Последние обзоры Legolas_Katarn

A short turn based RPG set in 15th century Hungary where a heartbroken knight who has taken to drink battles invading Hussites and begins to uncover the schemes of a supernatural cult his wife is involved with. Striking art and music, multiple ways for some events and character fates to play out, simple but charming looking battles, mixes heartfelt and comedic moments to good effect.

As he drinks in his room, Pavol witness the burning of an old fort in the distance and is sent by the local lord along with the priest Matej, who initially seems highly devout but has moments of flexibility as the game goes on, to find out what they can about the fire. There becomes an almost buddy cop movie feeling between the two as they start at odds but warm to one another's personality traits. As events play out you can have different guest characters in your party, some as side comedic characters who quickly leave and some with a story role to play. You might discover more information or side events that allow you to handle situations in different ways or discover information that might save or kill one of the game's characters. Characters have their comedic moments and personalities but also their serious moments, such as your lord constantly importing board games and seeking people to play with him even those you bring back to his keep for safe refuge or as prisoners but who also is willing to join you in battle or lead his forces to protect the land from the threats you uncover.

The art style remains unique and striking in the isometric view as you travel around, inside the battles that play out like first person dungeon crawlers where different weapons and items play out detailed animations in front of you, or the in the few cutscenes the game features. The atmosphere further enhanced by the excellent soundtrack from the psychedelic band Marcel Gidote's Holy Crab.

The battle system is the weaker spot of the game. It works well enough and doesn't tend to overstay its welcome with each fight being a unique encounter and the visuals being good. What holds it back is that even when you equip different items that might allow access to new special abilities you are really only doing the same things over and over. Using Pavol's half-sword to break the armor of stronger or more dangerous targets then hitting them until they die and moving to the next, healing with Matej blessing skill when injured and using items when needed or other party members in similar ways. Things likely only slightly changing near the end with some powerful attacks from ranged weapons. Enemies are constantly using stun attacks and if you have bad luck and someone gets focused on and goes down you either have to use an items that might seem rarer at the start of the game or wait for them to kill everyone so you can reload your last save. As the game goes on you will be swimming in money as their is never really any reason to even buy equipment but you can stock up on so many items that battles should never present a challenge.

A short RPG with enough well written personal and comedic moments and a unique art style I always wanted to see more of in and music that perfectly fit the game. The battles themself might not be that interesting mechanically but they do a good job in not overstaying their welcome.

Screenshots: https://bsky.app/profile/kennanw.bsky.social/post/3lf23qx4lqk25

Low poly PS1 styled horror FPS that has you playing as a murderer with memory loss getting orders to kill different targets from a strange voice on a radio, the detective hunting him, and some of the victims.

Mixes the horror, comedy, and surreal moments with simple but functional and bloody sniping sections and enough environmental detail and notes to piece together more details in the story.

Screenshots: https://bsky.app/profile/kennanw.bsky.social/post/3lew3fy52zk2s

A grindhouse somewhat PS1 visual styled horror title that has some ok moments but I didn't enjoy it nearly as much as the earlier and similar Bloodwash or the more action focused Night At the Gates of Hell by the same publisher.

You start your night getting called into work at the video store because another employee has called in sick, as you go through your routine you hear more about the missing people from the area and a detective informs you that they all had a membership at your store. It isn't long after that that you are captured by a pig mask wearing man carrying a meat hook and must find a way to escape from his dungeon.

It's a linear and short title that works well enough that I mostly enjoyed what was there but there is a bit less setup and buildup to your encounter like there was in the similar title Bloodwash and once you get to the fourth chapter out of the five the quality and atmosphere goes down. Chapter four has you escaping a sewer as you are chased by the killer while you try to activate five levers to open an exit door. The problem is I don't think I've ever played or seen a game that does boss or unkillable enemies chasing you handled that well (Hellknight probably the closest it gets) and this one falls into having all the issues that come with the mechanic. The killer isn't really in the environment and just kind of goes away after you run for a short time if you do run into an area where he spawns in, he is easy to run from and you can take two hits from him and will heal if hit once after a short time that combined with frequent checkpoints removes any tension making him more of an annoyance as is often the case in these situations. This sewer chapter is where you will spend the most time and, as sewer levels tend to, its not a visually interesting location. The fifth chapter has your encounter with him after you find a gun and this is also a very poor encounter where you can just stand in a corner and shoot as he runs back and forth at you until the fight ends.

