Qasir al-Wasat: International Edition

This Game is excellent. The stealth and puzzle game play is solid, but that's not the sell here. It is the rest of it. Set in 12th century Syria, utilizing Islamic mythology and synthesizing it with Crowleyesque fantasy, and looking like a cross between Persian/Mughal miniature art and The Legend of Zelda, this game is a unique aesthetique experience.

This game looks pretty but beneath the look lies some serious issues. The Good The art style and story are very interesting. I didn't get far but I really wanted to see more. The Neutral The music works but doesn't have any tracks that stand out in my mind. It did it's job but not something I go out and buy independantly The Bad My first complaint is the lack of a decent tutorial or even a very visible prompt that pressing s is required to move in stealth. The game gives you an easy to see prompt for movement by popping up the movement keys, and pops A over a door which you see your character swipe at and open, indicating it's probably an attack as well (It is). However the game never tells you that you need to press and hold s in order to move stealthily, otherwise your character can move one step and then be attacked because for a stealth game where you will most of the time be moving at a stealth speed, stealth is NOT the default. This is a bad decision which leads to numerous problems. Further the actual stealth gameplay does not seem deep with some of the areas being too tiny to actually do anything. Throw in an autosave feature vs. a manual save combined with autosave and you will be redoing sections if you mess something up in another section and get to sit through the dialogue...again. The unskippable dialogue of people talking that occurs outside of cutscenes, in which the dialogue is skippable. On top of this, I had the frustration of wanting to quit the game and hitting escape and realizing this did nothing. It wasn't until a frustrated 30 seconds later that I finally realized to open the menu, you need to hit return. ESC does nothing except skip cutscenes, I believe. This goes against gaming conventions and led to another annoyance added on top of the prior ones. It is within this menu that I finally discovered the section that tells you how to play. Also, I'm not sure if it actually tells you but I don't remember it telling me the difference but it does say you can poison people. What's the difference between poisoning them and a regular attack against them? I have no idea as I don't remember it saying. As for the stelath mechanics themselves. It's essentially a move silently and don't get in their physical way and you'll be fine. There are no ways to really move guards from their positions other than your ridiculously loud default movement. It doesn't matter what surface you're walking on. If it's carpet or stone, stealth movement is silent, default is loud. There are no pots or other objects that you can hit or use to distract the guards. This game lacks depth, nuance, and good feel for the gameplay.

Solid, enjoyable puzzles. Simple stealth mechanics. Beautiful aesthetic. If you like demonology, djinn, and alchemy type stuff, and the style in the screenshots appeals to you (and if you, unlike some of the people leaving reviews, have the foresight required to look at the "How to Play" screen in the menu before playing), then it's a solid use of 5 dollars and 6-7 hours.

This is a remarkable game, mainly because of its lore and ambiance. The mechanics, which some reviewers harshly criticize, are not that bad at all. They just require the player to take things slowly. Achievements are fun to get and truly improve replayability. All in all a game I would like to see a sequel to.

I was fortunate to stumble across this game a couple of days ago and immediately bought it after having overcome a brief initial astonishment (medieval Arabian myths, demonology, enchanted palace, playing as an otherworldly creature longing for knowledge? – too good to be true). Now that I’ve completed it (having unlocked the true ending, but still not solved all of the palace’s abundant mysteries), I don’t regret a single moment spent in “Qasir al-Wasat”. It’s shamefully unfair that the game is so little known (maybe except for Brazil); I would have purchased such a game upon release, had I only been aware of its existence in the first place. The unique setting, the storytelling, the excellent writing, the stylish visuals, the rich lore drawing from demonology and Arabian tales, the exciting exploration – every key point about this game is remarkable. As for the gameplay, perhaps I can’t judge properly as I’m definitely not into stealth and don’t enjoy avoiding traps and this kind of mechanics, but I must admit they all were well implemented and rooted in the story, which was just too interesting to abandon the game only because of some (for me) boring get-past-the-spikes parts. Besides, I can’t really call a drawback what is simply characteristic of the genre. For adventure game players though, I can say there are also some decent puzzles dealing with removing magical seals and creating alchemical solutions. All in all, it’s an intelligent and elegant game which I would willingly recommend, especially if you enjoy (historical) settings that go off the beaten track, Arabian tales and/or aesthetics, or are a fan of "Goetia", another indie game with different gameplay but, as the name suggests, a quite similar theme.

