Oddcore Is A Trippy, Fun, And Very Good Backrooms FPS

Liminal spaces and the “backrooms” have become overused concepts on the internet, with people labeling any room or area that is even slightly off as some creepy space. It’s annoying and tiring. But I still like the idea of eerie, dead areas hidden in our world in places like forgotten hallways and empty hotel rooms. I also like fast-paced boomer shooters that feel great. So I’m a big fan of the newly released indie FPS Oddcore, which mashes all of this stuff up into one stylish game.

Out now on Steam via early access, Oddcore doesn’t have much setup. One moment you’re hanging out in a room in your house, watching TV, before you suddenly clip through reality and enter a strange multidimensional hubworld called Oddcore that acts as a demented spin on a theme park. Sort of. It’s all very, well, dare I say…odd! Though it’s unclear why you’ve ended up here or what “here” even means, it doesn’t really matter much once you get past the tutorial. All that matters is lasting as long as you can as you hop between different liminal spaces and strange dimensions, killing all the bizarre monsters you encounter along the way with guns, swords, special abilities, and much, much more.

What kind of game is Oddcore?

The basic loop in Oddcore involves you hopping into a space and then completing an objective. It might be to kill 10 enemies. Or collect seven strange items. Or to survive a corruption ambush that sends deadly giant faces at you. You know, the usual stuff. Survive, and you hop to a new place and repeat. Killing enemies earns you souls, which can be spent to extend how much time you have before your run ends or to heal you via shooting your own feet. Between every few worlds, there are vending machines that let you upgrade your gear or abilities, and random boxes that contain power-ups and other useful specials.

Survive long enough, and you’ll earn tokens which can be spent in various ways. I spent most of mine at a slot machine inside a large arcade in the hub world. That slot machine spit out tickets if I got lucky, and I could use those to buy other pieces of gear. There’s actually a lot going on in Oddcore, and after just an hour or so of playing, I could feel it start to pull me into its web. I wanted to do just one more run…earn just a few more tokens…play just a little bit more.

It also helps that Oddcore has primo aesthetics. It’s got that retro boomer shooter look I’ve come to expect from these kinds of games in 2026, but augments that with monsters and locations that seem out of place. I recommend turning on the VHS filter as it covers all of the strange art and retro visuals in cozy scanlines that add to the experience. But even without the VHS filter, Oddcore is a damn fine indie shooter that will hopefully only get bigger and better as it makes its way through early access.