JYDGE

Alright, so another title from 10Tons that is uncomfortably close to Neon Chrome. This one is quite good. Now to be clear it is not as good as Neon Chrome, but that's ok. Neon Chrome has nearly infinite replayability due to proc gen, and JYDGE has premade levels (I will not use the term 'hand crafted'). The rogueish factor in Neon Chrome also gave it serious hooks for addicting gameplay.
But yeah, JYDGE is solid and does its own thing pretty well.
I like the mission structure and the tons of really cool unlockables and gear. 10Tons has shown they are really good at coming up with cool and novel mechanics, and now they have also shown us that they understand how to hide grind. That's a fantastic skill to have when developing games.
But on a very serious note - and moving forward - please, no more Neon Chrome look-alikes. I know that Time Recoil had its own angle and so does JYDGE, but the whole 'feel' begins to wear thin at some point.
Pros:
+Great functional unlockables and gear to customize your dude
+There is some pretty great subtle humor
+I like the mission structure
+The price point is right
Cons:
-I think this would have done better with proc gen levels; the premade levels aren't anything super special (have the levels generate once per save, so mission 1 is always the same BUT was randomly generated that once)
-I want those feels back from last summer when I was super addicted to Neon Chrome, and both JYDGE and Time Recoil sort of tease with that but don't deliver on that level (and that's ok, but it's true)
Get Neon Chrome first, but then get JYDGE.

I picked this up on a lark, when it was on sale. I'm glad I did! It is amazingly fun, and I'd advise it to anyone looking for something good, fun, and challenging. A lot of people are comparing this to Judge Dredd. Fluff-wise, it's kinda fair, since your character is "Judge, Jury, Executioner" and all that fun stuff, but crunch-wise, it feels closer to the old Crusader games.
There are a few things that have turned people off to the game, and I'll go over them here:
The progression is locked behind "medals"; level-by-level achievements for completing the levels in certain ways, like not killing any civilians, not breaking anything (ASTOUNDINGLY hard), or not being spotted. My advice if you are trying to do this would be to go after the medals oe at a time. Some of them have a nice synergy where you can get more than one in a single run-through easy. Others, not so much. The cyberware that helps with one medal won't help much on another.
A second sticking point is that there's not a whole lot of story. The overarching plot basically boiling down to "get rid of this one particular gang" and the story mostly being told as a radio voiceover played with a spinning graphic image. Yeah, if this were a bigger budget game from a bigger studio, there would probably be a huge, expensive cutscene showing gangers breaking into places and causing mayhem or whatnot, but IMO the resources were better put to making the game more fun. Plus, those cutscenes are usually only watched once, then skipped entirely every other time (the radio messages are skippable, FYI. No unskppable cutscenes in this game).
So if you're looking for a fun, easy in-and-out game, then give it a try! You might be pleasantly surprised.

In Jydge you play as a Jydge. Just one. A mass-marketed model made to dispense justice or the nearest approximation. A robotic cop that's also a judge that also terminates, connect the dots.
Made by 10tons Ltd, who have done about 10 billion other twinstick shooters, it's a twinstick shooter! You twinstick and you shoot. All the good stuff. It's objective based, so you tackle new objectives each map - free the hostages, disarm some bombs, and shoot some targets. On the way you shoot everyone.
Now this might look like Neon Chrome 2, from the aesthetic to the gameplay, to the destructible wall tech (which is great, by the way), takes place in the same universe, features ads from it, yeah. Honestly it's tied in with just about every other 10tons game, they all make an appearance either in the lore - the lore that doesn't matter - or as a secret item or whatever. I didn't notice any absences.
The main difference is despite being advertised as a roguelike (roguehate?) there is not a single procedurally generated element in this game. Maps are static, enemy placements are static - some stuff just has to be done once per map and carries over but else what you see is what you get.
Jydge is a better game for this alone.
All the maps in this game are fantastic - they're varied, they're intricate, they're memorable, they love you like your parents don't, and they don't get boring over the playthroughs and difficulties. You've got plenty of enemy variety, and learning routes around the levels is integral for getting "medals".
Apart from getting the ending (there's a dumb morality system, by the way - it doesn't matter and the plot is stupid the end) the real idea of the game is to get all 216 medals across the difficulties - difficulties that completely remix the levels and change your objectives completely - for the sake of getting them.
Pro tip: there's no grand finale thing for getting all the secret items and medals, you just do it. Do it because you can.
This is fundamentally pretty fun. It's a process that's carried by the gameplay.
Now it starts off slow and forgiving - just ambling around with your starter rifle taking down starter mooks and threatening potplants, but the variance in playstyles that you can make viable - and have to, to get the Nightmare medals - is all there. Stealth, Tanky, Hotline Miami 2.0, Pet Summoner AI Build with MLG strats, and just hitting things with your gun - none of them are bad.
Well some of them are. Until you get all the Cyberware, Mods, a couple of upgraded weapons and specials, and get to experiment with them. Then they're not.
Course getting all that requires all buying them then upgrading them, which you will not do. The economy is just bad, like 2007 bad, it's a total mess. You have to spend tens of thousands of credits to fully upgrade each weapon, credits that you just won't get. You'll get the 4 fully upgraded special and weapons, you'll get all the mods and cyberware, and after that you're not getting jack.
Get used to your tiddlywink selection of weapons. Unless you like grinding.
Pro tip: I used the C4, Flame Grenades, Stun Pulse, Snyper and Serial Shotgyn. Carried me through Nightmare like a charm with the right mods and Rythless.
Overall, though - great game, great aesthetic, and great sense of justice. If you're after an action game that's fairly easily paced and gameplay that lets you play around with, I absolutely recommend this.

