Blasphemous has a fundamental contradiction at its heart, being half a metroidvania, and half a 2d soulslike.
A good metroidvania has a progression curve that greatly empowers the player by the end, with the character dominating the world and zolting from one side to the other of the map with little effort.
This game, being a soulslike, does not have this progression and keeps the hit/dodge/parry challenge focused thoughout its whole playtime. Also, the soulslikeness, in this case, brings the first Dark Souls as influence, being a more slow-paced game, wich reinforces that fundamental contradiction. There are some frustating waiting games on this one - even in the optional tie-in challenge plataforming dungeons.
Folks at the kitchen addressed this problem on the sequel, making a more satisfying game by introducing several metroidvania tools to diversify the players' options of combat and traversal.
Nevertless, Blasphemous is a fantastic game, with an engrossing and unique vision, that kept me hooked to its immaculate pixel art and animation. When playing it, you just keep wanting to see what will come next.
The sequel is a better game, but this one has more elegance in its setting, themes and narrative, constructing a world of martyrdom, contrition and propitiation, where the suffering that marked the christian ideology gets removed from its historical context, and presented at face value, as an all-encompassing dogma, thus reflecting back to the mythos all the cruelty that marked the reality of its religion's trajectory.
Oh, and do yourself a favour and 𝐩𝐥𝐚𝐲 𝐢𝐭 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐒𝐩𝐚𝐧𝐢𝐬𝐡 𝐝𝐮𝐛.
A good metroidvania has a progression curve that greatly empowers the player by the end, with the character dominating the world and zolting from one side to the other of the map with little effort.
This game, being a soulslike, does not have this progression and keeps the hit/dodge/parry challenge focused thoughout its whole playtime. Also, the soulslikeness, in this case, brings the first Dark Souls as influence, being a more slow-paced game, wich reinforces that fundamental contradiction. There are some frustating waiting games on this one - even in the optional tie-in challenge plataforming dungeons.
Folks at the kitchen addressed this problem on the sequel, making a more satisfying game by introducing several metroidvania tools to diversify the players' options of combat and traversal.
Nevertless, Blasphemous is a fantastic game, with an engrossing and unique vision, that kept me hooked to its immaculate pixel art and animation. When playing it, you just keep wanting to see what will come next.
The sequel is a better game, but this one has more elegance in its setting, themes and narrative, constructing a world of martyrdom, contrition and propitiation, where the suffering that marked the christian ideology gets removed from its historical context, and presented at face value, as an all-encompassing dogma, thus reflecting back to the mythos all the cruelty that marked the reality of its religion's trajectory.
Oh, and do yourself a favour and 𝐩𝐥𝐚𝐲 𝐢𝐭 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐒𝐩𝐚𝐧𝐢𝐬𝐡 𝐝𝐮𝐛.