Dark Devotion Reviews

Forced to participate in a mysterious auction for items linked to “Dictator X” to learn the truth about your father’s death, you must investigate the secrets of each participant to piece together memories of the past, in the latest mystery game written by Rika Suzuki, the writer of Another Code and Hotel Dusk.

From the writer of Hotel Dusk comes a new visual novel with detective elements where an unlikely cast gathers in a creepy notorious castle.

Dark Auction is a great mystery adventure game just short of being amazing. The story is captivating and explores trauma with a compelling cast of characters and a story full of intrigue and deception. The soundtrack by composers Yuko Komiyama and Tsukasa Masuko is ear-pleasing, and the illustrations by Kohske are expressive and beautiful. The game's inexpressive character models and uncanny images clash with the overall presentation, but there's still a lot of good going for this game.

Dark Devotion has been a challenging and interesting addition to the Dark Souls-like genre.

Dark Devotion is hard, then, and depending on how you play it on the Switch you might find it even more of a struggle. Along with the dark visuals making handheld play occasionally troublesome, there’s also the fact that its text is awfully small, and pretty much illegible on the map screen. There are glimmers of a good game from time to time, though. Dark Devotion does have its merits; it’s just a shame they’re buried under so much frustration as a result of considerable laboriousness and unnecessary harshness. You really do need a lot of devotion to see the game through to its end.

Challenge can be a great driver for getting satisfaction from a gaming experience, but too much of it can drive the experience down overall. Such is the case with Dark Devotion: It is, without a doubt, one of the most challenging Souls-inspired indies to be released in recent memory, though not always in the ways that would make overcoming it more satisfying.

Dark Devotion may be a Souls-like, but it's not just another clone. While nailing both the combat and atmosphere of its inspiration, it also keeps things fresh by adding rogue-lite elements, streamlined character progression, and a forward-only exploration style to the mix that encourage replayability.

Dark Devotion isn’t a difficult game to describe. It’s an indie game that takes its cues from a lot of popular genres and fuses them into a somewhat unique experience. I could lob criticism at it, nitpick certain creative decisions—and I will—but it is undeniably a competently designed game, developed by what is clearly a talented team. I want to make that abundantly clear from the top. Playing it was a different experience for me personally, and one that ultimately left me feeling pretty hollow.

While Dark Devotion suffers from several easy-to-fix flaws that stop it being perfect, it remains a deep, dark and engaging action RPG.

Overall, I really enjoyed Dark Devotion. One of the things I love about 2D action games is learning a level like the back of your hand, and what I love about roguelikes is picking a starting build and trying to go as far as you can with it. This marries the two into something that, while it may not be for everyone, is definitely for me.

Dark Devotion has a lot going for it. There’s a lot of interesting design choices here, albeit flawed and need to be fleshed out before the game can shine. Until that happens, this game will leave you frustrated and lost, which isn’t a good feeling.

This souls-inspired roguelite frustrates just as often as it entertains.

Get ready to die with another killer 2D souls-like that flips the script in several ways for a refreshing take on the genre.