Will your Faith be Bleak and Forsaken – Review

Come with me, and you’ll be, in the world of Bleak Faith: Forsaken (c’mon admit it, you sang it to the Willy Wonka tune), where Sci-fi meets fantasy in this latest souls-like.

Now, normally here is where I’d spin a small sentence or two for the set-up of the story, but quite frankly I had next to zero idea what was actually going on. As you start the game, you are treated to a rather visually stunning opening cinematic with twisted yet confusing scenes full to the brim with a Sci-fi and fantasy blend.

With next to no dialogue accompanying it, the game almost forces you to just take a ride and experience what’s being shown to you while coming to your own conclusions about what in the world is happening. So if you’re the style of gamer who enjoys a story making sense, then turn away now. Even with other soul-likes you can work and piece out the story throughout the game with relative ease, but Bleak Faith: Forsaken doesn’t seem to do that.

Still, the game visually is extremely impressive especially when considering what I’ve read (but can’t find definitive proof on), the indie dev team behind this project consists of three people, and there are times that it shows. The areas you explore and rummage around through are all large and maze-like with constant intertwining paths which may cause players to be turned around more often than not. Yet sadly, despite the level design, everything is kind of bland in the colour palette.

Yes, everything looks nicely polished such as gear, weapons, enemies and bosses, it’s just a shame that everything seems so dull and grey while at the same time, the locations are quite grandiose and foreboding, making you feel extremely small in this world.

However, whoever was behind the sound design for Bleak Faith knew exactly what they wanted. Every metal clash, footstep and voice line is right on point. Even creatures snarling or the juiciness of a fleshy foe going down are all fantastic, but this also comes with a weird double edge.

To mirror the foreboding world around you, the background music is also extremely minimal and next to non-existent, save for moments where you may be standing still to re-collect yourself. In these instances, an almost Nier-like soundtrack with haunting arias will rise out of nowhere to make sure you’re still paying attention.

Hoo boy was the gameplay interesting. At its core, it’s immediately apparent that it’s Souls-like in terms of health, stamina and mana management. The various gears have different weights, all culminating towards how heavy you are, which in turn impacts how fast you recover your stamina from executing attacks as well as dodges or blocks.

Despite all these, Bleak Faith: Forsaken still does its own thing. For one, when you die the only thing you leave behind is your corpse (and current equipped gear) which I quite liked as a mechanic. Experience gained from your kills, you keep that regardless and do not have to make dashes back to recollect your lost experience.

While on the topic of levelling up, you can allocate your skills points at any time and not from a specific vendor. Combat and general gameplay personally is where my biggest issues lie, for Bleak Faith has a certain level of jankiness to its controls, in what I can only describe as floaty yet heavy controls for movement and combat. While not awful, this is still an issue when you need to be precise and plan your attacks accordingly.

All said and done this is pretty decent Souls-like despite its slight bulk and fairly dull colour palette. Regardless, if you are a fan of Souls-likes then I’d say it’s worth looking into. Maybe not at its full price of £24.99 as it gives off more of a £20 area quality, but it’s still enjoyable and impressive for a small team to pull off.