History VideoGame / TheAnacrusis

The game has gameplay heavily inspired by ''Left 4 Dead'' and a lighthearted, groovy 60's visual and environmental aesthetic inspired by 60's Science Fiction films. Players take the role of a group of 4 survivors consisting of practical Nessa, Liu the {{Cloudcuckoolander}}, the egotistical Lance, and Guion who's just glad to be here (and not dead) accomplishing various mission objectives on a luxury colony ship named the ''Isolode'' which has been taken over by an alien parasite that has converted the thousands of passengers and crew into a vicious horde of killer aliens.

* {{Zeerust}}: The game's aesthetics are based heavily on 60's Sci-Fi, and the groovy 60's vibe in general.

* FlingALightIntoTheFuture: Faster-than-light travel either doesn't exist in this setting or is very limited, so the 4 survivors know there's no hope of escape for themselves. The best they can hope to do is learn as much as they can about the aliens and send a message to Earth warning them about their existence, which won't be received for hundreds of years.

''The Anacrusis'' is a [[ScienceFiction Sci-Fi]] 4-player CoOpMultiplayer FirstPersonShooter by Stray Bombay, a startup Indie studio consisting of about two dozen developers with prior experience in AAA game development, including a few former members of the ''VideoGame/Left4Dead'' team. The game was released on UsefulNotes/{{Steam}} Early Access in January 2022, and saw a full release on December 5th, 2023.

The game has gameplay heavily inspired by ''Left 4 Dead'' and a lighthearted, groovy 60's visual and environmental aesthetic inspired by 60's Science Fiction films. Players take the role of a group of 4 survivors consisting of practical Nessa, Liu the {{Cloudcuckoolander}}, the egotistical Lance, and Giuon who's just glad to be here (and not dead) accomplishing various mission objectives on a luxury colony ship named the ''Isolode'' which has been taken over by an alien parasite that has converted the thousands of passengers and crew into a vicious horde of killer aliens.

The game has gameplay heavily inspired by ''Left 4 Dead'' and a lighthearted, groovy 60's visual and environmental aesthetic inspired by 60's Science Fiction films. Players take the role of a group of 4 survivors accomplishing various mission objectives on a luxury colony ship named the ''Isolode'' which has been taken over by an alien parasite that has converted the thousands of passengers and crew into a vicious horde of killer aliens.

** There's a very rare cloaked enemy that moves fast and attacks with a giant claw. It only appears once every 10-20 games, and isn't even listed on the end-of-mission stats screen.

''The Anacrusis'' is a [[ScienceFiction Sci-Fi]] 4-player CoOpMultiplayer FirstPersonShooter by Stray Bombay, a startup Indie studio consisting of about two dozen developers with prior experience in AAA game development, including a few former members of the ''VideoGame/Left4Dead'' team. The game was released on UsefulNotes/{{Steam}} Early Access in January 2022, and is currently still in Early Access development.

* ArtificialBrilliance: The game's bots, used in single-player or to fill in any empty player slots for your 4-person squad, are generally fairly competent and do a good job of aiding you in making it through a mission, at least on Normal difficulty. In fact, as the game's [=AFK=] mode (in which you can have a bot play for you if you need to go "Away From Keyboard") shows, the bots can actually navigate from the beginning to the end of each level on their own and can potentially beat the game with almost no human input required (though this can only be done on official maps since it relies on A.I. pathing scripts encoded into the map). The AFK bot does have some limitations the regular bots don't, such as being unable to pick up weapons[=/=]items or use grenades (likely meant to prevent them from changing your loadout when you're AFK).

** Brutes are large 8-foot tall LightningBruiser GiantMook MiniBoss enemies similar to ''Left 4 Dead'''s Tank.

* ArtificialBrilliance: The game's bots, used in single-player or to fill in any empty player slots for your 4-person squad, are generally fairly competent and do a good job of aiding you in making it through a mission, at least on Normal difficulty. In fact, as the game's [=AFK=] mode (in which you can have a bot play for you if you need to go "Away From Keyboard") shows, the bots can actually navigate from the beginning to the end of each level on their own and can potentially beat the game with no human input required (though this can only be done on official maps since it relies on A.I. pathing scripts encoded into the map). The AFK bot does have some limitations the regular bots don't, such as being unable to pick up weapons[=/=]items or use grenades (likely meant to prevent them from changing your loadout when you're AFK).

** Brutes are large LightningBruiser GiantMook MiniBoss enemies similar to ''Left 4 Dead'''s Tank.

* ExcusePlot: The game never goes into any detail as to who your characters are or what exactly is going on. There's nothing in the way of an introductory cutscene or anything like that either. You just run through the levels doing the mission objectives you're given, and all you can gather from context is that you're on-board some kind of spaceship which has been taken over by aliens. Any more concrete backstory can only be found in various interviews by the developers discussing the game.

* ArtificialBrilliance: The game's bots, used in single-player or to fill in any empty player slots for your 4-person squad, are generally fairly competent and do a good job of aiding you in making it through a mission, at least on Normal difficulty. In fact, as the game's [=AFK=] mode (in which you can have a bot play for you if you need to go "Away From Keyboard") shows, the bots can actually navigate from the beginning to the end of each level on their own and can potentially beat the game with no human input required (though this can only be done on official maps since it relies on A.I. pathing scripts encoded into the map).

* SchizophrenicDifficulty: The first episode is actually the longest and most difficult; later episodes are noticeably shorter, are easier to navigate, and are generally less frustrating.

* TheGhost: The survivors get their orders from a MissionControl named Boris, who is never actually seen or even heard from in the game itself, only referred to by the survivors, and who is apparently a woman.

* ArtificialBrilliance: The game's bots, used in single-player or to fill in any empty player slots for your 4-person squad, are generally fairly competent and do a good job of aiding you in making it through a mission, at least on Normal difficulty.

** Flashers emit a blindly bright aura of light which can heavily interfere with your vision.

* ArtificialBrilliance: The game's bots, used in single-player or to fill in any empty player slots for your 4-person squad, are generally fairly compentent and do a good job of aiding you in making it through a mission, at least on Normal difficulty.

* EliteZombies: The game has a number of special enemies similar to ''Left 4 Dead'''s special infected, though many behave quite differently from the ones in ''Left 4 Dead''.