Let's Talk About Luna Abyss

This is not a review of Luna Abyss, and this text reflects the personal opinions of the author and not necessarily the official position of Gamereactor.

Game Pass. There are now many different opinions on Xbox's subscription service, but for me, it has been a perfect source of games for several years, games that I wouldn't have bought otherwise. Luna Abyss is one of the games I discovered thanks to Game Pass, and in my opinion, it is one of the most unfairly overlooked games of this summer.

Somehow, Luna Abyss managed to go unnoticed (at least by me), and that's probably because there wasn't much hype around it, neither from the publisher nor the press. The game currently boasts an impressive score of 81 on Metacritic, which is higher than Moss: The Forgotten Relic, equal to Halo: Campaign Evolved, and just one point behind Splatoon Raiders.

Developed by Kwalee Games, Luna Abyss is a brutal and intense first-person shooter that blends titles like Doom and Returnal with a touch of NieR: Automata, for an action-packed sci-fi cocktail. You play as Fawkes, a prisoner sentenced to 10,000 days in detention in a prison located on the artificial moon Luna. However, she can have her sentence reduced over time if she completes a series of missions for "The All-Father," during which she must explore abandoned colonies and recover ancient technologies.

All of this takes place within a vast abandoned megastructure on the moon Luna, and you realize almost immediately that something is seriously wrong here. Aylin, the prison's AI, accompanies you on your missions: she monitors your every move and shifts from friend to enemy from one minute to the next. At the same time, strange voices from the "Abyss" begin to address Fawkes, and she realizes that her role is much more than that of a simple prisoner on Luna.

Luna Abyss is one of the most visually accomplished games of this year 2026. Everything unfolds in vast industrial areas and spaces characterized by great verticality, alien technology, and magnificent brutalist architecture. The deeper Fawkes descends into the heart of these almost gothic structures, the more the story of a lost civilization, swallowed by a catastrophe known as "The Scourge," is revealed.

There are long passages where you move almost in silence through these environments, both cold and, in their own way, beautiful. There are also long platforming sequences where you simply move from one area to another, jumping from platform to platform. Fawkes can fall from very high platforms without taking any damage; you therefore dive through enormous pipes and from dizzying heights, which is visually impressive. In these sequences, you can truly appreciate the fantastic brutalist architecture, combined with stunning lighting and structures you've never seen before.

Shortly after these calm, almost meditative parkour and platforming sequences, you are attacked by enemies, and the game instantly transforms into a "bullet hell" shooter. You must now constantly stay on the move, dodge swarms of enemies and volleys of projectiles, and synchronize your attacks to survive. Some enemies have shields that must first be destroyed with specific weapons, adding a tactical dimension to combat.

The same applies when enemies reach a stage just before being destroyed: you can then choose either to absorb the remnants of their energy or to use this remaining energy to inflict a small amount of damage on surrounding enemies. This is all spiced up by brutal boss fights, where you really have to use your weapons wisely if you want any chance of survival. And suddenly, calm returns. The two extremes of the game – the frenetic "bullet hell" combat and the absolutely calm platforming sequences – offer a magnificent and effective contrast.

Luna Abyss is a typical AA game. This means that not everything is perfectly polished or flawless. There are some imperfections here and there, and certain platforming sequences towards the end of the game demand such precision that the somewhat clumsy controls don't quite measure up, which can be frustrating. Additionally, there are also on-rails sequences that seem rather useless and primarily serve as bizarre filler.

I played Luna Abyss on Xbox Series X, and the graphics were quite blurry. I don't think it was a deliberate artistic choice by the developers, but I believe they prioritized a smooth frame rate and many visual effects. As a result, they had to run the game at a rather low native resolution and then upscale everything to a higher resolution on screen. You can notice this, especially if the internal resolution is quite low, as the different upscaling systems then struggle to keep up, although it will probably be different on the PC version, which I haven't had the chance to test yet.

Luna Abyss was a huge pleasant surprise for me. I was annoyed throughout the game by the blurry graphics, which were impossible to ignore, but despite that, the game captivated me, and I was drawn into its unique brutalist universe, its frenetic combat, and quite simply, the dark and heavy atmosphere of the entire game.

Luna Abyss is quite different from anything we see at the moment. It's linear, easy to pick up, and offers one of the most accomplished visual designs of the year and the most frenetic combat we've seen since... well, Returnal – without having the same level of difficulty – even though you can choose that level if you wish.

So if you have Game Pass on Xbox or PC, I recommend you take a look at Luna Abyss, if you haven't already. For me, it's the big pleasant surprise of the summer, despite all the typical imperfections of an AA game, and you can finish it in 8 to 9 hours.