As soon as I first laid my eyes on this game, seeing what it was aiming for, what inspirations it wore on its sleeve, I knew that I’d love it.

One of my favourite TV shows as a child that I still adore today was “Knightmare”, for those not in the know it was High Fantasy style competition with child participants, a dungeon master like host and what I guess would be best described as crude “virtual reality”.

One child would adorn a helmet that meant they could only see the floor in front of them, a bag to hold items and shield bearing an eye which would be the (in universe) way that this adventurers three friends, “far away” could give out advice and command the dungeoneer on his journey.
The adventurer in real life was on a TV set, using green screen (probably blue actually) technology the child would venture through dungeons, avoiding traps, speaking to monsters and actors being NPCs.
The three back at base would not just be guiding the dungeoneer simply where to move but would huddle in and discuss what answers to give when something such as, a spooky golem, would ask them a riddle.
It was brilliant, at the time it felt like magic but also clearly felt like, because it was, a game.
Treguard, the gentleman who acted as the guide, was a real life equivalent to tooltips, one that, if memory serves me correctly, was a bit more obvious as the show moved on and the children continued to fail to see the finish.

Cryptmaster pulls a lot of its flavour from this show but specifically its main gimmick.
In Knightmare they would acquire magical spells to help solve puzzles and with the command “Spell casting” they would need to spell out the word letter by letter.
In Cryptmaster you can say anything and spelling out the correct things are not only your answers to puzzles but the way to fight combat, learn about the characters and even more.

From the start you learn the party’s names by typing them out, you soon come across a chest but your undead brain does not have all its memories intact and the same goes for our leader, guide and companion the titular Cryptmaster.
Rather than just pop open this chest and get an item, each thing you find is a guessing game.
Your only information is how many letters are in the name of the item and asking old Crypty to tell you what it is based on commands much like a retro text adventure “LOOK”, “SMELL”, “TASTE”, all these and more are commands you give and our undead guide gives us his opinion.
Some of these you will get straight away and some you’ll be drawing either literally or in your mind to figure out what he could mean. Afterwards you aren’t awarded with the item, most of them you would have no use for, but you are rewarded letters that fill in blank spaces near each of your party.
This ongoing game of “hangman” is where Cryptmaster’s version of levelling comes in.
Fill all the spaces or type out the word once you can see it and that will either teach you a new ability for a character or give you a little piece of their background.
You can’t skip ahead so simply just typing over and over is only going to give you confused and sometimes sarcastic replies from your guide.

Now you’ve started learning these abilities and attacks you are able to take on the many enemies that roam the dungeon. The game gives you a choice of real-time (sort of active time battle) or turn-based. Each word has a timer and costs souls (a currency I’ll get to later) and your and the enemies’ health bars are based on the amount of letters in their name.
As the game progresses some enemies hit harder, some have shields that block words containing the letters adorned and some may only be damaged by certain effects.
The combat due to its real-time nature feels like a more visceral version of the dice rolling mechanics many CYOA books had. It’s simple enough but there are tactics, and, in some parts, you may feel like avoiding combat is your best choice.

Unfortunately I can see the combat being something that may feel too simplistic for some. I believe there are so many distractions that it never needed to be too in-depth but did feel a little disappointed towards the end where it didn’t feel like there was enough variety and that things could have at least scaled faster.
A problem I had by the end as I went back in to find more secrets and collect some Steam Trophies (because I still wanted more) was discovering quite how many words each of the four main characters could unlock.
To put it simply, I finished the game on row two or three for each and it turned out there were seven rows of words I could have collected.
It was nice to know I didn’t have to grind out these actions to see the credits but it also made it feel to me that the amount there was, was not really necessary.
I also found that the few times I did feel the difficulty had spiked, that having to learn the lore based words before eventually seeing one that could affect combat did feel like a chore.
Discovering the memories of your party is definitely a cool and interesting way to serve the player lore but I felt throughout that maybe these should have been separated which would have made the combat scale faster and potentially be more engaging.

Before even seeing Cryptmaster being played, I was intrigued by its art direction.
To me, and then confirmed through tweets, AMA’s and the like, the art reflects older fantasy books and specifically another text-based non-video game format, that being choose your own adventure books and another British classic in Fighting Fantasy.
The environments may be 3D but they look as if they are drawn with ink, gloomy, scratchy and full detail.
If there were one small criticism to make about the game’s looks it’s that although there are multiple locations the black and white dungeons still look a little too similar, but it’s a direction with a purpose and one I feel that if they did push for more variety would maybe have lost the game’s specific feel and fashion.

