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A criminal, a cultist and a cat looking for Nirvana!

To Crime Nirvana is a wacky game by Scitydreamer & Grasshoppermask.
It's a short game, I finished it in 1 hour exactly. No more and no less.

The protagonist is Ryuki, a thug turned bouncer that worked for a crime boss named King Crimeson, a criminal that attained enlightenment. After being incarcerated (for not paying taxes!) other criminals try to take his place, but Ryuki decides to fight the gangs. Or, even better, defeat the leaders of these gangs in one to one combat.
Well, more or less, since he is aided in his quest by Kat, his boyfriend cultist, and a cat, Salem.
Ryuki is in fact the main damage dealer. He has a couple of nice attacks and his style is called "Crime". Kat instead has the power of ... uhm... "Love" and lets him heal, resurrect and cure the party members from various ailments.
But the best one is probably Salem, that kitty can attack or distract the enemy, and, even better, he can restore the character's MP (that especially in Ryuki's case are quite low).


Oh yeah, he's cute, but wait until you have to fight him!!!

The game is a simple rpg, there is no exploration, just dialogues, and you visit maps just to find the gamg leader, challenge and defeat him. Except the first and last combat, all the others encounters can be fought in any order.

There's a gang of rollerbladers, another of greasers, one of graffiti artists and so on. It's like one of these old beat 'em ups with the difference that you just have to defeat the leader. Yes, o̶n̶e̶ ̶v̶e̶r̶s̶u̶s̶ ̶o̶n̶e̶ ... three versus one, well I guess that the cat doesn't count and Kat isn't much of a fighter.
So most of the work will be done by Ryuki, that possesses various nice damaged abilities since his power is called "Crime". Kat instead has the poter of "Love", and he's a cultist that can heal and fortify party members, or cure them from various ailments. Then we have Salem, a really useful party member that can scratch enemies, distract them or he can purr, restoring the MP of one or more party members, and this is particularly useful since Ryuki has really few MP points.


Salem is the cat and purring will restore the MP to one party member or to everyone including himself!

Opponents possess various abilities too. Some can attack all the party members and cause various effects, they can blind them, stun them, or make them unable to use their special abilities. Others have other gimmicks, the leader of the rollerbladers for example has the rollerblades that are targetted separately, and makes her quite powerful.

Besides combat there is not much else. Characters automatically rest after each combat, so they are restored and game can be saved (but you can also save before each combat encounter too). So no items, shop or even experience levels. Really simple, and short!

Despite this I liked a lot the graphic style and the story. It's bizarre but I also wished it was longer and more developed, it was inspiring and entertaining. I also found no bugs or typos or problems. Pretty simple and pretty good, but also... pretty to look at! Every chapter has its own palette, and I found the portraits of the various characters well done and charming.


Very well, now that you introduced yourself get ready for a good beating!

Verdict
Will you attain enlightenment and reach the fabled Crime Nirvana?
I suggest to try this short lighthearted game, it's nothing complex, and I also found it rather easy and quite simple. Still it's entertaining, nice music and very good dialogues frame a solid game and a quirky and lighthearted small adventure.
Ok, so this is short, little but fun. And I really liked the story, so much that I found it a bit too short, but good, so the verdict is 4! Good one!