Samurai Lantern

Samurais are among the most interesting warriors that ever lived, as well as some of the most mysterious. Granted, they were still a thing up until one or two hundred years ago, so there’s definitely more history regarding their traditions, unlike more ancient warriors from around the world. You can also read a lot of books about them, or even watch documentaries.

Samurai Lantern is a 2D platformer in which you control a samurai trying to collect the lanterns he needs, while staying alive in the middle of a monster invasion. The graphics are kept as simple as possible, but the difficulty level is anything but that. In fact, a few seconds might be all that you can stay alive for sometimes, depending on how sharp your reflexes are and how patient you can be.

The level is very small, and you can teleport from one side to the other using the classic platformer technique. Unfortunately, the enemies come from every direction, and you also have to keep an eye on the lanterns that randomly spawn around the stage. Thankfully, at least you can use your sword to attack enemies, but you need to coordinate your moves carefully to actually hit something.

As mentioned before, you need to move very quickly, otherwise a single touch from a monster is enough to kill your character and cause a restart. The greatest challenge is to understand the enemy movement, because although it looks random at first, it’s actually pretty predictable if you pay attention. Granted, all this depends on whether you have the patience to play for long enough.

The graphics are nothing to write home about, but the retro style goes nicely with the general mood of the game. It can be difficult to concentrate sometimes, mainly because the enemies are so small and difficult to make out from the background, but it really depends on how observant you are. Thankfully, at least the controls are very responsive and accurate, which is always great in a platformer.

In the end, Samurai Lantern might be a tad too frustrating for most people, but it can also be a challenge worth undertaking for ambitious gamers. Hence, it can certainly provide you with a bit of fun in the right conditions.