Fight with light against the dark in this “roguelight” platformer starring Victoria Bloom! Drive back the darkness that's overrun Bloom Manor and conquer swarms of creatures as you discover powerful new items to upgrade your arsenal. Are you ready to enter the ever-changing manor?
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This game was probably worth being made for the "roguelight" pun alone. That aside, it's a pretty cool roguelite which is suprisingly short. Does a game have to be long to be good? I personally like short games like this that don't overstay their welcome and which I can finish and move on to something else.
The game has a really nice art direction with some gothic artstyle and a very simple pallet of "colours". There are a lot of cute little details in the animations, especially when it comes to the protagonists such as her victory poses, the main menu... Really cool. I really really like the artstyle and the character design is neat too, the heroine really stands out in my opinion.
For a roguelite, the replayability is more limited than usual but as I said, I didn't mind that and on another hand, the game manages to bring something new regularly. The runs are divided into story progression chapters and will unlock the full dungeon after three runs, then customised runs with gimmicks which bring some welcome changes. It's still fairly limited though, why not change the spawn point for example instead of always starting in the same area or have a boss rush, or runs that don't require completing every area for the umpteenth time?
There are also quite a few balancing issues. A lot of the weapons feel underpowered and some of them are way too good compared to the rest. For example, there's a weapon that scatters light directly in front of you on the ground, the range is extremely limiteed, the damage is the same as any weapon and it doesn't have any special effect. Another one just slows down projectiles, which is pretty much useless considering the small range of the weapon. A lot of them just don't stand out and there's seemingly no reason to pick them, hell they can be worse than the default weapon. It's the same for the weapon perks: why pick something that increases my damage after killing an enemy when I can find the same passive but it works at all times? There's seemingly no advantage to the killing version and the game doesn't make a good job at explaining how long it lasts, how much of a bonus it is... What is flash damage? I never understood throughout the entire game.
Another issue I find with balancing is that the game gives you too many upgrade slots. This ultimately means that you can combine all the useful buffs the game provides you and you have to worry very little about making choices, which is a big flaw in a roguelite. I can combine electricity, healing, daze and burning all at once and the buffs such as damage seem pretty limited, so there's hardly any moment in the game where you're stuck in a dilemma. Since the drops get better with the run progression, it's also pretty rare to find multiple equivalent drops and instead you just get better gear, so the game really doesn't raise the question of how to build your character.
Still, I really enjoy the game despite its flaws and I think it's worth playing.
The game has a really nice art direction with some gothic artstyle and a very simple pallet of "colours". There are a lot of cute little details in the animations, especially when it comes to the protagonists such as her victory poses, the main menu... Really cool. I really really like the artstyle and the character design is neat too, the heroine really stands out in my opinion.
For a roguelite, the replayability is more limited than usual but as I said, I didn't mind that and on another hand, the game manages to bring something new regularly. The runs are divided into story progression chapters and will unlock the full dungeon after three runs, then customised runs with gimmicks which bring some welcome changes. It's still fairly limited though, why not change the spawn point for example instead of always starting in the same area or have a boss rush, or runs that don't require completing every area for the umpteenth time?
There are also quite a few balancing issues. A lot of the weapons feel underpowered and some of them are way too good compared to the rest. For example, there's a weapon that scatters light directly in front of you on the ground, the range is extremely limiteed, the damage is the same as any weapon and it doesn't have any special effect. Another one just slows down projectiles, which is pretty much useless considering the small range of the weapon. A lot of them just don't stand out and there's seemingly no reason to pick them, hell they can be worse than the default weapon. It's the same for the weapon perks: why pick something that increases my damage after killing an enemy when I can find the same passive but it works at all times? There's seemingly no advantage to the killing version and the game doesn't make a good job at explaining how long it lasts, how much of a bonus it is... What is flash damage? I never understood throughout the entire game.
Another issue I find with balancing is that the game gives you too many upgrade slots. This ultimately means that you can combine all the useful buffs the game provides you and you have to worry very little about making choices, which is a big flaw in a roguelite. I can combine electricity, healing, daze and burning all at once and the buffs such as damage seem pretty limited, so there's hardly any moment in the game where you're stuck in a dilemma. Since the drops get better with the run progression, it's also pretty rare to find multiple equivalent drops and instead you just get better gear, so the game really doesn't raise the question of how to build your character.
Still, I really enjoy the game despite its flaws and I think it's worth playing.