Wandering what would it be if Dante's Inferno (2010) became a metroidvania game? Now you have the answer, it's Blasphemous! I'll try to be as brief and honest as possible telling what I saw and experienced during my playthrough.

Before anything else my entire playthrough was during "V. 1.0.6" so, if there's something missing the devs might have patched it. At this moment the game is on "V. 1.0.8" and according to the devs:

Originally posted by Blasphemous Team:

"You'll also notice that this is Patch 1, which means more patches and content updates will be on their way - launching Blasphemous doesn't mean we're finished! - Wed, 25/09/2019"

Knowing that let's get to move on to the review...

POST UPDATES AT THE END OF THE MAIN REVIEW

1. In terms of presentation, narrative, lore, pixel art, soundtrack, etc... the game is simply flawless, a true sight to behold.
   
   
   • During the entire game a part of the lore is told throughout cutscenes (all well pixelated/animated, around 7 or 8 cutscenes if I remember right) showing the events "The Penitent One" (game's protagonist) has been put in order to fufill on his journey.
     
   • Also some of it's lore and characters are written in the descriptions of items you find during the playthrough; Interesting narrative having also voice acting for most of the characters except "The Penitent One" wich has the role of Silent Protagonist;
     
   • High amount of details on the pixel art, such as clothing movement on wind, background, NPCs, enemies, breakable items and last but not least emphasizing the game's gore, you can clearly see it when the enemies are about to be executed, really visceral with loads of gooseberry jam.
     
   • Amazing soundtrack, fits perfectly the games gothic atmosphere of what could be somewhere around the Medieval Spain where the Latin language was the norm among the churces of the time or so.
   
   
2. Despite all the qualities I mentioned earlier, the game do has some minor/major problems and all gameplay related.
   
   
   • It's normal to expect plataforming on a Metroidvania game afterall, but holy s.hite, this game's plataforming caught me off guard sometimes, I could swear I made a right jump and then ending up falling to my death. Not that it's bad by any means, it's more like an extra challenge for some, you just have to be more precautious when jumping, missing a ledge by 1cm literally costs your life. Not to mention this game has Megaman syndrome wich means if touch the spikes you are gone.
     
   • On this game you can save your progress on "Prie dieus" (the game's bonfire) that's right, and just like Dark Souls not only your HP, Fervor (bar used to cast prayers) restores, but all enemies respawn again.
     
   • By killing the enemies, destroying objects or talking to some certain NPCs you aquire "Tears of Attonement" wich is your currency. Can be used to buy Quest Items at the merchant, upgrade/unlock "Mea Culpa" (your sword) abilities on the Mea Culpa Altars and also converting your HP into Fervor.
     
   • About the combat system I consider it ok, not something Devil may Cryish or Dante's Inferno-like. It's also expected from Meroidvania games to have atleast more than two or three weapons apart from your main, don't get high expectations about that, the reason is the only weapon there is in this game is your standard sword from start to finish.
     
   • Be warned that every enemy can stop your attacks animation, even the weaker ones can stop you, no matter how advanced the sword abilities might be.
     There are some abilities in wich you simply stand still (Charged Attack) uncapable of moving letting your guard exposed taking a free hit, in most of situations stick to basic attacks wich are efficient. The knockback you take from the enemies attacks is quite huge, specially projectiles, if you are near a cliff/ledge chances are you end up dying due to the fall.
     
   • One last and important advise, the map is colossal to go by foot, hence why the use of fast travels, even so if you want to go to a specific point on the map besides using the fast travel you'll still have to walk a looooong way to get there, and if you die midway, you'll be returned to the last save point you rested making the hole traveling process frustrating for many, my advice? Save oftenly.

Now the most important question you want to hear, "Should I get/buy this game or not?" If after all I said so far you are still in doubt of buying it, apart from all the mixed reviews I highly recommend you to give the game a chance, you never know. However, on my case even after getting a bit upset with the sword abilities, died a ton of times due to treacherous plataforming, regardless of what the others say I still liked of what I played and saw, definitely will play again! Now let's wait for the upcoming patches and see how things goes.

---

After a year since my last review and first playthrough, the game has got a decent amount of updates and its time to repay it a visit. So here I am once again to share my thoughts on it:

• A free DLC was added called "The Stir of Dawn" enabling a New Game + experience, with higher difficulty, tougher enemies (dealing more damage and HP), an extra lore, locations, quests, items etc. Also bringing five new bosses being the last one unlockable after defeating the privious four ones in this DLC.
  
  
• The World map went by a complete overhaul making it easier to see where things are. Now its possible to pin markers on the map to help find your destined locations and items you wish to obtain/get.
  
  
• The main church in Albero will now open its doors after defeating one of the three initial bosses ("Ten Piedad", "Our Lady of the Charred Visage" or "Tres Angustias") allowing the player to enter what seems to be an empty room with nothing but a donation box at the end. The more donations you do (in Tears of Atonement) the higher the rewards will be, ranging to new Rosary Beads, Teleportation between Prie Dieus (bonfires) wich improves the traveling system, new Skins (cosmetics), etc...
  
  
• Not to mention the correction of bugs, mostly revolving around plataforming mechanics, enemies getting stuck inside walls or freezing in place after dying. Some of these may still occur but are majorly reduced by now.
  
  
• Last but not the least, the Devs also added Spanish (Castellan) voice acting to the game helping to enhance its emmersive atmosphere during the playthrough, some enemies/characters sound more menacing than normal in Spanish, a nice touch to be honest.

