Inscryption - Review

Inscryption is one of the strangest, uncomfortable, bizarrely horrific and puzzling psychological horror deck building game, I’ve ever come across. If you’re looking at this strange game with confusion, don’t worry. I’m just as confused.

Inscryption is many, many things rolled in to one. I played the demo a little while back and found myself somewhat enjoying the style of game. I’m not a huge card battler fan, not typically a fan of the sheer random nature of them. Inscryption has a somewhat in-depth card system at first glance (that becomes immensely more in-depth and complicated about a third in) that is easy enough to pick up and play. Four card slots, the ability to see where your opponent’s card will be ahead of time, and a variety of card effects. From undying, being able to sacrifice a card infinitely, flying. There is a wide variety of cards to learn and play with.

Then about halfway into the game, after beating the glowing eyeballs of the game master in front of you, you are blessed with an almost completely new game. Reminiscent of some old school card battlers. A 2D dungeon crawler like aesthetic, with a completely revamped card battle system. Necromancy cards that require bones, a magic deck built around empowering other cards with gem cards. Technology deck, that involves building up power over your turns to play more powerful cards, or the beast deck which is most familiar to the style of game you’ve already played for the last few hours in the cabin.

Problematically, after finishing this section, you get pulled back into a 3D cabin like sequence again, with a slightly different map methodology. No longer the roguelike, but a progressive RPG with checkpoints. 5 lanes of cards now, and a focus on blending the power and gem cards as the main focus. This section in of itself is fine, and enjoyable. The puzzles in the area aren’t anywhere near as complex as the start of the game, and far easier to brute force. It seemed like half the amount of love went into this section of the game.

Upon beating this section, I was expecting to be thrust into another revamped game, so that I could compete with the two other Scrybes. Having now beaten the Beast Scrybe, from the cabin, and the Technology Scrybe in this section. But no. The game moves into a final sequence, where you get to see a small chessboard style map for the Necromancer, a refight against the Beast scrybe, that turns into just inflicting damage for no reason, and then a Yu-Gi-Oh 3D battlefield style duel with the Magic Scrybe. Then it ends?

It feels like half the game is missing here. I was enjoying myself so thoroughly up to this point, expecting to see even more cool innovations, and more unique environments with new puzzles. Yet, no. The game reaches a climax as it deletes itself, and that’s it. It feels half completed. Like the second half of the game just wasn’t completed so a finishing sequence took its place. Perhaps there is a way to experience the battle against the other Scrybes, but I didn’t really feel like trying to theory-craft for a potential change.

This is even more frustrating in that it feels like half of the story is now missing too. Upon completion of each section, you get a series of live-action recordings to watch of Luke Carder, the Lucky Carder, who opens TCG packets for his video channel. It explains him finding the coordinates for something on an Inscryption card in a resealed packet. Which turns out to be a floppy disk with the game on it. Further details are revealed when “KAYCEE” a death card that acquire in the first segment of the game is revealed to be directly related to the floppy disk and game. A strange secret agent type person coming to Luke’s house demanding the game be handed over. There is a compelling story going on behind the scenes that feels like it stops dead with a bullet.

The game is fun, there is no doubt. The puzzles are straight forward enough, and almost all of them are completely able to be brute forced through. The gameplay itself is enjoyable, and despite there being such a depth and expansion of cards available in the game, it’s not particularly difficult. The first segment, in the cabin is probably the most frustrating in terms of difficulty. Everything after that is immensely easier and will take you half the time the first segment did. There’s about 15 hours’ worth of gameplay here, yet there feels like a real lack of replay reason. Beyond a completionists mentality, I have no real desire to go back into the game.

Which is frustrating because I really enjoyed the time I had with the game. Yet I can’t help but keep going back to this idea that it’s just half finished. That there is a huge chunk of game missing, and in turn a truncated rapidly finished story. There’s no long-term continuation of the game, like is typically seen in most roguelikes, and because the puzzles are only a puzzle the first time, they become a hindrance on subsequent playthroughs. On completion you can play from any part of the game, and watch any of the live-action recordings, but my real question is.

Why?

If there is something more, there is no explanation as to how it is achieved. There is no explanation as to why the game events even occur. There is a fundamental portion missing, and the game being fun, is not enough to make me want to continue to play. There’s so many cool concepts in the game, and there is a world of options that could be expanded upon. The sound design is great, the characters themselves all feel rather unique and with depth, despite never being fleshed out that much. The card game itself is fun to play and never feels unfair or unreasonable. Strategy will always triumph in most situations and progress feels good.

Inscryption is a really strange, confusion, journey. It starts out with its absolute strongest segment and finishes on its weakest. The final cutscene recording is fantastic and leaves me wanting more. Yet there is nothing else. There is no further development. It’s… disheartening. I definitely recommend picking the game up and checking it out. But be aware, that it feels like there is almost a whole half of the game missing, and that in itself can feel kind of deflating. Replayability is low, but there would be a completely different experience on replay if you chose to do so.

The Score

7.0

Review code provided by Devolver Digital

The Pros

+Card system is fun

+Characters are enjoyable

+The Campy Live-Action scenes are great

The Cons

-Half the game feels missing

-Puzzles aren’t that enjoyable

-Story feels unfinished and rushed