Not a bad game but from the other similar games by the publisher I've played, Bloodwash had a better atmosphere and buildup, more character perspectives, a better final encounter with the killer, and no overly long section of running around in circles trying to find levers to pull.

Screenshots: https://bsky.app/profile/kennanw.bsky.social/post/3leqa4ldsd22d

Improved on the first in every way but combat can still feel a bit stiff and limited as well as overly sanitized and while exploration can be fun the game is filled with uninteresting collectibles.

The story starts five years after the previous game with the group from the first having split up for various reasons. Cal has continued to take jobs from Saw Gerrera making him a high value target for the Empire. After the prologue on Coruscant leaves his ship damaged and Cal disillusioned by losses suffered and finding that the Empire remains as strong as ever, he looks up his friend Greez to repair the ship on the planet Koboh where he has opened a saloon. Koboh acts as the largest planet with there likely being as much to do there as the entirety of the original game. You find temples to explore, people to help and recruit who become regulars you can learn more about at the saloon, fight local raiders, and discover technology and a hidden planet from the High Republic era that sets off the rest of the plot that sees Cal reuniting with the other characters from the first game. The story was fine, well acted, Cal is a better protagonist this time, you spend more time with Merrin who I'd still rather be the main character, and the supporting cast is typically enjoyable to interact with.

Combat is greatly expanded on but still falls a bit short. In the first game you unlocked a double bladed lightsaber late into the game and could start to chain attacks from one style to the next. Here you lose that chaining ability but basically start the game able to use a single, double bladed, or two lightsabers with a heavy cross guard style found later as well as a style that has more lunging attacks with a single blade in one hand and a blaster in the other. Each style has their own base combos and skills to learn in their skill trees but I was disappointed that you can only equip two styles at once at checkpoints and they lacked any attacks that flowed together between them. Likely because of the spread out skills in five different styles combined with all your other skill trees each style doesn't have very many skills to learn with some upgrades being just enhancements of the previous skill or each one blocking shots in a different way or having a different style of throw attack (with the exception of the blaster style where you just shoot the gun). The combat is better than the first game, not that that is saying too much, and there are some fun moves here but it still tends to feel a bit too slow, limiting in what combos can do, still feels both sanitized and a bit dull with how many hits some enemies can take from a lightsaber and what little visual damage it tends to do to its targets. Combat tends to be the most enjoyable when you fight large groups of weak enemies that you can quickly move between with each being finished with a blow or two and being susceptible to your powers but too often are fights limited to you against one or a small number of tanky, guard heavy, or somehow more maneuverable than you opponents that pose little threat and can start to feel more like a chore to fight where one of the best things to unlock is an upgraded force push that you can use to throw some stronger foes off ledges just to get fights over with.

The environments look great and Koboh and the other larger planet Jedha give you more room to explore and discover hidden secrets, puzzles, lore, and stronger enemies to find all without an overly invasive UI that many games in this style tend to have. The saloon area gives you something to come back to to check in with characters both to learn more about side characters and as a way to hear rumors that give you an area to search in on your map to find old jedi temples, side boss enemies, or locations where you might find new characters to meet. There is a lot less forced backtracking than in the first game, if you do need to go back somewhere fast travel and short cuts you can unlock make getting around easy and while you won't go to that many different planets the different sections of Koboh do a good enough job in changing the environment up enough to keep things interesting. The actual rewards for a lot of the exploration can be fairly disappointing with many being nothing more than dull cosmetics or color options for certain cosmetic or items that you can trade in for cosmetics. You might actually want to follow the main story a bit before doing too much exploration as you will be held back by Cal needing to acquire some abilities that allow for new movement abilities that will be required to progress through many side paths, though if you do explore early the mediation point checkpoints and shortcuts make it easy to get back where you need and the map is helpful in marking sections you have not entered yet or barricades you haven't been able to interact with. Just the way that you move around and abilities you have or learn to traverse the environment do a lot to improve the feel of the game when compared to the original.

A longer and improved version of the first game that this time did enough to make me enjoy playing it (even with a length that is likely nearly doubled if you do side content).

Performance wise it ran fine with everything turned to max and ray tracing on, but did crash three or four times and had issues with some Steam trophies unlocking (fixed by either starting the game from the EA app it loads from when you get it on Steam and once by using load save instead of continue on the main menu).

