Shiness: The Lightning Kingdom (StLK) is a third-person action-RPG based in the magical yet fragile planet of Mahera. Your journeying party includes 5 members, each provided with specific tools or abilities that will allow you to progress through platforming and puzzle challenges. While the game suffers early from the shackles of its depth and pacing, fans of fantasy RPGs and gameplay similar to that of Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm will find reasons to stay around to see the conclusion.

StLK focuses on providing a collage of well-established game mechanics from different genres and is, for the most part successful. Progressing through each zone, you will need to swap between your party characters for triggering weighted switches, color coding crystals, and other activities that should be familiar tools in your gaming kit by now.

Each area often feels lofty and large, and as a result, you sometimes start to feel that they were probably against either budget or deadline issues for the first few hours of the game. Once you are about 5 hours in, you really start to see the creative and technical aspects shine. If you show this dedication, you will get through to the really good stuff.

The familiar mechanics and friendly faces make for a fun all-around experience and worth your time.


While the game blends the player experience with platforming and puzzle aspects, the reason that you come and stay for StLK is the fighting system. The level of customization is a welcome addition as well; allowing to modify the magic-types you are utilizing, equipping support skills that your allies can do on the sidelines of a fight, as well as special moves through button combinations.

As you walk through the overworld, enemies roam freely through certain areas and will initiate combat once engaged. You can crouch and sneak to achieve a back attack for a slight advantage or to move past the enemies and save time. Once initiated, combat becomes a circular arena with a colored wall matching the elemental magic types (Earth🟧, Water🟦, Fire🟥, Air🟩). You may switch out with your party members during combat, as may the enemy.

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Overall, the combat is fairly easy to understand but doesn't provide a lot of middle-ground once you progress further into the game. I've seen complaints that enemies have a polarity between easy to seriously difficult, and I think this largely can be attributed to being able to face-dive without much finesse getting started. It will ultimately evolve into a pattern of parrying the opponents' attacks for a counterattack of your own, using block/dodge to avoid magic attacks, and using your hyper attack when available for heavy damage and gap closing. It is easy to be coddled into a false sense of security as you bore your way through the early game without having to block or parry often. Hyper moves are one of the last combat-related things you will learn, several hours into the game. I did feel that the equipment, item, and skill systems had deep aspirations, which ultimately led to needless complexity. Unfortunately, I at no point felt that my skill or item builds were critical to my experience. However, these were still thoughtful additions, and allow the game to remain casual and fun.


The story can be a lot to take in without much explanation, so you have every permission to be confused. As the premise is presented to you, there are these planetary islands called Meteora. Our main protagonist Chado (pronounced "Shadow") meets a Shiness (a mysterious being with elemental magic) while grieving the death of his mother. The Shiness mentions the Lands of Life, which causes Chado to hatch a plan to build a flying machine with his buddy Poky and leave their Meteora to bring back his mother. This leads to a crash landing and the beginning of our story, which lands them in the middle of a conflict between kingdoms.

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All of that is a lot of wind-up to say that the story can sometimes become frantic and requires a certain amount of whimsy. Try not to come in with too many preconceived notions and research and just go along for the ride.

My PC Specifications:

Intel i9 9900K 4.8GHz
16GB DDR4000 RAM
GeForce GTX 1080ti
2550x1440 Resolution

StLK does not provide many advanced options for graphics. With the above configuration and highest settings, 60FPS was easily maintained throughout. AA is about as fancy as it gets in this department!

This isn't the type of game where polygons and geometry are brimming out of your GPU. It would rather spend its time on being stylistic through its vibrant and beautiful cell-shading. The characters are unique and memorable, yet all too familiar with their fuzzy anthropomorphic faces that will remind you of the simpler days of gaming.

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The soundtrack is really good, arguably one of the best parts of the game. Composed by Hazem Hawash, it could easily be found adorning a much higher budget title. There is even a bonus track from Hiroki Kikuta (known for Secret of Mana). Overall, the music acts as an amazing soundscape for the experience.

The voice acting is few and far between and can leave some to be desired. Overall, I would say that it still rates above average in the grander landscape of RPGs of this type, especially as an Indie title. Sound effects were on point and delivered the expected results.

It will be clear that the game has its fair share of bugs, many of which relate to terrain meshing issues, in my experience. I didn't ever have any issues so bad that I was falling through the floor or similar, it is just that your character's collision always feels a little off with the geometry of each level.

The only aspects that could truly test your patience will be the controls just feeling a little finicky and dated. Your characters inertia going into jumps can be strange, and the platforming challenges are sometimes due more to the systems than the design.


StLK has some rough edges, but if you can hold tight and see it's an ambitious vision, you will certainly enjoy your time. The game provides for an endearing indie experience with an artistic vision that often reminds me of older Atlas JRPGs. Hang tight through the first couple of hours and you'll be rewarded for your time.

I would recommend this game to those who enjoy games like Spyro or Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm and enjoy casual action RPGs.