16.4 hours played
Written 5 days ago
A very charming adventure game which takes some of the best elements of stories like Podkin and Redwall, gameplay reminiscent of older adventure games, all set in a very well curated world.
Clearly an indie game, played on Steamdeck and while it went well the game was un-optimized and utterly drained my battery, and it has that kind of awkward pacing that open world games can have where the early game is a bit overwhelming & the endgame is suddenly fairly linear. But, that pacing is player-imposed as I was worried about points of no return and did everything I could at first.
The game takes place at a single location, a keep, that gets expanded as more parts open up. So a core part of the game is exploring eary and then using that info to route better paths & know where to look for things as it progresses. Day/Night is important for several quest and items, so planning your quests is a bit of a mini-game on it's own! Game is largely exploration, stealth, some minor puzzles & platforming, and a lot of dialog!
The game expects you to read most of the books, songs, lore notes, etc and for you to extrapolate from quest information, which was refreshing if a little confusing at times. E.g. Keys are important and physical objects in this game, so you're expected to keep an eye for keyhangers and look on top of desks. Easy once you know, but took a second to realize.
Doing just about everything put the game at ~14 hours, though a lot of that was pointless backtracking because I missunderstood a few quest, overall game is in the 7-10 hour range. Absolutely worth snagging regardless of any sale.