Screenshots: https://bsky.app/profile/kennanw.bsky.social/post/3leoai6w4cc26

A 30 minute game with an uncomfortable atmosphere where you follow the commands of a masked man as you click 10,000 times and slowly hear more about the man. The dialogue, rain outside the window, sound effects, shadows, and angles of view and appearance of the man all make for an unsettling environment. Does a lot with the little it uses and the short length.

Gives the ending away and removes some tension with opening content warnings.

(You can hold down mouse or spacebar instead of clicking the mouse for those that don't want to click 10,000 times or would be unable to)

Screenshots: https://bsky.app/profile/kennanw.bsky.social/post/3le5tkfzyz22q

Hollowbody is an early PS1/2 styled survival horror with some very good things about it that would make it a classic of the era it emulates, if not for the areas where it feels more like a demo.

You play as Mica who is entering a dead city that was walled off from the rest of the world, seemingly after some type of biohazard spread and infected the residents. Mica is attempting to locate a missing woman who is implied to be her girlfriend who had joined a team of people entering the area to search for answers about what happened and why no one was ever held accountable for the deaths. As you explore you are attacked by somewhat humanoid creatures, hear a mysterious voice who seems to know you and keep calling on phones that you pass, and you find notes and hear memories about the last moments of people's lives or what went on in the early days with people removed from their homes, armed forces taking over certain areas or shooting people attempting to enter protected zones, and the area finally being bombed. As you find bodies of resident you are given information about their name, date of birth, occupation, cause of death, etc seemingly by a piece of technology that Mica has, but as you move further into the game and start finding bodies of masked workers or security forces those details all show up as classified likely signifying that those responsible for the situation 60 years ago are likely manufacturing a lot of the common technology used by people like Mica. As you explore you not only find old decomposed bodies but what looks to be newer corpses as well. The setting and background story are a positive, though they don't have the time they need or the impact by connecting you as much to the wider world to be as interesting as they could be.

The visuals are good and camera angles are helping to create a moody atmosphere perfectly in line with some of the better early PS2 titles. The sound design is also a highpoint with music, background ambient noise, whispered voices, and an unsettling white noise kind of background sound that fits the atmosphere. As you move through areas shelves might fall, monstrous faces appear in walls, TVs flicker to life, etc. It does a great job capturing that era of gaming. There are multiple areas where many games would take advantage of a jump scare or sudden enemy ambush, while Hollowbody seems more content to just creating a more tense feeling from the thought of something happening while having the environment do a better job at telling a story from what is there. Although, because it never once uses these moments for any kind of threat and due to how weak the enemies are, this is a design choice that can lose its strengths the longer the game goes on. Are they going to spring out from under the sheets, out of the water, out of the closet, out of the confessional, through the window, the answer is always no but with how other games have trained you you'll probably be expecting it even though it would rarely make sense to actually happen.

While I am not someone that usually enjoys puzzles, it is more expected in this type of game and what you find here is often little more just minor fetch quests to find obvious nearby items or combine item A with item B. Some almost to the point of busywork only included because it was to be expected. You combine obvious items to advance and even if something might not be an expected solution your inventory is light enough to just make it easy to try everything when the option to use an item comes up. One area has you pick up some alcohol after you find yourself surrounded by locked rooms and closed shutters only to see a bin full of papers when you leave the room that is next to a sign that says a fire will unlock all doors and you just happen to have started the game with a lighter.

One of the best moments of the game is in the sewers (I think the developer deserves some praise because I don't think I've ever said that before) where your seemingly fragile state of mind starts to become more apparent. You collect items and see things that don't seem to make sense for the setting, looking at the items in your inventory has your character mentions she doesn't remember picking them up, and despite how they are used or not used you end up being taken in more winding routes that shouldn't exist. I may have run into a bug where the machine you use the items you collect on did not fully appear for me and it made the protagonist's thoughts make even less sense and it had me automatically setting objects on invisible things that just had them floating in midair, and if that is a bug I'd be fine with them keeping it in.

There was an update about a month and a half after the game released that added some minor areas, roadblocks, and area separations (I assume there must have been loading or performance issues in some of the larger spaces) and from what I saw watching a playthrough before the update what was added seem like fine if not particularly interesting additions. There was a bit more narrative elements added with a series of objects you can collect, though the way you find them involves backtracking from nearly the end of the game to back to one of the first areas. The game's short length and low number of locations make that less tedious than it would be in some games but collecting those items didn't really add much to the experience.

