![]() ![]() It's not a complete and total disaster – occasionally, when the screen is a little busier, you might feel a flicker of engagement as you dash between combatants – but overall, we'll be leaving this one for dead. A sequel or heavily-modified relaunch could salvage the game into something much stronger, as the core idea of resurrecting fallen monsters is a decent one, but its treatment here renders it irrelevant. It’s not horrible, but it’s bereft of both meaningful content and any manner of unique execution. With nothing to offer besides some pleasant storytelling, we cannot recommend Sword of the Necromancer on any meaningful level. So we dug, and dug, and dug… and turned up empty. It’s so barren that we were absolutely convinced that we must have missed something. We only wish they were in service of a far, far superior game. You’ll find lore documents scattered around, and well-drawn (though strangely low-res) cutscenes with warm, heartfelt voice acting enrich the proceedings. It’s all so uninspiring and that’s a terrific shame, because as we mentioned, the storyline is pretty interesting. We could give some of this a marginal pass if there were some pretty aesthetics or interesting environments, but barring some palette changes every floor looks more or less exactly the same, with character and enemy sprites that are just about acceptable. The second boss got stuck in a wall, unable to attack us while we spammed the A button and gradually whittled down its health with absolutely no resistance. Which begs the question – why even attach a roguelike structure? It’s buggy, too. You can kill the normal enemies and bosses very easily with your sword, as long as you’re patient. Summoned monsters taking up a slot and being basically useless – even with gradually-accrued upgrades - essentially writes off any reason to engage with Sword of the Necromancer’s primary selling point. The aforementioned item limit essentially means that the item synergies and gameplay diversity that literally define this genre are conspicuously absent. We could reel off a laundry list of complaints. That’s such a basic thing and would have made the game far breezier and more fun. You’ve got a fun, speedy dash move to help you get in and out of enemy range, but it’s very limited and on a cool-down, so you can’t even zip about the dungeon when you’ve cleared it out. Between floors, you’re able to send items back to the “hub” area to use, abuse and upgrade for your next attempt, but there’s very little more to it than that. Kill enemies, get a key, fight a boss, go to the next floor. It has the ostensible structure of Enter the Gungeon, but with none of the gameplay variation that makes that title so compelling. You’ve seen all of it before, and done much better. ![]() Okay, obviously that’s untrue, but we’re trying to inject some entertainment value into this review of a game that it’s shockingly difficult to write anything interesting about. We’d say it’s best not to get attached to them, but you won’t really need them anyway as their A.I is rubbish and they couldn’t hit the side of a barn – a major problem given that the third boss is the side of a barn. Resurrected enemies level up as they fight, but they’re easily killed. General combat sees you slashing at your enemies ala Zelda, but upon defeat, it’s possible to reanimate their corpses in order to fight alongside you. We’ll come back to this nonsense shortly, but an explanation is in order. Captured on Nintendo Switch (Handheld/Undocked) This would maybe, maybe be OK, but the central mechanic of the game – resurrected monsters that fight on your side – take up a slot each. ![]() It’s hamstrung by one major and completely insane design flaw you can only carry four items. That’s really not to undermine the no-doubt hard work and passion of the developers, but there’s just nothing whatsoever to get your teeth into in Sword of the Necromancer. ![]() What this amounts to is a roguelike dungeon crawl with so little focus it’s almost embarrassing. ![]()
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