this post was submitted on 23 Jul 2025
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I'm playing - but not recommending - Blasphemous this week. It is quite possibly the least fun I've had playing a video game. It's a game that is specifically designed to infuriate you and waste your time, and I guess in that respect they really nailed it. If the bosses weren't so easy I'd say playing Blasphemous feels like what people who have never played a Soulslike thinks playing Dark Souls feels like.
It's a shame too because I want to like this game. I want to love it. The art direction is great. The music is good. The lore and world building is interesting. The level design on a macro level - the interconnected world and the way shortcuts link areas together - remind me of Dark Souls 1 in the best possible way.
It's just an absolute chore to play. The mixture of deliberate but awful game design combined with absolutely terrible execution makes for quite the mix. You can't make what is essentially 80% a platformer filled with instant death hazards when the controls are this clunky, movement feels this bad and hitboxes and ledge/ladder grabs are this atrocious.
Contact damage on every single enemy (with all damage in the game having knockback on you) is a lazy and unfun design choice. Enemy placement - especially projectile launching enemies - is done to maximise impact so you can't quickly skip through areas on subsequent visits but have to slowly clear them out lest you'll get knocked into some instant death spikes. And there is a lot of backtracking required, both for the quests (that are unsolvable without a Wiki by the way) and for retrieving your body after dying.
I'm in the final non-DLC area now but I'm very close to just calling it a day instead of succumbing to the sunk cost fallacy. I'm really not having fun and it's taking every ounce of willpower to not just do what I want to do, which is fire up NG+ of Mandragora: Whispers of the Witch Tree.
I spent exactly 1 hour with Blasphemous before refunding it. Too much platforming for me and the combat is not exactly fun and didn't feel fresh.
Best combat in any metroidvania is F.I.S.T: Forged in Shadow Torch and Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown, IMO. They're almost like character action games: launchers, on-the-fly weapon switching, dash/jump canceling… etc. Full combo systems—only thing missing is a style meter.
If you thought the first hour of Blasphemous had too much platforming then hoo boy. Just wait until you see the endgame areas. I agree about the combat completely, and also the character customization and progression is very lacking which also reduces my enjoyment. Most of the character upgrades are completely useless - wow, an uppercut as a 4th attack in your attack string? You barely have enough time between dodges for two attacks, let alone 4. A charged attack that takes three years to channel? When are we supposed to have time to use this?
I'll look into F.I.S.T., looks kinda cool. Will keep an eye on any sales. The Lost Crown is on my radar too, I recall it got rave reviews.
I really do want to recommend Mandragora though. It is more heavy on the Soulslike and ARPG than platforming, which I personally really liked. Heavy emphasis on character progression, upgrades and skill builds. Still plenty of fun Metroidvania elements with secrets and ability gated sections of earlier areas and so on. Heavily recommended!