Enemies are a weak point, with their only being about three types of them. You have the regular enemy, a larger version of it that really isn't more threatening it just takes more damage, and dogs. The enemies are slow and nonthreatening even on the normal difficulty with a very large amount of healing supplies and ammo being available to you. I ended up having over 17 healing items and only had to use one when it wouldn't let me move immediately after loading into an area and I was hit by an enemy it spawned next to me. In total I healed twice because of the situation mentioned, and once when I walked past a car got hit by a dog sitting out of view behind it and knocked into another enemy who his me into another dog. I had a large amount of revolve ammo, most of the shotgun ammo you find in the game, and never actually used the bow and arrow and flamethrower that you can get other than just taking some test shots before reloading a save. When they become more numerous in the second area enemies are so slow and ineffective that not only can you easily run past them in the wide open spaces, but most of the time you could also just walk. Even the dogs can't keep up with your run speed (which sounds like it was increased in outdoor areas in a patch after launch, so that may not always have been true). The enemies don't seem to care much about you most of the time, forgetting you were even there if you move a short distance away. A dog is introduced that I couldn't even tell was an enemy for some time because the lock on function sometimes doesn't visually appear and half the time the dog's AI seemed to have it running in my general direction, passing me, then running back the way it came and off screen. That the monsters aren't stuck to a small area and are more free to roam around could lead to more interesting situations but it mostly just made them all the easier to ignore for me. What is a better part of the enemy design is the screeching, crying, and other sounds they make combined with the radio static you often get when around them adding to the unsettling nature of the locations.

You have a few different ranged weapons to use which all tend to feel, sound, and look weak when connecting with an enemy. You hold the lock on button and shoot until they fall down. The melee system is a bit better than what is usually found in the genre from the time it is borrowing from. Chaining melee attacks...

Full Review: https://www.backloggd.com/u/Kennan/review/2148074/
Name in game: https://bsky.app/profile/kennanw.bsky.social/post/3lc7zibtj222o

A good remaster of a game that was more impressive for its time but hasn't aged as well as some other early FPS titles, or the later games in this series.

Dark Forces is a nearly 30 year old FPS that takes place before and after A New Hope. Former imperial officer turned mercenary Kyle Katarn takes on tasks to steal the plans for the Death Star and to destroy the Empire's new Dark Trooper project.

The remaster does a good job updating the stage and cutscene visuals, gives the old blurry or muddy look more details that couldn't be as easily noticed before (and allowing me to play a game that would have had me become ill from motion sickness if I tried to play it anytime in the last 15 years). It doesn't do anything to the music, but I found the lower quality of the more traditional Star Wars themes to be more interesting than just having the common repeated Star Wars music you've heard many times before.

For weapons you have a punch attack that can do a decent amount of damage but is rarely a practical option unless you find a lone melee enemy or find someone alone with their back turned. Kyle's pistol does not have the charged shot alternate fire function found in later games but it does fire a single accurate shot that can make it useful at mid or long range. The rifle uses the same ammo as the pistol but fires full auto while being less accurate and using two ammo for every shot. Thermal detonators are grenades that you can charge the distance thrown by holding the attack button and depending on primary or alternate fire can be thrown to explode on impact or rolled and set to detonate after a delay. The repeater fires at a rate in between the pistol and rifle while also having the pistol's accuracy, it also has an alternate fire to shoot three shots in a triangular style that can make it the closest thing you have to a shotgun. The fusion cutter is somewhat similar to the later bowcaster weapon shooting higher damaging green colored shots, the primary fire shoots one of three barrels being slightly slower to fire and for the shot to travel but doing more damaging than the repeater while the alternate fire shoots all four barrels at once for large enemies or crowd control. Mines can be set to detonate after a delay or when something is near them. The mortar gun acts like a grenade launcher and is basically a faster and potentially safer method of using thermal detonators. The concussion rifle is more unusual, firing at a rate slower than the pistol but where the shot lands does a higher damaging AoE attack, though the somewhat auto aim mechanics of the games, height issues further effecting that auto aim, and being able to hit yourself can make it more difficult to use. For some reason the actual shot of the rifle is also invisible until it hits making using it less enjoyable in general. The assault cannon can fire both fast and damaging but slower moving plasma shots or a missile with the alternate fire mode.

