Children of the Sun Review: A Crazy Tactical Puzzler Where You Have One Shot

Reviewed On: PC
Price: $14.99 USD
Developer: René Rother
Publisher: Devolver Digital
Release Date: April 9, 2024

Please Note: A review code was provided by Devolver Digital but does not influence the opinions in this review.

Devolver Digital is known as a big juggernaut publisher of indie games and they (at least for me) usually hit it out of the park with the games that I am interested in. This game was announced on February 1st of 2024, and came out a little more than just two months later; which might not be enough time to push this game since there have been many, many games that have released and/or announced in 2024 already. This isn’t the first game that I have played from a solo dev this year, but it always impresses me when a commercial game like this one is developed by one person. So, does this game have enough uniqueness that it stands out or does it blend in to the sea of many games that have come out already this year? Read on and you will find the answer you seek!

The story is one that is never directly told to you in the game, rather you have to develop the story as it is shown to you during the adventure that lasts about 4-8 hours, depending on your overall skill level and your inner completion-ist. Basically, you are trying to destroy the leader of THE CULT because THE CULT promised you and your family a better life, but it was actually lie. Instead it brought you, THE GIRL, hell and now you are bringing everyone else to hell that comes across your path. I will say the scenes are very brutal and graphic with what they show, with them all having more detail than just first glance. Honestly, it is kind of a confusing tale with how they show it to you, but piecing it together it is a nice story.

The gameplay is one of the biggest aspects of any game, in my opinion. In this game, the gameplay is simplistic where in each level you only have one bullet to kill the entire group of enemies. The number of enemies is at the top right corner with them ranging from just a couple to a whole bunch. Before you take your first shot, you can move THE GIRL around a specific area to mark enemies that are located in the level. There are environmental items or creatures that you can use in order to complete the level. The types of enemies, the game difficulty, and abilities that are available to you increase overtime; with the final level being very technical with how it was designed (which I liked a lot).

A couple of levels are not like the others, and sometimes it was kind of annoying if I am being honest as it slightly takes you out of the immersion. In addition to just completing the level, most of them have an additional challenge that you can choose to complete or skip. Some of the challenges are cake walks, while others are very tricky and will require a bunch of tactical thinking. It definitely feels very rewarding if you beat them all to obtain the 21 achievements the game offers! After each level, you are also scored based on time, the number of shots you take, distance traveled, body parts, and more; but thankfully there are no achievements locked behind setting a specific score or time. Below are two different levels to show what you will be doing in the game.

Honestly, it was just okay for the audio and music, while the art in the game was fantastic. As you can hear in the couple levels above, the audio sometimes overtakes the music and the music design choices are not all that terrific. Sometimes I did have to put on additional music when playing the game, which is not something I love doing. It is a shame because the art on the other hand is absolutely terrific. In the story cutscenes, the visuals are really well done with how sharp and crisp they look. The levels are also diverse with the different enemies, environments, and the detail quality of even small items inside of buildings are terrific overall.

In terms of performance, the game was fairly solid throughout the entire adventure with only the occasional frame drop here or there. The game never crashed which, to me, is a good thing with a game like this as you don’t want to break the emersion of playing as THE GIRL. I thankfully did not have any graphical anomalies with the game as it would be problem if say for example the enemies somehow disappeared in the level or the bullet turned invisible. One of my only issues with the game is it isn’t always clear when it comes to some of the challenges, which is a problem if you are just missing one or two and have tried everything you could think of. Thankfully, if you are stuck, the internet is available. I think the game is well polished beyond belief, minus the occasion dip which is unfortunately a flaw in most games in this day and age.

My PC specs are based on a HP Victus Gaming Laptop, so it isn’t super powerful, but in no way is it weak. The system houses an Intel Core i7-12650H, 32.0 GB of RAM, a SSD, and it is a 3050TI system, so it is more than suitable for this game based on the system requirements that were posted on Steam. I would have checked out the game on Steam Deck as it is indeed verified; however, I personally do not have one so I was unable to. As long as you have a good overall computer, you can definitely run this game without difficulty.

Even with the problems that I personally had when it came to the audio design and music within this game, the very occasional dip in frames, and the story being a little hard to follow if you aren’t using your brain; everything else is just so well crafted and terrific to play. The gameplay might seem very simple and easy to play, but it definitely is a bit harder to really master. The challenges are tough, but definitely something you should attempt as they basically provide more hours to the amount gameplay that is offered in the game. If you like tactical thinking and puzzle focused games, I believe you will enjoy this title. This is one of the most interesting games I have played for this year and definitely one of the most memorable, even if it doesn’t stay in my Top 10 come December.

Review Score: 8.5/10