Going mad? Don't worry. Everyone has that. Everyone has a... baroque of theirs after all.

But what is baroque? And Why is baroque?

Baroque is a distorted substance that grants people the will to keep living in this post apocalyptic world and for that, to stay alive: You will kill, destroy, burn and murder.

In a world where god was actually a being that is the heart of the world and humans choose to tamper it with taking it's ability to feel "pain" resulting a giant distortion wave that turns majority of the living things into grotesques and also condemning the world into an eternal wheel of distorted reincarnation

Even tho, it's not possible to save this world entirely, we are choosen and sent by the council of angels that built by humanity to destroy the god. But can we erase this world without going mad with guilt and insanity in this unending cycle? Or should we choose our own and actually embrace this world?

Yeah that's my summary of the baroque(can be faulty at some places tho), but tbh you won't find most of the information in the game without looking at outside sources. It tells it's story more like a dark souls titles where if you don't find a specific npc, you won't understand a thing what's going on in this game (and to do that prepare to read guides). Honestly, this is not my favorite kind of storytelling and it's roguelite gameplay is ten times are not (this the only one I had played until now. Bc I hate anything rogue).

Then why baroque? That's simple. Because I am an adventurer at heart and the distorted world of baroque locked my interests in the moment I saw it's gameplay videos. Even tho I haven't played smt3, it kinda gave similar feelings to me where you really want to know what the heck is going on and how this world operates and I love that kind of thing where you slowly piece by piece see the world's deeper parts and in that sense it didn't disappointed me. It's variety is vast and somehow game manages to surprise you with it's dungeon gimmicks and monsters even in it's last hours unlike something like persona(tbh I only played 3 and 4 ).

Anyway, Did you know that this game hugely inspired by the dragon-quest spin-off Torneko? I thought it was smt but I guess it's not good to prejudge things (just like berserk fandom whenever they see a big sword or grotesque monsters, they scream: omg berserk reference??? Even tho berserk didn't invent them... I still love berserk But I just hate them)

So back to the game, how is gameplay? It's... alright. You have only 3 gameplay mechanics. Use item, Throw item, Attack with item. That's it.

Also movement is tank movement but with strafing buttons included.

How the most of the gameplay goes is, you attack an enemy, then back up or strafe around it to dodge it's attack, then attack back with items or use/throw them for status effects... rince and repeat

What makes the baroque's gameplay interesting is it's actually an item management game rather than an action game. Game's attack system is entirely dependant on the status effects and elements. Physical, lust, confuse, burn, freeze, paralyse, stomachache, randomized, teleport and more. And of course this effects are stored in the items you find or combine.

Oh also there are some small gameplay elements as well, there is a robot? That can combine things and give a item with random stats, there are npc's that give specific rewards to specific items, there are "cores" where you can throw your items and it will send that item to entrance that will make your next game session much easier(thankkkk goooooddddd)

But you can't be lazy. Why? Because in this game you have not just a health bar but also a vitality bar that goes down every second and that's where the tension comes in. You need to kill enemies fast enough or find heart items to refill it back before you die.

Combine this with the entirely randomized nature of this game like sometimes game decides to prank you and spawn you into a group of monsters or in front of a canon trap machine, also combination with the one time save feature(you can only save once and load that save once) and that's what changes your current run session to great or awful (ngl sometimes rng really really hate you to the point trying to cheaply kill you).

Honestly it's a short and still an easy game despite it's rng issues as long as you play it like a dark souls game(first slow titles to be exact) where you stay cautious and don't be too greedy and always look out for enemy openings, then you won't die many times or even once. It's mostly fair... Mostly... (Aside from the rng examples I gave of course...).

For finishing this game, I played 5 runs for it(only 2 deaths where one of them is rng's fault and other is mine with forgetting to save). But honestly you only need 2 runs to finish it(tho you need to kill yourself couple of times sometimes bc story progression demands it, I didn't include them). It's that short but that's what makes it great because of it's good pacing in my opinion. Otherwise it could get old easily because of it's simplicity and that's what I heard about the ps1 version of the game where there are more floors/levels to go through that bloats the game.

Then why the f.... it took that long for me to finish this short game? That's because... turns out when you become an adult, you can buy the things you wished a long time ago but your time equally goes down.

Anyway to not make the rest of the review depressive, game ends somehow similar to Gunvalkyrie. A sega game that have a dystopic steampunk theme. I assume it's a coincidence, but it suprised me as well. That's what I wanted to say

Lastly, is it worth playing? For me yes, but for you I don't know. But maybe I would recommend to play once and at least do a one run to see and experience what it's world is about. After all there is not many games with the concept of madness to experience.

Inarguably one of the most unique games I've ever played. Fantastic combat system, puzzling narrative that I still feel like I need time to stew over but most importantly a game that has an identity that is uncompromising and original. It does accomplish everything it sets out to do with a surprising amount of grace for such an old game. Massive recommendation for me.

My only minor gripe was a character that was meant to serve as a means to make the game easier but he also clashes with the tone and themes of the story a little bit more than I'd like.

Inarguably one of the most unique games I've ever played. Fantastic combat system, puzzling narrative that I still feel like I need time to stew over but most importantly a game that has an identity that is uncompromising and original. It does accomplishes everything it sets out to do with a surprising amount of grace for such an old game. Massive recommendation for me.

My only minor gripe was a character that was meant to serve as a means to make the game easier but he also clashes with the tone and themes of the story a little bit more than I'd like.