SWAPMEAT playtest impressions - A creative roguelite shooter that shows promise

With Lab Meat 6, the latest playtest for SWAPMEAT allowed fans and newcomers both to dive into its wacky, zany sci-fi world of visceral-yet-goofy gore. Airing from July 17, 2025, to July 23, 2025, via a weeklong public beta on Steam, it offered a glimpse of what to expect from the final product via a slice of chaotic third-person action across its procedurally generated levels and objectives.

Here are our early impressions of the SWAPMEAT playtest. including what the game is about, what it does well, and so on.

SWAPMEAT playtest showcases both chaos and creativity

The world is full of discoveries to make and new power-ups to collect (Image via One More Game)

In SWAPMEAT, players step into the sci-fi boots of an employee belonging to a meat company. Like other similar titles with a dystopian yet goofy take on capitalism, this game sees the unlucky protagonist go to nearby planets to harvest alien meat from hostile creatures. To accomplish this, players must utilize those alien body parts by fusing them with the protagonist to gain the upper hand.

SWAPMEAT is both slightly squemish yet hilarious in its concept. Starting with a default loadout, players will tackle the various alien critters roaming around on each map with a primary and secondary weapon, and the gunplay feels great.

Depending on which enemy parts drop, they can be equipped on the head, torso, or legs, each with unique effects. While a set of creepy-crawlie legs enables faster movement, a massive brain for the head allows players to unleash a powerful energy beam at foes. Clearly, some body parts are a lot more useful than others. Furthermore, defeating foes and leveling up allows players to select between bonuses.

The Hunters can latch onto players, too (Image via One More Game)

However, in addition to the player's health, body parts have their own HP bars, and this is key because SWAPMEAT is a surprisingly challenging experience. Foes hit hard and come in large numbers, so utilizing the game's verticality via relevant meat parts and jump pads allows some leeway.

The biggest threat is the Hunters, who spawn after a meter onscreen fills. Players must contend with them on top of trying to accomplish main and side objectives, which include clearing outposts, fishing, harvesting minerals, and so on, with the last step being evacuating the planet with all collected resources.

Creative folks will undoubtedly come up with devastating body part combos to make runs a breeze. This is a roguelite, however, and death will send players back to the start and strip them of all upgrades and meat parts. Trying to advance through the campaign solo is incredibly challenging, so going at it in co-op with three other friends is the right call.

Fans of games like Risk of Rain 2 will feel right at home with this title, and I can't wait until the final launch to see how the full game turns out.

Read More: 7 best roguelike games to try out in 2025

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Edited by Rachel Syiemlieh