I'm liking the little touches that this game brings to the table. Monolith took a page from Downwell's book, in that there's some duality involved (which simultaneously rewards skilful play) when taking certain upgrades into consideration. Expanding your max health works identically - if you stay topped off, upon collection you'll fill up a given number of notches with a cap of 4 - and conserving static ammo upgrades from the shop for later use is also something I periodically think about, depending on whether I've stumbled upon a potent weapon. There's other small details I appreciated too; the HUD gradually changes colors the closer to death you are and there exist additional cues that quickly convey information, like audio for forced reloads, distorted sound when submerged in water (which slows down movement) or blinking low-health enemies like you'd see in old-school beat 'em ups. There's more, but I digress.
Given the type of game Monolith is, namely pre-dominately a shmup kind of affair, the implementation of these conveniences (that are otherwise no big deal elsewhere) is very important here. Without them the more chaotic parts of a run would've felt
too hectic, so the foresight from the developers is most definitely welcome since conveying information this way directly benefits the concept of spatial or resource-related awareness. Sub-bosses and bosses especially almost relentlessly pepper you with projectiles - without teetering into pure bullet hell territory - so thanks to these relatively minor assists, you'll quickly learn (as is par of the course for the genre) to only spend a quick glance at something unrelated to the incoming onslaught, or rely on specific sound design elements in the middle of being pro-active. In other words: they help enable keeping your enemies and your own ship within your peripheral vision, whilst largely focusing on the bullets themselves before manoeuvring through them. Instinctive conditioning once you've become astute to said tools.
Also, what happens when you mess with the cat NPC after it gives you the elipses treatment is cute.