Enemy variety is a bit low and you aren't going to get the more gruesome Doom style deaths with blood and mangled bodies but they do visibly react to being shot and give combat lines when they engage you. The earlier missions are mostly just going to be Imperial officers, stormtroopers, and naval troopers whose main difference is that amount of health. Eventually you run into a few different kind of droid enemies like the interrogator droid that can shoot and do direct health damage at close range, probe droids that explode when shot down, the little marksman training droid Luke practiced with that is small and hard to hit but only does 1 damage when it hits you, and ceiling or wall mounted turrets. Alien enemies like grenade throwing Gran, melee equipped Gamorreans, and concussion rifle wielding Trandoshans eventually show up as well as prototype and finished dark trooper enemies.

Outdoor environments aren't at a place where they look very good or even make any sense for the environment and while indoor sections can look better, in some cases by copying classic Star Wars film style locations, there is the hidden main path design more common at the time where a tiny little staircase might be in the back corner of a room and around a wall that can make the levels more difficult to navigate than they need to be (the improved visuals of the remaster probably make it easier to spot where to go than in the original version). The more auto aim nature of where you shots are going combined with some weapons just not shooting straight by design usually works fine but can become more of an issue once height or windows get involved and it keeps firing to low to hit targets, enemy death animations still tend to treat enemies as alive for a short time that can both make them a target of your auto aim while also preventing you from walking through them or picking up ammo for a short time. While the weapons are all usable and effective in their own ways, most of the guns just don't feel, sound, or look that interesting. There's a focus in some levels of puzzle based switches to flip in the correct order, minor mazes combined with what can just be naturally confusing level design even with a good map you can overlay over your vision, or minor platforming sections that never felt great with the game's speed and how it sometimes seemed to jump perfectly and sometimes seemed to jump after a slight delay. Killing an officer might give you a keycode that you have to lookup in your PDA that shows you a three digit symbol code to enter into three computers to progress, kind of different at the time but really amounts to busywork instead of just being an auto use keycard.

Most of the game is just fine to good mechanically for the time with the more unique elements like the multi floor environments not doing as much mechanically apart from further adding to the chances of getting lost. Seeing some of the Star Wars characters and expanded narrative of the Death Star plans isn't as interesting 30 years later and after a constant influx of Star Wars content and reboots over that time and even if it were there isn't much here narratively except for Boba Fett showing up to be an embarrassment like what became common outside of books, Jabba trying to kill you, and Vader commenting on events between some missions. It's a short game played over 14 stages where a lot of that time can be figuring out where to go or just getting from place to place and occasionally running back to your ship in the starting area after your objective is complete.

Going to be more for those with an interest in games from its time, it's not going to do much for those looking to just play a great well remembered FPS and what was updated in the remaster isn't going to change that.

Screenshots: https://bsky.app/profile/kennanw.bsky.social/post/3lc2gwwnnv22f

Solid beat em up that is animated well and makes use of dashes, guards, air juggles, and icons above enemies to give warning of attack types to allow you you to fight effectively.

For your actions you have a normal melee combo, dash by double tapping or with a button press that also allows you to dash up and down, guard and counter after a successful block, grab that can allow for a melee combo or throw, a jump that is less effective for dodging and more for continued aerial combos, and a special meter that allows for two different ground and one aerial special attack that you can use for damage or to get out of an enemy attack combo. The game controls well and your characters are fast and responsive enough to switch between enemies on both sides of you or to do a quick guard or dash in between blows. Your best source of damage is often to finish off most of a regular combo before grabbing the enemy and finishing off that combo to launch them into the air where you can then combo them again (and possibly again with a aerial combo). You can find melee weapons and guns that can be used for more damage and knockdown or that can be thrown at enemies and can pick up some large objects like barrels that do heavier damage when thrown at enemies. Using your special attacks can break you out of enemy combos and holds and using a special or a throw from a grab gives you brief invincibility to avoid enemy attacks. There are three starting and two unlockable characters that have different damage, resistance, speed, and special strength with their own combos and attack types. The difference between them is enough to make them feel different though not to the extent where some games have character differences where you can almost feel like you're playing a different game when you change to a new one.

