Midnight Fight Express is a great exercise in turning your brain off and bashing skulls. From the fully intact skull of Jacob Dzwinel, this top-down beat’em up leans heavily on its action flick inspirations with its stylized fights and pulse-pounding soundtrack. While the story may leave some wanting, the fast-paced action and level ratings will keep any John Wick wannabe hooked, as they try to climb the leaderboard.
The game opens with you being interrogated by a paint-by-the-numbers good cop-bad cop duo. You recall the night before, in which you went on an amnesia-fueled rampage around the city, accompanied by a mysterious drone. While the story is delivered by unvoiced dialogue and is mostly forgettable, the levels are not. Your revenge drenched night plays across 41 levels all of which feel unique and never like the game is repeating beats just to pad out the level count. Highlights include a level set in a single public restroom, an oil rig crawling with pirates, and a tight situation that takes you through multiple train cars.
Some levels do contain questionable invisible walls, one standout example is the motel level, with some patios just unreachable. This limit of exploration is unfortunate. I want to explore every inch of the map, not get stopped at the stoop. Another minor annoyance was the few times the game wouldn’t show the inside of a building and instead opted for character outlines, for both the player and nearby enemies. For a game that depends on picking up things in the environment, this feels like an oversight.
Midnight Fight Express looks great. From the dank sewers to the checkered floored restaurants, each level feels lived in and ready to be a playground for you to cause chaos. Backing it up is the moody soundtrack from Noisecream, which can make you feel like a complete badass in one moment and then switch gears completely into creating a layer of mystique around the world Dzwinel has created.
The shining star of Midnight Fight Express is its replayability. You’re given a rating after each level completion. Your score increases by completing challenges in the level, pulling off big combos, not dying, and taking enemies out in many different ways. The potential for a higher score increases, as you tech up through the game’s different skill trees. A favorite of mine was the finisher tree, but players can explore different paths like grapple, projectiles, and sidearms. No one path feels like it strong arms the others out, and they do complement each other as you start to mix and match.
One standout in my time with the game included the ability to kick objects at enemies and then roll into them to deliver a finisher. I did find myself wanting more opportunities to interact with the environment. An early finisher skill you can unlock does allow you to defeat enemies using walls and railing, but I think of the missed opportunities in not being able to use the numerous surrounding cars or other oddities to your advantage.
No matter your playstyle, Midnight Fight Express just feels good. I was pulling off combos I would never dream of in other games. I never found myself meandering between enemies or hitting a difficulty wall. Any failure felt like it was on me and not the game. It also never feels too easy. Enemy variety is wide, and new enemy types are funneled into the action in a way that never feels overwhelming. Fights only slowed for the story to progress, but this can be turned off in the menus. Regular fight levels are broken up by the occasional vehicle level. Here the focus is put on the gunplay, which isn’t a strongpoint thanks to the touchy aiming. Thankfully there are only a handful of vehicle levels.
Enemies occasionally drop guns that you can pick-up. These are messy little spit cannons (which is not a bad thing). With a gun in hand you’ll sporadically shoot, looking to thin the enemy herd. This adds to the chaotic feel of the combat and violence of Midnight Fight Express. The guns never feel like they completely takeover (outside of the aforementioned vehicle levels.) Partway through the game you gain a side-arm, which can be used sparingly to shoot enemies with electric bullets. I grew concerned that this would change the flow of combat, but ammo was sparse, and the side-arm never packed as much of a punch as weapons picked up throughout levels. The only minor annoyance with the side-arm is that it is tied to the same button as finishers. A few times I found myself shooting, when I actually meant to chokeslam someone into the ground.
Midnight Fight Express is the top-down beat’em up I didn’t know I needed in 2022. Its ease to pick up and acceptance of all playstyles makes it a standout in a world devoid of regular beat’em up releases. Anyone with a spare $20 laying around or looking for an excuse to dust off their Game Pass, will find hours of enjoyment as they work their way to the top of the leaderboards, one throat punch at a time.