This game took about 10 hours to complete, so for the current steam sale is completely worth it. The puzzles in it were enjoyable and a bit difficult but that only made it better. I didn't have to look up a guide to figure any out, so that was nice. What I did have to look up a guide for was what I had to do next towards the end. Usually that's a deal breaker for me, but it was fine with this game since most of it was actually really well designed. As far as the gameplay, I generally hate games like this. I don't like walking around, running between rooms and overcoming traps and guards. However, the story was good and it drove me to continue and the mechanic of sneaking had a sense of fantasy realism. Basically no one is invisible (duh) but if they were the game portrayed how it would play out well enough. The graphics were fitting. I don't like 2D anything unless it's one of my old favorites, but actually the art was a really good. The sounds were good and musical. I wish there was voice acting, but instead it's something like Don't Starve when conversation happens. The voice acting could have really upped the game's value. Nonetheless, it was well done the way it was done. So I definitely recommend you purchase it even if it isn't up your alley (but at the $10 sale.) If it is up your alley, 15 dollars is better than acceptable. If you speak Arabic, I'd recommend it at $15 simply because it was so fun to read the names and know that you know the translations. It's set in a Muslim setting, so if you are Muslim, I guess that's nice too, but I'm not, so I have no idea.

This game has unique, beautiful and polished art style, interesting lore and engaging plot. I loved every minute of exploring the enigmatic palace. Puzzles were the right amount of complexity for me too. Sound design is minimalistic, but quite clever. My only complaint about the game would probably be the music, or the lack of it really. As a musician, i cannot but think how this game would benefit from simple but authentic music, like oud or ney taksims, or mid eastern percussion layers, maybe something of this kind: [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wYQ_ol3L9Ag] Ney flute music [/url] I'd recommend this game for you if you enjoy artwork, atmosphere and exploring in games. This is probably not the game for you if you expect fast paced action. My thanks to developers for the great experience!

More fun than I was expecting. Like Legend of Zelda with mostly puzzles. It was easy, but tough to know everything to do. It was to play as far as I could, then still fun to follow along with a guide from the web to learn what I was missing to do next. It was easy to keep playing each day in a row until I solved as much as I could do before stumped. But after setting it down for a week, I never felt interest to pick it up again. I'm glad I played it through. I didn't really care enough to open it back up to "finish" it after I did what I could. But I'm still glad I played it for bit. [3/5 stars]

Just brillant! I'm not a fan of stealth games at all, never have been. And this game has lots of stealth elements. But in a very unique way. First of all, you play one of the most interesting characters imaginable. Then the story is dark, nothing is like it seems at first. The setting is fantastic. I don't want to spoiler so that's about it. I just want to say, I've bought several games in the last time that I found more than disappointing. This little gem here is different. I've only just played somewhat over one hour, but already I have the feeling that I've become addicted in a certain way. I want to know where this game is going; I want so see if my decisions affect the outcome, if I gather enough informations etc. Just buy it, if the trailer seems like it could give you something. I wrote the comment above quite some time ago; sadly, what killed the game for me, was a bug that prevented me from progressing. Or I did something in an order that prevented me from progressing. As I know what to do, that this don't happen anymore, I started again, because I really loved the game, but stopped playing after half an hour, because now it feels just lame, repeating everything again, just because the game hasn't thought of the possibilities the players choose. This is sad!

The stealth mechanics are simple, but that's not a bad thing at all. Learning how to navigate the palace, evade traps and guards, and get to the "golden" ending provide a satisfying challenge.

Fun stealth based game. Nice artwork. Atmospheric audio. The only negative, if it can be called that is the absolute need for a controller.

Sorry I am changing my opinion about this game. What appears to be an arab-themed sneaker game requires hotline-miami type combat skills with puzzle elements. The scare arab cultural references do not make up for the lackluster gameplay. Totally frustrating after the few minute introduction. No Arabic language support. The controller interface is a mess, and I did not like the sound effects. Sounds like wooden shoes when walking, when the character is a wolf. Sorry, I liked what they tried to do here, but it just was not executed very well. Fifteen dollars, really? Uses the Unity Game Engine and takes up 1,500 MBs of diskspace.