The characters all look fantastic, rats, knights, blobs and more, all as you’d expect and all feeling like they were pulled straight from the page of an old Warhammer book.
The only thing that sometimes doesn’t look right is when bumping into an enemy at an odd angle. It was never game-breaking but did sometimes look awkward when they’d shuffle into the camera and have to turn around - the sort of “glitch” that I wouldn’t actually want removed but a very minor argument for a teeny bit more polish.
One of the top points in why this game is worth anyone’s time is that the voice acting is top tier and is genuinely funny throughout and as an extra bonus, Treguard from Knightmare, the same actor is in it as a narrator.
There are many games that attempt comedy and for me, the majority fail, but between the silliness of the riddles, finding items and the great characters I was doing small chuckles from beginning right up to the end.

Finally I want to just speak on the “souls” currency I mentioned earlier.
As I said each word you say in combat costs souls, one per letter, and these are acquired not just from winning fights but from collecting bugs (typing their names when you see them on walls), fishing and the in universe card game WHATEVER.
WHATEVER isn’t particularly my favourite in universe card-game but much like Triple Triad, Gwent and the like it is an enjoyable distraction that runs parallel to the main quest without hindering your progress.
I wanted to give some focus to the souls because I found it a clever combination of currency and MP, action points or whatever you prefer. Too many games want you to juggle and remember so many different types and Cryptmaster keeps it all about letters.
Grab letters, use letters, spend them as money. It’s a small innovation that doesn’t change the world but one I’ve not seen enough people speak about.

In the end, Cryptmaster was love at first sight and a game that I felt like only I’d want, something that combines Knightmare, Atmosfear (coincidentally also known as Nightmare) and Fighting Fantasy, not only exists but completely delivers.
It looks good, sounds good, is funny and plays well. Sure there are a couple of minor balance things I would like to be different but nothing that ever had me close down steam.
It never outstayed its welcome, so much so I went straight back in to delve deeper into some of the games more cryptic puzzles, and by the end it had cemented itself not only as a confirmed good time but one I would happily recommend even to those who aren’t quite a nerdy child of the 80’s like me - although if you are, Hoo boy, get this!

As soon as I first laid my eyes on this game, seeing what it was aiming for, what inspirations it wore on its sleeve, I knew that I’d love it.

One of my favourite TV shows as a child that I still adore today was “Knightmare”, for those not in the know it was High Fantasy style competition with child participants, a dungeon master like host and what I guess would be best described as crude “virtual reality”.

One child would adorn a helmet that meant they could only see the floor in front of them, a bag to hold items and shield bearing an eye which would be the (in universe) way that this adventurers three friends, “far away” could give out advice and command the dungeoneer on his journey.
The adventurer in real life was on a TV set, using green screen (probably blue actually) technology the child would venture through dungeons, avoiding traps, speaking to monsters and actors being NPCs.
The three back at base would not just be guiding the dungeoneer simply where to move but would huddle in and discuss what answers to give when something such as, a spooky golem, would ask them a riddle.
It was brilliant, at the time it felt like magic but also clearly felt like, because it was, a game.
Treguard, the gentleman who acted as the guide, was a real life equivalent to tooltips, one that, if memory serves me correctly, was a bit more obvious as the show moved on and the children continued to fail to see the finish.

Cryptmaster pulls a lot of its flavour from this show but specifically its main gimmick.
In Knightmare they would acquire magical spells to help solve puzzles and with the command “Spell casting” they would need to spell out the word letter by letter.
In Cryptmaster you can say anything and spelling out the correct things are not only your answers to puzzles but the way to fight combat, learn about the characters and even more.

From the start you learn the party’s names by typing them out, you soon come across a chest but your undead brain does not have all its memories intact and the same goes for our leader, guide and companion the titular Cryptmaster.
Rather than just pop open this chest and get an item, each thing you find is a guessing game.
Your only information is how many letters are in the name of the item and asking old Crypty to tell you what it is based on commands much like a retro text adventure “LOOK”, “SMELL”, “TASTE”, all these and more are commands you give and our undead guide gives us his opinion.
Some of these you will get straight away and some you’ll be drawing either literally or in your mind to figure out what he could mean. Afterwards you aren’t awarded with the item, most of them you would have no use for, but you are rewarded letters that fill in blank spaces near each of your party.
This ongoing game of “hangman” is where Cryptmaster’s version of levelling comes in.
Fill all the spaces or type out the word once you can see it and that will either teach you a new ability for a character or give you a little piece of their background.
You can’t skip ahead so simply just typing over and over is only going to give you confused and sometimes sarcastic replies from your guide.

