Sacred Reviews: Myrkri

Introduction

"Myrkri" is a fantasy game developed by manpaint that centers around one of my least favorite eldritch horrors. Yeah, I really don't have any love for vampires and was kind of hoping this game would be well written enough to help me look beyond my loathing for those bloodsucking cretins for a few moments. Instead I found "Myrkri" to be a colossal failure on many levels. So much so that I found myself actually cheering when I discovered a game ending bug in this game. After all, if the game is unbeatable due to bad event scripting then I can simply drop this game in order to work on something else. And while I'd normally hold off on a review until I've beaten a game. I'm more than happy to review this game based on the few hours I've already put into it.

Story

For starters the story in this game feels highly disjointed with the player being warped from one scene to the next in the beginning. So much so that I honestly thought about quitting before I even reached the human world. After all, the constant jump cuts from one character to the next make the narrative needlessly difficult to follow. I suppose this could have been manpaint's intention considering were following a bunch of rebels as they attempt to take down the current ruler of the vampires, but even if that was the case I'd argue it's terrible idea to throw people into the deep end and hope they stick with your game long enough to piece everything together.

Outside of my issues with the game's opening being a massive mess. The game also suffers from a rather rough translation. Not so bad that the game is impossible to penetrate, but annoying enough to make me wish manpaint had asked for some help.

Gameplay

The game really struggles on the combat front in a multitude of ways. For starters the bosses you encounter in the early game can barely scratch the playable characters. And while a more casual game normally wouldn't earn too much ire for this sort of direction from me. The early boss battles in "Myrkri" tend to drag on for an excessively long time due to the bosses having massive amounts of health while the player can barely dent them. As a result battles tend to drag on for a couple of minutes as the player mindlessly taps on the z key in order to perform basic attacks. And while I'd normally try to break up the monotony a little with some special attacks. You don't actually have access to any special moves at the start of the game. So you have no choice but to mindlessly smash the z key over and over and over again.

And while I'm not sure the wolves are as much of a problem in the English version since I avoided them like that were COVID-19 given gnashing teeth and deadly claws. When I played the French version the wolves were a menace that could easily tear you a new one if you confronted them. So while the bosses you fight early on are a complete joke. Some of the regular enemies will absolutely destroy you.

On the other hand, the spiders you confront in the human world are an absolute joke. So much so that I don't even know why the developer included them. After all, you can easily tear them apart with a single hit. Though, I suppose I should just be thankfully they don't come with 4,000 HP and the inability to inflict damage.

Graphics

One thing you'll quickly notice about "Myrkri" is just how dark the game is. In universe this explained by a curse hanging over the human world. A curse whose origins I'm not entirely sure about considering the game became unplayable before I could get to that point, but even if this curse had a good explanation it wouldn't make the inability to see entry and exit points on several maps any less annoying. In a way playing this game feels like fumbling in the dark while looking for a door knob during a power outage. A look that would even make Fumikage Tokoyami from "My Hero Academia" grimace. And his catch phrase while training his quirk was "revelry in the dark".

And while I suppose this direction would be a bit more acceptable if this was a horror game. The game tends to advance a lot more like a short story on rails with the player often times not having much say in where and what the characters are doing. Add in the developer's love of jump cuts and I'm sometimes left wondering if the sprites I'm looking at on screen are the heroes or the villains.

Sound

At one point the game's music make it sounds like your going to be chased in a dark cellar with your only source of light being a small lantern, but the expected chase never occurs. While I suppose some would applaud the developer for misleading the player and subverting expectations. I really can't think of any other instance in this game where the music really stands out. As a result the rest of the game's soundtrack just comes across as rather unremarkable. Albeit, my opinion on the music is limited to the background tracks I heard before I hit the game ending bug I mentioned in the intro.

Game Ending Bug

The game suffers from some bad event scripting where the game isn't able to advance anymore after you've cured the plague in the human world and talked to the King's royal mage. After you've done that stuff you should have enough clues to advance the story, but one of the vampires just directs you back to problems you've already solved. Even if you have 5 out of 5 clues. Jeez, I couldn't even advance the plot after presenting him with 6 out of 5 clues. Yes, it's actually possible to find more clues in this section than the developer apparently intended. In all honesty the clue count issue kind of makes me think of that time Goahn wiped out an extra Cell Jr. in Dragonball Z.

Conclusion

Even if "Myrkri" didn't suffer from a game ending bug that makes beating it impossible. I'd still say this game is a massive disappointment with needlessly long fights in the early game to maps so dark their almost painful to look at. As it stands I'd suggest giving "Myrkri" a wide berth. Hell, I'd recommend "Witches & Vampires: The Secrets of Ashburry" and "Vampire Legends Power of Three" over this game. And those games have vampires just casually milling about in broad daylight.

Posts

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I agree, this game is terrible. I realy wonder what I was thinking back then.
Well without knowing how old you were when you made this game. I'm going to assume it was those edgy teenage years that led to this game.
author=thesacredlobo
Well without knowing how old you were when you made this game. I'm going to assume it was those edgy teenage years that led to this game.


Yup.
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