As the shooter genre aged, it began to reach toward other genres for inspiration. Bending shooting with the statistics and upgrades of a role playing game became a popular option, but what would happen if a third-person shooter was merged with a multiplayer online battle arena, or MOBA, spiced up with a dash of striking minimalistic graphics? The result would be Minimum, a multiplayer shooter that takes cues from the MOBA playbook without copying the design outright. Minimum features impressive maps, charming and clean aesthetics, and superb, high-octane gameplay that manages to keep your pulse pounding after many hours. However, a host of glitches constantly pester, threatening to replace any moment of joy with sheer frustration.

Minimum's central feature, and where you spend the majority of your time, is its fantastic Titan mode. Here, two teams of five players do battle while aiding and protecting their titan, an enormous mechanical colossus. In Titan mode, your team's goal is to guide your metal friend all the way to the enemy's lair to destroy their power core, all the while tearing through two defensive walls, the opposing players, and, of course, the enemy titan itself.

Battles have a satisfying ebb and flow as players either fight a titan-charged onslaught or work together to gather precious materials. Eventually, the titans meet and clash in the center of the arena, and both teams simultaneously fight off the opposing side while helping their titan by chipping away the health of its equally massive adversary. As one titan is defeated, the other continues its steady march toward the enemy stronghold until victory--or defeat at the hands of the opposing team.

When both titans meet their doom, the game enters a temporary creep phase that continues until the titans respawn. In this phase, you hunt small, neutral AI-controlled creatures, which drop power-ups that charge the fallen titan. The more power-ups gathered, the stronger your titan becomes when revived, and its chances of winning the next titan clash are greatly improved--so long as your team works together to prevent your enemies from attacking your empowered titan and protecting their weaker allies.

Battles have a satisfying ebb and flow as players either fight a titan-charged onslaught or work together to gather precious materials.

The constantly changing battlefield, along with smart level design, makes every battle in Titan mode a thrilling joyride. Snipers take aim and fire bright, colorful shots between the shuffling metal legs of titans. Grenades pop, sending blocky bodies flying, and warriors brandishing swords wreathed in red or green flame slam head-on in a whirlwind of multihued fire. These chaotic fights erupt in all corners of Minimum's imaginative maps. Each extensive level features elevators, sniper perches and, if you know how to be sneaky, plenty of pathways that either lead you to a fight where you're needed or allow you to sneak up behind unsuspecting foes. If you find yourself in the thick of a battle that is turning against you, there is always cover nearby. I found myself falling in love with every map I played. My favorite, however, goes to Path of Lanterns, a horseshoe-shaped level adorned by ancient Japanese castles.

Weapons and armor grant powerful abilities that aid you in battle. Your character isn't exactly a powerful hero to be chosen among many as in typical MOBAs. After all, as per Minimum's fundamental art direction, everyone starts as a character made of white or red rectangles in humanoid form. Abilities, instead, come from your equipment, where personalized loadouts allow you to create your own ultimate warrior. You can become a walking tank, sacrificing movement speed for more health and increased weapon damage, or perhaps a crafty ninja, dual-wielding katanas while receiving speed boosts for every foe you cut down.

The constantly changing battlefield, along with smart level design, makes every battle in Titan mode a thrilling joyride.

Picking up building materials in-game allows you to upgrade your armor up to three levels on the fly, increasing the effectiveness of the abilities. Gathering glowing blue blocks dropped by defeated enemies empower weapons by up to five levels, undergoing an impressive visual metamorphosis. But keep in mind, a death resets your weapon's level back to zero; however, your armor level stays the same. At the end of a match you are awarded in crafting materials, split into blocks and polyhedrons, which you spend in the armory to craft even more powerful weapons and armor.

Minimum offers a few, more familiar, multiplayer modes in Team Deathmatch and Horde. They share a list of smaller, arena-style maps, ranging from an ancient Japanese garden lit with paper lanterns to a gleaming space station, complete with a docking spaceship and antigravity areas. Team Deathmatch pits you in a five-on-five match where the first team to hit 50 kills wins. Removing titans from the equation does lessen the excitement somewhat, but the gunplay is competent enough for team deathmatch to be fun in bursts. Building material for armor is also more of a trickle than the shower seen in titan mode, which adds a flare of challenge, keeping you not only on the offense, but also on the lookout for rare crafting material while dodging plasma missiles and avoiding turrets.

The dull Horde mode is even less likely to keep your attention. In Horde, you and your team defend against an onslaught of enemies such as astronauts, ninjas, and dinosaurs--yes, dinosaurs. Minimum’s bots, however, are too dumb to even make fighting blocky raptors all that engaging. Enemies spawn in random locations throughout the map and proceed to take you out either by dancing in place while shooting, or by charging, blades drawn, into your stream of fire. Horde is a yawn-inducing affair, where most of the challenge comes from surviving against bullet sponges while watching out for dinosaurs that nip at you from behind. You get one life per round, but dying in Horde allows you to keep up with the action as a camera floating behind your allies’ backs. Trying to move to different angles, however, is nauseating. Instead of weaving with the changing environment, the camera smacks into objects while occasionally vibrating in protest to your attempt to get a clearer picture. Warning your buddies of impending dinosaur attacks isn’t easy when your view is stuck inside a wall.

Minimum is still far from finished, and it shows. Menu screens flicker, and occasionally you load into a match frozen for several seconds as environmental objects pop into view. Horde mode's follow cam is nauseating, as it smacks into objects surrounding the player in focus. Worst of all, however, are the shockingly frequent game crashes. During my first four hours into the game, Minimum crashed once per hour, forcing me to restart my computer. Oddly, the crashes only seemed to occur while I was either trying to quit the game or navigate the menu; the problem never cropped up while I was in a game. Minimum is due to receive updates in the forms of new weapons, armor pieces, and maps, but given its current state, I'd rather see the glitches and game-ending bugs ironed out before getting a new toy or two.

Minimum is a game of incredible moments. Watching an enormous titan, its form taking after a sumo wrestler, lifting another titan, designed after a samurai, straight into the night sky and tossing it into a cliff is awe-inspiring. More than a dozen hours in and my heart still flutters at the sight enemy titan marching along to a slow, thumping soundtrack. Titan mode manages to be both recognizable and fresh, while featuring some incredible maps in which to blow your opponents away. Minimum can be something special, but the unfortunate distractions, such as watching your computer boot up for the umpteenth time thanks to another crash, keep it from reaching its goals. With a few tweaks and perhaps some extra building blocks, Minimum can, like the imposing titans that call it home, stand tall among its peers.