first things first, the early access of guilt the deathless is very short, so keep that in mind. i have barely over two hours played and finished the given content in my second run. the first run was over pretty quickly due to learning the game and over committing without having any knowledge about what's going on. overall it was a pretty enjoyable experience with some minor caveats! in my opinion the game is way too easy and because of the lack of difficulty, i was able to finish it quite (maybe too?) quickly. i'll definitely do some more runs to check out missed content and i'm looking forward to more content updates in the future.
what i liked:
the atmosphere is pretty dense and i did instantly fell in love with the unique style of guilt. exploring the vast and forsaken lands was an immersive experience overall.
the combat was a tad bit bare bones, but still quite fun in the end. everything's responsive and works well so far. there are several mechanics that gives you iframes and that's always a sweet thing to have since it provides you with the option and feeling of outplaying something.
the boss fights were interesting and somewhat unique so far. although some more difficulty would be desirable.
the graphics are gorgeous. i'm always looking for these retro styled games with oldschool 3d/2d graphics and outer brain studios did a decent work on this one. they definitely nailed the art style and art direction of their game.
enjoyed the different biomes so far.
interesting npcs - let's see how the evolve over the course of this early access development.
calm and melodic soundtrack, which serves the immersion quite well.
i haven't had a single bug so far, even tho this version is still very early access.
what felt debatable to me:
~ parry was way too easy to pull off, so it is making you basically invulnerable by spam taping block while facing bullets or attacks. somewhat tighter timings would be decent to provide a more satisfying combat experience.
~ the game does require much more diversity with loot. more different weapons, more different armor, more spells, basically more of everything. so has to be the power level - it was kinda hard to obtain a single upgrade at some point (very early).
~ the enemy variety is rather lackluster at the moment.
~ would've loved to see some more collectibles and/or flavor texts for lore and world building. hopefully there will be some in the future.
~ can't say much about the story, since the game isn't finished yet. the potential is there.
~ the rooms are quite empty. there should be more barrels, boxes, candelabras, statues or so. ofc more interior for design purpose would make the maps more immersive and less empty. at the moment every room is basically an empty room with a random number of monsters, maybe a chest, maybe something to plunder, maybe an explore barrel or two an that's it
what i didn't like:
making the enemies fighting other monsters was a terrible design choice in my opinion. it is simply making the already pretty easy combat even more trivial. this has to be removed or changed asap.
the inventory needs to be bigger. i've had to constantly salvage stuff which made looting tedious at some point.
7.5-8/10 decent core of a game, definitely recommend. i'll update this review after some majors updates and the 1.0 release.
