enemy about to strike can interrupt their move, sparing you the need to dodge.

The game also features a character-swap mechanic, encouraging you to switch fighters mid-battle. This turns combat into a tag-team affair, allowing you to bench tired characters, even mid-attack, and bring in fresh ones. Once you master the rhythm, it’s quite satisfying—until you mistime a dodge and a giant monster sends you flying down the hallway.

Characters And Weapon Rolls

As a gacha game, fans of the genre will be curious about its mechanics. Black Beacon employs a character and weapon gacha system, with weapons tailored to specific characters. Both can be leveled up, and while the variety of ingredients needed can be extensive, much of the management can be automated.

You might encounter characters through the gacha before meeting them in the story, but as the game suggests, the flow of time is convoluted. This adds an extra layer of variety to your experience.

Overall, Black Beacon is a quirky gacha game with a penchant for telling a more esoteric story, backed by solid gameplay. We’re eager to see how it evolves post-release.

Does this sound like your kind of game? Or perhaps a fascinating row of shelves in the vast library you inhabit? Then you might want to check out Black Beacon right now, available on the official website, App Store, or Google Play.