Now you’ve started learning these abilities and attacks you are able to take on the many enemies that roam the dungeon. The game gives you a choice of real-time (sort of active time battle) or turn-based. Each word has a timer and costs souls (a currency I’ll get to later) and your and the enemies’ health bars are based on the amount of letters in their name.
As the game progresses some enemies hit harder, some have shields that block words containing the letters adorned and some may only be damaged by certain effects.
The combat due to its real-time nature feels like a more visceral version of the dice rolling mechanics many CYOA books had. It’s simple enough but there are tactics, and, in some parts, you may feel like avoiding combat is your best choice.

Unfortunately I can see the combat being something that may feel too simplistic for some. I believe there are so many distractions that it never needed to be too in-depth but did feel a little disappointed towards the end where it didn’t feel like there was enough variety and that things could have at least scaled faster.
A problem I had by the end as I went back in to find more secrets and collect some Steam Trophies (because I still wanted more) was discovering quite how many words each of the four main characters could unlock.
To put it simply, I finished the game on row two or three for each and it turned out there were seven rows of words I could have collected.
It was nice to know I didn’t have to grind out these actions to see the credits but it also made it feel to me that the amount there was, was not really necessary.
I also found that the few times I did feel the difficulty had spiked, that having to learn the lore based words before eventually seeing one that could affect combat did feel like a chore.
Discovering the memories of your party is definitely a cool and interesting way to serve the player lore but I felt throughout that maybe these should have been separated which would have made the combat scale faster and potentially be more engaging.

Before even seeing Cryptmaster being played, I was intrigued by its art direction.
To me, and then confirmed through tweets, AMA’s and the like, the art reflects older fantasy books and specifically another text-based non-video game format, that being choose your own adventure books and another British classic in Fighting Fantasy.
The environments may be 3D but they look as if they are drawn with ink, gloomy, scratchy and full detail.
If there were one small criticism to make about the game’s looks it’s that although there are multiple locations the black and white dungeons still look a little too similar, but it’s a direction with a purpose and one I feel that if they did push for more variety would maybe have lost the game’s specific feel and fashion.

The characters all look fantastic, rats, knights, blobs and more, all as you’d expect and all feeling like they were pulled straight from the page of an old Warhammer book.
The only thing that sometimes doesn’t look right is when bumping into an enemy at an odd angle. It was never game-breaking but did sometimes look awkward when they’d shuffle into the camera and have to turn around - the sort of “glitch” that I wouldn’t actually want removed but a very minor argument for a teeny bit more polish.
One of the top points in why this game is worth anyone’s time is that the voice acting is top tier and is genuinely funny throughout and as an extra bonus, Treguard from Knightmare, the same actor is in it as a narrator.
There are many games that attempt comedy and for me, the majority fail, but between the silliness of the riddles, finding items and the great characters I was doing small chuckles from beginning right up to the end.

Finally I want to just speak on the “souls” currency I mentioned earlier.
As I said each word you say in combat costs souls, one per letter, and these are acquired not just from winning fights but from collecting bugs (typing their names when you see them on walls), fishing and the in universe card game WHATEVER.
WHATEVER isn’t particularly my favourite in universe card-game but much like Triple Triad, Gwent and the like it is an enjoyable distraction that runs parallel to the main quest without hindering your progress.
I wanted to give some focus to the souls because I found it a clever combination of currency and MP, action points or whatever you prefer. Too many games want you to juggle and remember so many different types and Cryptmaster keeps it all about letters.
Grab letters, use letters, spend them as money. It’s a small innovation that doesn’t change the world but one I’ve not seen enough people speak about.

In the end, Cryptmaster was love at first sight and a game that I felt like only I’d want, something that combines Knightmare, Atmosfear (coincidentally also known as Nightmare) and Fighting Fantasy, not only exists but completely delivers.
It looks good, sounds good, is funny and plays well. Sure there are a couple of minor balance things I would like to be different but nothing that ever had me close down steam.
It never outstayed its welcome, so much so I went straight back in to delve deeper into some of the games more cryptic puzzles, and by the end it had cemented itself not only as a confirmed good time but one I would happily recommend even to those who aren’t quite a nerdy child of the 80’s like me - although if you are, Hoo boy, get this!