Inscryption

Genre: Turn-Based Card Game / Roguelike / First-Person Graphic Adventure

Players: 1

You can find a video of this review here!

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Review:

Note: This review has been directly sponsored by a kind donation from Ben. Thanks again for your generous contribution!

Inscryption, released on PC in 2021 and ported to PlayStation 4 and Nintendo Switch in 2022, is a game that combines elements of Card Games and Roguelikes, within a framing device of a First-Person Graphic Adventure. The premise in this game has the player in a dark cabin with a mysterious, sinister dealer who has entrapped the player into partaking in a card game with the player’s life at stake.

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Dark Dealings

Right from the start, Inscryption strikes an ominous tone, almost as if the game itself is cursed, with some post-modernist elements that do a great job of drawing the player into the game. When you play Inscryption for the first time, the option to start a new game is un-selectable, you can only apparently continue a previous game in progress, with the implication being that some terrible fate has befallen the last person to play the game, and now you have unwittingly become the next in line to meet this fate.

Much of the wonderful dark tone that this game presents players with is sold through the outstanding soundtrack and sound design. The soundtrack in this game uses a combination of subdued instrumental themes, weakly playing as if the life has been sapped from them. Also, the sound design here underlines the threatening nature of the dealer, blaring discordantly when he speaks. Meanwhile, you’ll find yourself being addressed directly by the characters on the cards in your hand, who speak with meek and silly sounds akin to what Undertale used for the character Sans. Just through the tones the game uses, it heavily implies that the cards are on your side and the dealer is a threat, even though the dealer’s words are mostly polite and the cards occasionally criticize or outright mock you.

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Creature Feature

The core game at the center of Inscryption is a deck-building Card Game with Roguelike elements that bears a strong resemblance to the structure of Slay the Spire, though the mechanics of how the game works are quite different. Players have two decks of animal cards, one containing a variety of different creatures that they will collect and enhance throughout their play through the game, and one filled with zero-cost squirrel cards, with all animals having an attack value (zero for meek critters like squirrels), a defense value, and a cost. At the beginning of each turn, players can draw one card from either deck.

One of the Card Game’s primary mechanics is sacrifice – most animals will require a payment in blood or bone, with blood obtained by slaughtering live animals on your side (the fate that befalls most squirrels), and bone obtained gradually as your animals die in combat or due to your own sacrifices. Combat in the game is roughly similar to the sorts of systems seen in Magic: the Gathering, Hearthstone, and similar card games, but rather than life points, attacks that slip by the defenses on either side tip a scale in one direction or another, meaning that you’re not whittling down life totals, but rather, trying to do enough damage to outpace the damage the enemy does to you.

This in and of itself is clever enough, but Inscryption adds in Slay the Spire-style branching choices and card enhancements as you proceed through the game. Land on a backpack icon on the game’s map and you’ll get a selection of single-use items to help you on your way. Land on a card space and you can add a creature card to your deck. Come to a campfire or a sacrificial altar and you can permanently strengthen a card, or sacrifice one card to empower another card with the sacrificed card’s ability.

In addition to these sorts of spaces, you’ll find plenty of surprises along the way, such as battles with unique conditions or specially-empowered enemies, or encounters with the unusual denizens of the harsh world that the dealer is describing to you (sometimes with the shadowy dealer putting on a creepy mask to act out the character you’re encountering). And of course when death comes in this game (and it will, this is a Roguelike after all), you’ll find your next run through the game empowered by a card created by an amalgamation of the features of cards from your defeated deck.

Since I’m already comparing this game to Slay the Spire (and really, I feel like the comparison is inevitable), I’ll say that on balance, I tend to prefer the card game mechanics of Spire to those found in this game, though they’re both quite enjoyable. However, Inscryption does one other thing to set it apart, and that is its framing device, which allows you to freely move around the creepy cabin in between battles. Here you’ll find various objects to interact with and puzzles to solve with your cards themselves advising you on how to proceed. This isn’t an idle distraction either, as your efforts in this part of the game unlock cards which are then added to the primary Card Game.

And then there’s the game’s second and third acts, which I will not spoil here, only to say that just when you think you know what this game is about, Inscription throws you a delightful curveball. And while I agree with others who have said that these latter parts of the game are nowhere near as good as the game’s first act, I still think that the later sections of the game are enjoyable in their own right, even if they can’t quite live up to the wonderful atmosphere found in the game’s opening.

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Riddles in the Dark

I spoke about this game’s great sound and atmosphere earlier here, but I didn’t mention the graphics, and that’s in part because this is one of the more problematic elements of the game. Stylistically, this game’s 3D visuals are excellent, going hand-in-hand with the creepy atmosphere of the game, with the dealer himself represented only by an animated pair of eyes, long green arms and clawed hands, and occasionally the aforementioned masks. These are joined by various arcane objects within the cabin, with everything dimly lit by candlelight (I’ll get to this in a moment).

However, while all of this is all well and good, the cards themselves and many of the textures are highly pixellated, something that I would think is a stylistic choice except it doesn’t seem to match the rest of this game’s style and atmosphere. I feel like, if they were going for a more “videogamey” look, there would be other visual elements that would reflect this sort of low-resolution visual style too, but as it is, these elements stick out (though less so in handheld mode).

However, the part of the presentation that really bothers me the most is the overall dark look of the game. Stylistically, the darkness covering this game is perfect, but it’s just not very conducive to a card game where you need to actually be able to see the cards. In docked mode this is fairly acceptable, but when playing the game in handheld mode, the cards closes to the opponent can be pretty difficult to see, especially when the lighting changes to get even darker during a boss battle or special encounter. There are settings in the game’s menus to change the brightness levels, but these don’t help that much – they don’t reduce the darkness, they just make the darkness lighter.

There are a few other minor quibbles I have with this game. The mechanics are not always properly explained, and sometimes the game prevents you from looking at elements of the game when you’re meant to be making a decision elsewhere, such as refusing to let you look at the descriptions of your single-use items while deciding which deck to draw from. Your in-game hand will sometimes cover up parts of the cards you need to see. Also, specifically for the Nintendo Switch version of the game, this release makes no use of the touchscreen, despite that it seems like it could benefit from that.

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Are the Cards Stacked in Your Favor?

However, these small missteps are forgivable in a game that is otherwise a delightfully atmospheric and so fun and full of surprises. While this game may not quite top Slay the Spire as the next great Deck-Building Roguelike, it is an outstanding entry in this growing genre, and one that is an easy recommendation to anyone who enjoyed Slay the Spire. And for those who have yet to play Slay the Spire wondering if this game is worth trying, I would still give an enthusiastic “yes” – Inscryption is an excellent game in its own right, and the Graphic Adventure elements set it apart from other games in its genre. Do not miss this one.

tl;dr – Inscryption is a deck-building Card Game and Roguelike with a First-Person Graphic Adventure framing device with players finding themselves in a dark cabin with a mysterious, sinister dealer playing a card game about sacrificing animals. The card game itself is excellent, and the foreboding dark atmosphere is absolutely wonderful. Unfortunately, that same darkness can make this game hard to see in handheld mode, and there are a few other minor frustrations here and there. However, in spite of these issues, Inscryption is a macabre delight, and it’s a game I highly recommend, especially to fans of similar games like Slay the Spire.

Grade: A-

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