Original Steam Review Text
Given the experience with this whole franchise, it appears this dev has bought a game engine when it dropped down to the $12-$20 mark, and just rolled with it.
Like Usurper, this game features:
- Poor control layout
- Sluggish game-loop
In addition, you get the following bonus content:
- No fun-factor in killing enemies
In short, this is a game that is tedious and just not a fun thing to play.
Summary
Writeup
This is a top-down 2d game that is just bad.
Following in the grand Skautfold: Usurper format, this game carries over the tradition of sluggish movement and poor control layout.
Cost
At the time of review, this game is $7.99 on Steam in the USA.
Rating - 🐈
🐈 ❌ ❌ ❌ ❌
Recommendation
Do not buy this game.
It is sluggish. It is confused. It isn’t an interesting artifact to consider.
Hours played at review-time: 0.2
Detailed Review and Information
Game
Type
2D Top-Down
Music
It’s music; it’s there.
Graphics
When static, the pixel-art is decent enough. Next to the rest of the game, it’s excellent.
However, when these pixels are animated, all does not go well for this game. The animation loop is a sloppy, sluggish mess–the game itself plays at 44-45 FPS, but the animations and sloppiness of animating make the game feel far, far slower.
It is a painful slog to even walk about the map, as the animations give the character a delayed feeling. When coupled with input lag, the whole experience is rather poor.
Controls
Layout
The initial control layout, on the Xbox 360 controller, is wrong and fails to learn from 35+ years of game development insights and conventions.
Correctness of Controls
Just no. They’re sluggish to respond, aren’t properly-mapped, and it really doesn’t matter because the game isn’t worth playing for longer than about ten minutes.
Controller detection and/or hot-switch/hot-swap
I saw no evidence of being able to swap between a keyboard, controller, or a controller type in-game.
Game-Loop
It’s slow. I’m not going to waste any digital ink on this.
Engine
Game Maker Studio 2 is employed.
Level design / layout / maps
The ever-present dungeon level overlay gives a charming insight into just how poorly-designed and -laid-out this game is.
UI/UX/CX
Miserable.
Developer
The developer can be summed up, for now, in my initial review of Skautfold: Usurper.
He runs Pugware.
Confidence-vote
Zero.
History
| Game | Release Date |
|---|---|
| Skautfold: Shrouded in Sanity | May 2016 |
| Skautfold: Usurper | February 2018 |
| Skautfold: Into the Fray | March 2019 |
| Skautfold: Moonless Knight | March 2020 |
Shop Type
Single-developer, full-time, only job.
