Reign of Blades

In the indie world of hack and slash games, Reign of Blades is one you need to make time for. It’s a relatively short title that takes you through more than enough fights using swords, spears, mallets and more.

You play the role of a young princess whose land is taken by an evil woman of great power and her army of mindless henchmen. It’s your tasks to use whatever skills you posses to fight the enemy and reclaim that which is yours and your people’s.

There is no name to the young girl or background story for the events that lead to the hostile takeover but there are plenty of fights along the way until you face the evil queen. Visually, Reign of Blades looks really good, animations flow and are well devised, characters are truly unique and there’s a nice particle system to go along with your special abilities and those of the enemies you face.

Apart from that, Reign of Blades catches attention and manages to make you dig deep into the game with the help of its great soundtrack. The game is brought to you by a collective of students, and they synced up perfectly because the songs are simply fantastic. They make a huge difference.

In Reign of Blades, the main character really knows her way with a weapon. There are melee and ranged attacks to perform and when your energy level reaches max, you get to unleash a mighty special attack. Played using a keyboard, game controls feel ok though you will struggle a bit at times so a controller will be your best option.

A very nice feature that’s embedded into the game is the option to equip the helmets of tougher enemies you defeat. There are several you can pick up along the way and each one grants you not only a different look and weapon, but a different fighting style. Depending on your choice, your attacks can increase in speed or power, special moves are replaced with new ones but the helmets are destructible, so you won’t be wearing them all the time.

A thing you might not really get down with is the fact that most fights happen in an arena fashion, meaning that you enter a room and the doors remain locked until you defeat all the enemies. This makes the game a bit too linear but on the other hand, you have to face your enemies with increased awareness and most fights put you in front of new enemies or new combinations of enemies.

On a closing note, for an indie game, Reign of Blades delivers a very nice game with gameplay that’s as captivating as bigger titles, and in all honesty, it’s a bit tougher than a lot of them.