When you finish a stage you are given two choices that might lead to one of two possible stages to go to next and that will eventually give you one of three final stages for the game's ending. Each ending will have a unique boss fight and possibly unique enemy types to that stage, while taking certain paths might see you not even running into certain types of normal enemies. There is nothing particularly interesting about the narrative or character dialogue but the enemy variety comes with multiple types with different attack patterns to learn. Some enemies might drain health, some attack right away and avoid hit stun shortly after getting up, some make use of ranged attacks, some sidestep and attack from behind if you attempt to grab them, some grab you and drain health, etc and as a warning for the type of enemy you are facing or for certain stronger attacks icons will appear over an enemy's head letting you know to dodge or block a charging or grab attack or that you should move away from the enemy you just knocked down. Bosses change up their attack patterns a bit around the mid point of a fight and can start to require you to use dashes and blocks to more effectively fight them.

Solid classic style beat em up that doesn't do anything particularly good sound, music, or narrative wise but has good, responsive, and well animated enough combat to be worth a look.

Screenshots: https://bsky.app/profile/kennanw.bsky.social/post/3lbohogqfzs22

Veil of the Witch is a fairly feature complete early access tactical turn based roguelite, and spin off of the first game, that narratively takes place a few years after Lost Eidolons and features some returning characters including some whose fate had been ambiguous. While there is obviously some elements that need to be finished and a few to improve on, its a very solid start for an early access title with a good battle system and characters that are fun to use in combat.

Each run will see you taking the main character and up to four of eight possible companions across three different areas that each end in a boss fight. Each segment allows you to choose between two to three paths that will show you the likely reward type to gain (or show a random outcome) and if the choice involves a battle or not. You can take paths to find different items to enhance characters and the shop you run into on runs in your home base or focus on, find randomized relics that can give you positive passive abilities or ones with a mixture of benefits and drawbacks, run into ally side characters that have their own storylines and join for the next two battles, run into events that raise character partnership levels that give you bonuses when close to each other in battle, collect money and find a shop to spend that money in, find a campsite to other rest and heal or gain an upgrade for a skill, etc. Many of these areas can end up giving you a choice or multiple choices where depending on what you choose or if one of your companions is able to interact with the event you can roll a 12 sided die for various possible outcomes. It is also possible for some relics to lead to certain locations not otherwise available.

The game uses a similar battle system to the first game but with the more cinematic army battling backgrounds removed from the fight to instead just feature a faster paced and more common style where animations are character out on the map itself. This is a system where each character has two types of weapons equipped (light/elemental/dark magic tome, two handed sword, two handed axe, axe and shield, spear and shield, shortbow, longbow, two swords, sword and shield, etc) and is wearing one of three kinds of armor (cloth, leather, or plate). All weapon and skill attacks hit but a unit's accuracy and guard stats can effect the total damage done as can defending, having a shield, or certain types of weapons being better against certain kinds of armor. Magic has its own side effects where it can leave targets stunned, on fire, frozen, etc and using the right kind of magic on a certain type of terrain can create additional effects with water slowing wet characters, lightning doing more damage to wet characters or doing chain attacks on water, fire detonating poison clouds but doing less damage to wet enemies, etc.

As they level up characters will be able to choose between two different rolled stat increases or new skills and the skills that each character starts with and that they can learn combined with weapon and armor upgrades that can unlock their own passive and active skills leads to a variety of ways a character can be played and how well they can work together. The total number of abilities is limited enough where you won't find endless possible interesting combinations but the more focused set of skills and the ability to spend in game currency found on each run to reroll skill and stat options has made it so I've never gone through a run disappointed in any characters final skillset. The randomness could certainly have ended with some being favored but I've never seen anyone end up as a barely usable mismatched mess of conflicting abilities and stats. One of the first characters you get might seem much better suited as nothing but a healer based on her starting skills and stats but if you choose to upgrade her sword and shield and gain certain passive abilities she can end up a decent damage dealer who heals everyone and gains a large shield every time she does damage while also having access to a lunging AoE lightning strike ability that turns her into a mixture of a damage dealer tank and healer.

