When it comes to some of the series of indie games I’ve played over the years, there are those that are clearly cruising along with greatness, and then those that seem to generally be struggling. Among those that haven’t been the most consistent, or had the easiest time, the somewhat odd lineage of the Skautfold games comes to mind. While they’ve always done a good job of being visually distinct, it’s in the gameplay category that they’ve been a bit all over the place. Whether that’s from switching between genre playstyles or just the quality being inconsistent, where most series can slowly continue to improve, this one feels like its developers are determined to take some risks every time and then just see how it works out.

After spending quite some time trying to get the story rolling, you’ll slowly get on to some actual action. It always strikes me as an odd choice to lead with a narrative when you could have asked me what it was all about 5 minutes later and I still couldn’t have really told you. Something involving a cult and some attempted diplomacy, but whether the problem was the details or the way it was presented not sucking me in, I started out with no real investment in what was happening. 

Oddly enough, for all the time it spent on getting its storyline going, it put next to no effort into orienting the player on the controls and how combat works… and this is a game that needed that. This series has always sort of gone in its own direction when it comes to the feel of play, but this time while I can see what they were going for overall, I can’t say the execution is terribly satisfying. You could try to get the timing of your block down to save yourself in battles, but I found it was far easier to simply move around to trigger enemies to attack while keeping a slight distance, and then following up with my own strikes. That said, the button scheme doesn’t conform well to normal expectations, which would normally obligate you to explain them a little, and there just isn’t a satisfyingly fluid feeling when you do make your move. It’s all just a little too awkward. While you can choose to stick with it, muscling through to make the most of what’s in front of you, there doesn’t seem to have been enough focus on the player experience, and getting people invested. It instead feels more like they’ve just made something, and then expected people to fall over themselves to like it, regardless of its quality.