The game is often bundled and discounted, so I'll make little issue about cost and focus instead on Jydge being a good, solid game that rewards the time you spend with it. It's limited but well worth playing.
Jydge takes the devs' quite successful mechanics from Neon Chrome and noticeably improves the customization and play options but refocuses the design from a simple roguelite to mission-based setup, where you have specific levels with objectives to accomplish (and of course, secrets to uncover). Each level comes in multiple versions with different enemy arrangements and their own triplet of objectives. Basic level goals vary but tend to involve elimination, rescue, or grabbing stuff. Objectives generally favor different loadouts and ways of approaching the level, though sometimes you can do everything in one run. There are also some meta-progress elements, like locked doors and elite enemies which can be dealt with in one run, and then are out of the way for any future runs on that difficulty. You also get currency to buy upgrades, which you keep regardless of mission success.
Without the procedural content design, this one has to stand entirely on loadout diversity and its missions, and I would say it definitely succeeds, but unsurprisingly this limits what it offers. You should not expect Jydge to entertain you past accomplishing its set mission goals and playing with some different loadouts for variety, and Jydge makes it fairly clear this is exactly the intent (meta-progress in level content is cute, but it does mean those elements of playing the level get consumed and removed). The player also needs to enjoy the game somewhat deliberately, choosing loadouts that both work and entertain at the level you want (there are definitely more and less challenging options). It could have done more, and it's a shame its scope is deliberately limited, but it does what it does well, and honestly, it's nice to forgo the random, extremely uneven experience of roguelites and generated content and just play a solidly good game, so I'll give it a pass, but I hope the devs bring all this together someday.
Also, there are some notable late-game unlocks that bring unexpected change to the available play space (unless you read the achievements, I suppose). I don't think concealing your content is smart, but I welcome the additional time with the game.

if you know the judge dredd movie (the old one ofc!!) you know what this game is all about.
kill bad guys, rescue hostages and 'confiscate' money.
pretty simple but BIG fun!
the music is really catchy indeed while sound and graphics are not that special but they've got a nicely fitting retro feel to them. oh and there's lots of neon, too!
lots of gear and weapons need to be unlocked and upgraded to get the most fun (aka carnage) out of the missions. you can be sneaky and use a sniper rifle while being invisible in the shadows. or you just strap on some body armor and kick in the front door with a rocket launcher. different missions require different tactics so it's always important to pick the right gear for the job at hand. if you keep dying you most likely brought the wrong gear to the party!
however there is a little downside. to progress the story you are forced to replay pretty much all maps on higher difficulty. i didn't mind since higher difficulty comes with other mission objectives and obviously a greater challenge. but you know...some people just want easy wins.
i finished the game in about 6 hours but i put a LOT of extra time into completing all maps on all difficulties and getting the game 100% completed.
great stuff!
still not convinced? just buy it for the neon and shut up.

I got this off a humble bundle, and wasn't expecting much, but it's surprisingly good. If a little repetitive since (spoiler) you will be completing each level LAYOUT a minimum of four times. But there are loads of toys and loadouts to mess around with. I played this on Manjaro Linux and it works out of the box flawlessly.

Short Summary: Jydge (pronounced Judge in the game) is a “twin stick shooter” game, meaning you control your character from the top down perspective using WASD keys while aiming 360 degrees with your mouse. Other similar games are Guns N Zombies, Alien Shooter, Alien Swarm, etc. The game is broken up into levels that you will need to replay over an over to get the “medals” needed to unlock later levels. Each level has 3 objectives, 1 is the main objective, such as kill this boss, or free all the hostages. The other 2 objectives are optional, such as kill every single enemy in the level, or take no damage during the level. You do not need to complete them all in one try (just the main objective). The reason you want to collect these medals (1 for each objective you complete) is that missions are locked if you don’t have enough medals. For example: to play stage 10, you might need 25 medals, so replay stages 1-9 until you have enough (each medal only counts once). So to recap, the game requires a ton of grinding, completing levels over and over for money (to buy upgrades), and to have enough medals to advance to later levels.
The game’s story is pretty much a cut and paste of Judge Dredd movies (I’ve seen the Sylvester Stallone version and the Karl Urban version, but never read the comics). Your city has been overrun by crime, and in desperation the leaders have created the Jydge program, where a law enforcer (you) dispenses justice on the street as judge, jury, and executioner. In other words, kill all the bad guys without worrying about consequences. Honestly the story is pretty sparse, with a few short cutscenes (if you can even call them that) talking about how controversial the Jydge program is. It’s very easy to accidently kill a bunch of civilians in each mission.
As for gameplay, it’s fairly standard twin stick shooting, with upgrades and new weapons purchased between stages. You need to grind to progress, not just for the medals, but also to get enough money for the huge number of upgrades available. There are going to be times when you need to customize your upgrades to meet specific challenges, for example a stealth build to get a “don’t be detected” medal, or a “stun” build to kill really fast/strong bosses. The game was a little harder than I expected but people who play “bullet hell” games or rogue-like games such as Binding of Isaac will find Jydge to be a breeze.
Overall I would recommend this game to people who enjoy twin stick shooters where you buy weapons/upgrades but I caution you that there is A LOT of grinding. Because of this, the game really doesn’t have much re-playability because by the time you beat it, you will have replayed every level at least 3 times already (less if you’re awesome at getting optional objectives).