Qasir al-Wasat is interesting but sometimes frustrating. Sometimes (possibly just my computer) the game sort of stops responding so you are sneaking around and then then you let go of the button but the character just keeps going. It took me a while to get use to the keys used in the game and at first glance I didn't realize I could change the key bindings till after I'd already gotten used to them. You don't have to kill anyone except the 3 targets (if you can be careful enough) or you can kill everyone in sight. Many of this games achievements revolve around trying those in varying degrees (killing everyone, killing none, killing only men, only women, only soldiers, only civilians). I can't say I really want to try playing it through more than once but during the initial play through, it can be both addicting and frustrating but mostly enjoyable. I do like collecting achievements though so maybe if I give it a bit of a break between playthroughs I would be willing to give it another go trying for missed achievements. If it weren't for a desire to complete achievements though this would be in my opinion a single playthrough game. The developers set the story in Syria but decided to use Persian miniatures for their stylized characters and settings. Though I like the style I don't see why they couldn't just set the story in Persia. They seem to try to reconcile it as a mish-mash of cultures and peoples who end up trapped in the castle but still it's sort of like soft Orientalism that they try to validate. The music is sort of occasionally pseudo-Middle Eastern-ish but in the most base and generic way. I do like some of the small touches they put into it that are fairly true to an accurate portrayal of the Middle East. The characters do mention Allah, there are many items which were modeled after actual items in museums, the castle is modeled after real life Syrian castles, and they even have a sort of pseudo-Arabic calligraphy in the game that's actually a fairly good representation of Arabic Calligraphic Art but without actually being Arabic (or Turkish, or Persian/Farsi).

Timers. For 3 hours, and because the mystery is engaging, I endured the terrible controls that are unfit for stealth, the gormless corporate checkpoints that are unfit for a PC save system, the italicised semi-cursive typeface that is unfit for comfortable reading... I won't be enduring timed races with these same lousy controls. Especially not when death (by traps) closes gates that were opened earlier and that are not timer-dependent. Seriously, not only do the controls ignore traditional schemes, for example with Sneak mapped to a trigger, the latter requires a permanent trigger press (no toggle; way to kill a gamepad,) it confusingly acts like a zoom out when figuring out empirically what buttons do (the 'help' is incorrect,) you lacerate air like a buffoon when you want to open a door (because both actions use the same key; meanwhile most keys remain unused,) you get stuck when walking along walls, and a basic doorstep crossing is tedious more often than not. Then you must distract/attract guards. Without tools. Not breaking anything. Only by walking overtly for a fraction of a second at the right distance. Have fun with that. If detected, you die, redo everything between here and the checkpoint, and even worse, wait once again for the entire NPC conversation to play out before you can retry your luck. All these annoyances are nothing compared to having to run on the clock. Unforgivable heresy. Immediate uninstall. Guaranteed thumb down. Before that, it was crappy, but still playable.

Great ambiance and story but poor gameplay.

A terrible, long-winded introduction that is approximately five solid minutes of reading and then you're thrown into the game with no tutorial whatsoever. You'll almost certainly get killed in the first room 2 seconds after the mission starts. Eventually you'll probably figure out that there's a "walk silently" button and a "kill people" button. All around, a bad introduction to the game. Nothing in the game is bad -- it is just pretty basic. There's not a lot you can do other than "walk quietly" and "stab people", so your tactical options are limited. No dousing torches to make the room dark or causing a disturbance to pull guards away or....all the other things that many other better stealth games do. If you're really wanting to play a stealth game and have already finished ALL the other better ones...maybe give this a try? But most likely, there are a lot of other better games out there you haven't got around to yet.

Liked - story was intriguing. The characters are well-written, even down to the civilians. Dialogue is minimal, but showed the characters' thoughts. Like the insight into Markor's mind. - puzzles are great!! Although I struggled with some of the later puzzles, they were not frustrating to the point where I'd stop playing. - the art is sumptuous. love the designs Things that can be improved: - The sound design. The loud footsteps of the protagonist can be jarring at times, especially since it is a stealth game. Other than that I found the minimal music and the use of music cues to heighten the tension effective. - All the puzzles were good and had room for failure, but there was one [spoiler](the rooms where I had to shed the blood of 3)[/spoiler] where I got stuck and there was no way to "reset" without quitting the game and returning to the previous save point. - the controls for the alchemy puzzles were clunky. They felt counter-intuitive to me, so I kept removing things I didn't want removed, and picking/selecting things that I didn't want to select. Maybe one key to select and drop would be a better option. Overall, I really enjoyed this game. It was intriguing enough for me to spend some of my non-game time thinking about the story, or a puzzle I was stuck with. The world that is created is one that is rich, and makes me want to learn more about the mythology behind this game. Worth the time and the money.

Clever but in the end, boring.

The story was intreging and fasinating

Utter waste of time.

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