Rarely do I change a GOTY pick years later, mostly cause I try to play everything I know would greatly interest me but once in a while something gets by. Especially something like this, a unique indie game that is unlike anything really. I enjoyed Pony Island, the previous game by Daniel Mullins, this is a massive step in quality. Inscryption is such a wild ride that it has become my GOTY of 2021.

It’s best not to spoil much of Inscryption so I’ll keep things vague. At its heart it’s a rogue like card game with adventure elements. The story is you are playing a long lost disc housing this mysterious old game no one knows about, so you are a person playing a game and wild things go from there. This ain’t the deepest card game, it’s no hearthstone, you aren’t building your own deck to battle other players or anything, it’s a story driven card game, it’s has the rogue like elements but the secret sauce is that’s it’s really a linear story. You will get help and items to push you along just when you were struggling, cause it’s not really a randomized game, it’s pretending to be. That’s part of the beauty, the difficulty is tuned perfectly, it has just enough depth to keep you hooked on this card game while not overwhelming you with options or endless repetition because it wants you to go to the next story beat. It’s amazingly paced, for all its crazy twists and turns, not one segment over stays its welcome, it’s brilliant design.

I have to hand it to Mullins, this card game, that is clearly not a full on deck builder but pretending to be one, is really deep and unique and could totally be a stand alone customizable card game. The main game involves sacrificing cards to gain blood points which lets you use better cards all with their own abilities. Card battles take place on a 4 vs 4 row battle field, the ever changing opponents make every battle very engaging. Even though there is random elements to your run as you get to choose your power ups, your extra help items and boosts; some how the fights manage to come down to the final turn, the last attack. Yes you can also break a run with very overpowered cards (again this game isn’t concerned with a card game meta, it’s a story game) which makes you feel like a genius for creating such a powerhouse. There are boss fights with totally unique mechanics at the end of each section, yeah you have to repeat them quite a few times but I still found it fun to fight them.

In between card matches is an adventure game style almost escape room. You search around this cabin for clues, cards speak to you can give you hints on how to proceed. Solving puzzles gives you the special items needed to advance further and further in the card game and start to unravel the greater mystery of the game. The adventure parts were a blast and scratched that exploration itch as well as some really good puzzles. And again I dont want to spoil most of the game but where it goes is so cool and well implemented. I can’t think of many games that do two contrasting gameplay styles so well.

What takes Inscryption over the top is where it goes from its initial presentation. I won’t spoil it but it’s like an ever blooming flower that keeps opening and opening, more amazing layers than the last. My mind was blown so many times, just when I thought they can’t go further it does. It’s also a surprisingly emotional journey as well with such captivating characters.

It’s hard to find any faults with this game. I guess I could say some of the sections are repetitive, you have to repeat runs… ok yeah but it’s part of the game simulation. I think the overall real world part of the mystery left a lot to be desired. I can always say the puzzles can be better, more bosses, more content but really what’s here is really great and special.

Inscryption is a must play game, don’t read much about it just play it. If you ever liked card games you will like it. Hell even if you don’t other elements might grip you. If you find yourself thinking that games don’t surprise me anymore do yourself a favor and play this new classic. It’s one of the best indie games I ever played.

Overall Score 9.4

Increíble
De las mejores experiencias que tuve jugando un jueguito
Gameplay divertidísimo, lore interesantísimo, ambiente zarpadísimo y personajes piolísimas
Este juego lo tiene todo OBRA MAESTRA 10/10

Desde It Takes Two que no me siento TAN satisfecho con un juego que no sea un Resident Evil

What begins as an addictive deckbuilder with roguelike elements and mysterious puzzles around the margins slowly becomes a transformative postmodern commentary on gaming media, the search for meaning in art, and the relationship between players and the ruthless economy of video game conglomerates - all of this while never losing that satisfying gameplay loop and finding ways to iterate on it and keep things fresh. The enrapturing atmosphere of the game's first act is admittedly missed once its first big twist is revealed, but the way the narrative evolves around the gameplay as the player progresses does a good job of keeping things balanced and intriguing.