The battles themselves are currently a bit limited in number for multiple replay but what is there does show a variety of different scenarios. Some scenarios allow you to fight a large number of enemies or choose to retreat, you might need to move to stay ahead of poison, make use of balistas to help you stop a large number of advancing monsters, find your usual enemies being attacked by monsters or the undead and have a choice to ally with them or fight both groups, etc. Some of these battles can use a bit more to them, they might have variation in enemy type and strength depending on what chapter the scenario is found on but some different variations in what happens or spawn locations would be nice and some are just too simple such as ones where you are just fighting some small spawns of generic non-threatening enemies while you open a few treasure chests scattered around.

Between runs you can access a town where an alter can unlock permanent passive upgrades for weapon and armor types or bonuses for positive events on your runs. You can access conversations between your character and your companions. Rune resources can be spent to promote you and each of your companions twice that gives minor stat bonuses while also upgrading a base skill and unlocking three new skills to acquire each time. When you reach a level three partnership with an ally you can also change your main character's class into a slightly altered version of that companion's class where you can end up with a new possible mixture of abilities and main weapons.

Currently on the negative side, the actual narrative and ally events seem to be the most unfinished and there isn't quite enough content variety for the length of multiple runs through the game. Completing the chapter three boss fight just tells you the journey isn't over and takes you back to your base. When you meet an ally it seems like they should do more as while they do have a storyline they often seem to say that they are specifically looking to do something that should lead to a unique battle scenario that never actually happens and instead they just join for two fights then have a conversation before leaving until you find the same character in a new run to continue the story. When some of your stat ups are going to come down from a choice between one of two options it really highlights how impractical it is to ever want to choose to raise critical defense or magic resistance you aren't likely to get hit by crits or magic anywhere near as much so just prioritizing damage or just having more physical defense or total health always makes more sense. The game has the problem some roguelite have where many of the possible reward options are things for progression back at your home base between runs (partnership rank ups, shop upgrade items, class promotion items, and sacred embers to unlock passive stat and effect bonuses) but eventually you aren't going to need those things and getting them does nothing for the run you are currently doing where usually in other games the events with them or type of bonus it is might at least effect something currently. I would also say the game is very easy because I always prioritized getting those home base upgrade items even on my first playthrough and so far I have completed all five of my runs with the only challenge really being the second boss on my first playthrough because I didn't know he could hit and apply status effects to multiple characters standing in a line. You can end up with...

Full Review: https://www.backloggd.com/u/Kennan/review/2124941/
Lost Eidolons Review: https://www.backloggd.com/u/Kennan/review/801437/
Screenshots: https://bsky.app/profile/kennanw.bsky.social/post/3lbmi6hppss2q
https://youtu.be/hFNEc4j-uhQ?si=ZifxtNN5rg6-QWHy

A strategic game of Russian Roulette with a shotgun against an otherworldly opponent. Short but good atmosphere and use of items for different strategies and a recently added multiplayer mode.

The match takes place over three rounds where both you and the "dealer" have an amount of health with you brought back when hit by blood transfusions or defibrillators. The first round has you both at three health where getting shot removes one, you are shown how many live and black rounds are being loaded into the shotgun and have to choose to fire at the dealer or yourself which will pass the dealers turn if you shoot a blank when aiming at yourself. Hitting the dealer or yourself with a live round gives them the next turn. Winning that first rounds moves you to the next segment where your life increases and items are added into the mix for both you and the dealer with them pulled randomly out of a box and set to your left and right side, able to be used at anytime during your turn. Items can range from healing items like cigarettes that give one life or expired medicine that can heal for two or damage you for one, handcuffs that prevent your opponent from acting by making them skip their next turn, adrenaline that lets you steal an item from your opponent if you use it right away, a knife that saws off the barrel of the gun making it do two damage for the next turn, and a variety of items to help you guess correctly if the shotgun has a live round or blank loaded. You can combine what you know about what was loaded into the gun and what was left with items that allow you to do things like remove the current shell, examine what is currently loaded, swap the type of shell currently loaded, or a phone call that tells you what is going to be loaded in the future.

Some have mentioned the occasional issue with the dealer AI going through multiple items where they should know what is currently loaded before aiming the gun at their own head and shooting themself, but I thought that just added to the atmosphere and horror theme of the dealer. Completing the game once unlocks a double or nothing mode where you can enter into a new round to increase your final winnings.

There's not a lot to the game but it has good atmosphere and style and the gameplay works well.

Screenshots: https://bsky.app/profile/kennanw.bsky.social/post/3lb7xuiwd3k2e