Well fellas.... with everything stated above, I still higly recommend you all revisit this game even more than before due to all the content added. Time to die once again \[T]/

Wandering what would it be if Dante's Inferno (2010) became a metroidvania game? Now you have the answer, it's Blasphemous! I'll try to be as brief and honest as possible telling what I saw and experienced during my playthrough. Before anything else my entire playthrough was during "V. 1.0.6" so, if there's something missing the devs might have patched it. At this moment the game is on "V. 1.0.8" and according to the devs: [quote=Blasphemous Team]"You'll also notice that this is Patch 1, which means more patches and content updates will be on their way - launching Blasphemous doesn't mean we're finished! - Wed, 25/09/2019"[/quote] Knowing that let's get to move on to the review... [b]POST UPDATES AT THE END OF THE MAIN REVIEW[/b] [olist] [*]In terms of presentation, narrative, lore, pixel art, soundtrack, etc... the game is simply flawless, a true sight to behold. [list][*]During the entire game a part of the lore is told throughout cutscenes (all well pixelated/animated, around 7 or 8 cutscenes if I remember right) showing the events "The Penitent One" (game's protagonist) has been put in order to fufill on his journey. [*]Also some of it's lore and characters are written in the descriptions of items you find during the playthrough; Interesting narrative having also voice acting for most of the characters except "The Penitent One" wich has the role of Silent Protagonist; [*]High amount of details on the pixel art, such as clothing movement on wind, background, NPCs, enemies, breakable items and last but not least emphasizing the game's gore, you can clearly see it when the enemies are about to be executed, really visceral with loads of gooseberry jam. [*]Amazing soundtrack, fits perfectly the games gothic atmosphere of what could be somewhere around the Medieval Spain where the Latin language was the norm among the churces of the time or so.[/list] [*]Despite all the qualities I mentioned earlier, the game do has some minor/major problems and all gameplay related. [list][*]It's normal to expect plataforming on a Metroidvania game afterall, but holy s.hite, this game's plataforming caught me off guard sometimes, I could swear I made a right jump and then ending up falling to my death. Not that it's bad by any means, it's more like an extra challenge for some, you just have to be more precautious when jumping, missing a ledge by 1cm literally costs your life. Not to mention this game has Megaman syndrome wich means if touch the spikes you are gone. [*]On this game you can save your progress on "Prie dieus" (the game's bonfire) that's right, and just like Dark Souls not only your HP, Fervor (bar used to cast prayers) restores, but all enemies respawn again. [*]By killing the enemies, destroying objects or talking to some certain NPCs you aquire "Tears of Attonement" wich is your currency. Can be used to buy Quest Items at the merchant, upgrade/unlock "Mea Culpa" (your sword) abilities on the Mea Culpa Altars and also converting your HP into Fervor. [*]About the combat system I consider it ok, not something Devil may Cryish or Dante's Inferno-like. It's also expected from Meroidvania games to have atleast more than two or three weapons apart from your main, don't get high expectations about that, the reason is the only weapon there is in this game is your standard sword from start to finish. [*]Be warned that every enemy can stop your attacks animation, even the weaker ones can stop you, no matter how advanced the sword abilities might be. There are some abilities in wich you simply stand still (Charged Attack) uncapable of moving letting your guard exposed taking a free hit, in most of situations stick to basic attacks wich are efficient. The knockback you take from the enemies attacks is quite huge, specially projectiles, if you are near a cliff/ledge chances are you end up dying due to the fall. [*]One last and important advise, the map is colossal to go by foot, hence why the use of fast travels, even so if you want to go to a specific point on the map besides using the fast travel you'll still have to walk a looooong way to get there, and if you die midway, you'll be returned to the last save point you rested making the hole traveling process frustrating for many, my advice? Save oftenly.[/list] [/olist] Now the most important question you want to hear, "Should I get/buy this game or not?" If after all I said so far you are still in doubt of buying it, apart from all the mixed reviews I highly recommend you to give the game a chance, you never know. However, on my case even after getting a bit upset with the sword abilities, died a ton of times due to treacherous plataforming, regardless of what the others say I still liked of what I played and saw, definitely will play again! Now let's wait for the upcoming patches and see how things goes. [hr][/hr] [h1][b]POST UPDATES:[/b][/h1] After a year since my last review and first playthrough, the game has got a decent amount of updates and its time to repay it a visit. So here I am once again to share my thoughts on it: [list] [*]A free DLC was added called "The Stir of Dawn" enabling a New Game + experience, with higher difficulty, tougher enemies (dealing more damage and HP), an extra lore, locations, quests, items etc. Also bringing five new bosses being the last one unlockable after defeating the privious four ones in this DLC. [*]The World map went by a complete overhaul making it easier to see where things are. Now its possible to pin markers on the map to help find your destined locations and items you wish to obtain/get. [*]The main church in Albero will now open its doors after defeating one of the three initial bosses ("Ten Piedad", "Our Lady of the Charred Visage" or "Tres Angustias") allowing the player to enter what seems to be an empty room with nothing but a donation box at the end. The more donations you do (in Tears of Atonement) the higher the rewards will be, ranging to new Rosary Beads, Teleportation between Prie Dieus (bonfires) wich improves the traveling system, new Skins (cosmetics), etc... [*]Not to mention the correction of bugs, mostly revolving around plataforming mechanics, enemies getting stuck inside walls or freezing in place after dying. Some of these may still occur but are majorly reduced by now. [*]Last but not the least, the Devs also added Spanish (Castellan) voice acting to the game helping to enhance its emmersive atmosphere during the playthrough, some enemies/characters sound more menacing than normal in Spanish, a nice touch to be honest.[/list] Well fellas.... with everything stated above, I still higly recommend you all revisit this game even more than before due to all the content added. Time to die once again \[T]/