I was very skeptical about writing this review, especially with projects and obligations on my plate at this time, including my novel, which is finally picking up speed. The reason mainly, is because, this was a piece of work that was so unremarkable and short at a glance. Yet, I can't say it isn't something I'll remember fondly. This is the game, "Castle of Heart," for the Nintendo Switch, produced by the company 7 Levels. The game was released on March 23, 2018, yet you have reviews on the game from March 22nd. This is the age of an impatient speedrun society. It received pretty bad reviews generally, but I didn't look at any when I decided to buy it. I was just intrigued by the advertisement as a throwback, oldschool difficult side-scrolling platformer.
The game didn't disappoint completely, but it didn't completely deliver either. I started playing the game quite a while ago, in summer of 2018. I took a couple of breaks, and usually worked on 1 or 2 levels at a time. In this game, you play as a knight who has been cursed and turned to stone. The sorcerer who destroyed the kingdom and inflicted the curse on him, has kidnapped his love- the princess. It was her tears that kept him from meeting his demise in the first place. On his quest, he follows the trail of the fleeing sorcerer, and meets foes, who are either controlled by the sorcerer, or at times cohorts of his. The story is simple, but it is never told forcefully enough in my opinion, and so it remains very forgettable throughout. The game is split into 4 chapters, each containing about 7 levels. Usually, the last level will have a major boss to fight.
The game was boasted as having super difficult platforming and enemies. However, I didn't notice anything remotely special about this, save for a few platforming sequences, and some of the enemies in the last few levels. In fact, the end of the game really crept up on me. Out of nowhere, I was confronted by the last boss, who I must say, did engage in some decent dialogue before squaring off with me. Even that fight wasn't as memorable as it should have been. None of the boss fights lasted long, and there were a few long levels, but usually they were just rushes of difficult enemy packs and short platforming sequences. Occasionally, you had to jump on moving wagons, and platform along a ride down a perilous cliff. A few of these were somewhat breathtaking and cool, with a feeling of accomplishment when making it through, but there just wasn't enough by far. I did like how there were well placed and hidden secrets in the levels with useful items like bombs and special weapons like a Frost mace, which you could use against some difficult enemies.
I will say that the game did deliver more often when it came to combating enemies. I wasn't a huge fan of the sluggish combat system, but the difficulty in some of the later levels was high at some times, and slightly rage inducing. In the game, you have a regular attack button, and the left bumper button is an attack modifier that allows a slow, but powerful attack, mainly good for breaking secret walls. The right bumper button throws the selected projectile in your inventory, or the X button will fire shots from a bow which is auto-aimed. Your character, in his stone state, is slowly dying without gathering energy from foes, and loses life constantly. You must defeat enemies to stay alive, reminiscent of Shinobi on Playstation, or Otogi on Xbox. There are healing items scattered throughout the worlds that you will constantly be looking for. If you lose too much health one of your arms will fall off, and you will no longer be able to wield 2 weapons. The left trigger blocks, and has a bunch of recovery frames to it. The right trigger does a roll, with is extremely slow to execute. You have no invincibility frames in any action, on top of the slow speed, so a simple action like rolling out of danger can result in a huge amount of lost health. Luckily, there are checkpoints at various places in each level, which restore your health, when you first reach them, and become respawn points.
I really want to find something great to say about this one. Even the graphics, while good, lacked variety to the point where they were stale and annoying to look at after a while. The level design was almost lazy. There wasn't any memorable music I can recall. The song at the title screen, along with the opening monologue was decent at best. I did enjoy how the storytelling followed up from that and concluded very poetically at the end of the game. It was short, but sweet. There was one page of credits. Then, just like that, it was all over.
The thing is that the game wasn't even memorably difficult. I would have given points for that. This game was even more underwhelming that Vulgar the Viking, which also boasted retro-difficulty. None of the bosses were milestones to defeat at all. The last boss took me about 2 tries, and lasted about 30 seconds. That was as long as those fights got. A few areas in the last couple of levels had so many difficult enemies with so little resources, that I had to bolt through them to the next checkpoint. That's about as climatic as it got. In the game, later on, you have to have a second weapon with some power, or you simply won't be able to defeat the hordes of enemies. Each of them has extremely high defense and attack, even taking a bit of damage to kill with strong dual swords. This was more broken than legitimately difficult. It also happened very seldom.
All in all, I expected more, and I'm reviewing this as a completionist. I don't only want to review stellar titles that I play, but I have to acknowledge games that I invested time in, that were not so great, just to be honest. I can't recommend this game beyond a mindless splurge. If you have money burning a hole in your pocket and want a game to move your thumbs or test your buttons, pick it up. It won't be one that beckons a replay. It wasn't memorable, and it's hard to even keep it occupying space on my memory card. A very flat game, with nothing whatsoever that stood out about it. 5.5/10
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