game is normal; plot jumps through a million hoops to go nowhere and do nothing. we need to get past this video game 4th wall arg shit man its the same as those films of trains going towards the camera (c.f. ddlc, undertale). plus im an insane rabid hater of the concept of folk horror. if i were awake i would have the brain space to actually write some shit about how both these latter two problems r related to alienation from orality and community life like i do with everything ever but im literaly sleepig rn

im here again and its like this: when a game like inscryption keeps telling you over and over "guys heres the line and uh ohh im going past it" like a precocious 11yearold playing capture the flag in the school gymnasium, all it does is provide the feeling of revolution while firmly adhering to some artificial distinction between performer and audience. the immediacy that allows for a potential participatory element is reinstated so that it can be subjugated AGAIN to the creation of an authoritarian mystical relationship btwn artist and audience that manifests itself in the audience's exclamation of an artist's "GENIUS!". it is only possible for a "fourth wall" to be "broken" if we begin with the premise of alienation from the creative process. this is why when people online solved the arg, mullins was like "actually no you didnt because thats not how i meant for you to figure it out". it is just romanticism again, in perhaps its most assertive form; typical romanticism asks politely that you suspend disbelief instead of simply trying to do it for you

this ask for the suspension of disbelief is nowhere near universal; the greeks were all about honest audience acknowledgement. in their tragedies, for example, soliloquys would unabashedly direct themselves to the audience. here is not an exchange of one reality for another, but the mere affirmation of the reality of the play in the context of a greater reality. the audience is expected to have in perspective both the representation, and the fact that it is a representation and exists in this particular immediate context and broader culture. when we forget the commensurability of art with the rest of the world, we inherit the mistake of the romans, who, not knowing what the pottery they plundered was for, could only gawk at them; they became symbols of status

athens existed at a point in time where they had to reckon with BOTH orality and literacy. nowadays writing entirely predominates our aesthetic thought. even the intimation of orality ie the thought that we can participate in a work of art just as much as its author feels totally new, even when such an intimation is limp and underneath it is just writing again. like so much other arg slop, inscryption relies on this alienation from orality to create fear. i'm not going to spoil the game by giving you specific examples, because i don't think the plot is even interesting enough to talk about at length. i will say that inscryption understands that it is doing this, and that's why it uses imagery with explicit connections to oral culture To do this -- this is called "folk horror". this sort of thing runs on depicting pre-literate cultural forms as SAVAGE. at its most elaborate, the game says: literate culture is more sophisticated than and inevitably conquers oral culture one million times out of one million. FUCK THAT !!!!!!!!

I haven't finished Inscryption. Perhaps that's why reviewing it seems a bit redundant or unfair - but I think with Inscryption this can be excused.

It is what it is on the tin - a roguelike card game that doesn't pull any punches. It tells you right from the start it's going to be hard on you and it is. But it's not frustratingly hard. Dying provides you with the ability to make some of the most f*cked card combinations possible. It got to the point that most of my late-game act 1 runs were focused entirely around obtaining a death card and buffing it to hell and back so it would oneshot the boss. Or making the final boss die from 1 bit of death by touch damage.

Inscryption is fantastic game. Truly.

'Why didn't you finish it?' Because I also think it's extremely pretentious. After Act 1 the game becomes much more streamlined and though it doesn't really change genres - it certainly feels like it does. It also has a difficulty spike near the end of it that forces you into specific builds, where as Act 1 incentivised you trying to make something that would break the game. That's not possible in Act 2. Act 2 pretends to hold your hand but never truly teaches you how to fight the truly hard fights. Most of the bosses are a breeze if you can simply read. So when you finally find a hard boss, it is frustrantingly difficult. To the point I had no clue how I was ever going to be able to finish it.

I never got to act 3, and I don't intend to. I think Inscryption is still a game everyone should experience at least once - as the opening act is literally one of the best experiences I've had in gaming and I don't even really like card games.

So at 14hours in, I shelf this game. Maybe some day I will return to it, till then I'll sit here with a good experience that I don't want to ruin for myself.