Lucah: Born of a Dream

All I can say is, beautiful, absolutely beautiful. Please for the love of anyone support this developer and play this game.

Love the game. Still have no clue what's going on half the time.

"at the heart of the world there is a trauma." truly one of the best games i've ever played. it's surrealist gold that can stand on equal grounds with the genre's greatest. the story had me sobbing more than once, and the delivery of the game's themes of despair, isolation, and the need for absolution hit me incredibly hard. you can tell how personal this story is to the creator, how much of it reflects their real life, pains, and traumas. i don't think you can depict these things so accurately if you haven't lived them yourself. the game's art style perfectly captures the feeling of desolation that oozes from this game, with horribly emotional moments depicted only as scribbles, and nightmarish scenes where you can't even tell what you are seeing. and the music is absolutely incredible, it's haunting and harsh and it accompanies the art style perfectly. this game is truly inspirational in so many ways as an artist. the gameplay is fast and punchy and fun but frankly it could have been a walking simulator and my opinion of the game wouldn't change a bit, it's the least of my priorities when it comes to gushing about how great this game is. i can see this game not being for everyone, it's incredibly intense that's for sure, both in it's overall vibe and it's themes, and surrealism isn't everyone's cup of tea. but if you are into either of those things and don't need your art to fully 'make sense' then absolutely 1000% buy this. i got through all of the story in about 12 hours, as i used cheats to get through NG+ which was too difficult for my tastes. buy this game. it's the type of art that's so incredible it feels wrong to not share it with someone

This game just oozes style. And even when you just thought you did everything, I promise you, you didn't. A must play for any one who loves souls likes and stories that make you think for hours.

После прохождения и забега на НГ+ с коррупционной концовкой скорее не доволен и не рекомендую игру, но не все так плохо. [h1] Что понравилось [/h1] [h2] Музыка [/h2] Самая сильная сторона игры. Уровни / главы здесь называются Трэками. Сложно сказать, что это по жанру. Какой-то техно эмбиент нойз. Уютный и поглощающий. Мрачный. С некоторых треков ловил слуховые галлюцинации по итогу. Это жутковато, но прикольно. [h2] Визуальный стиль [/h2] Он узнаваемый и выглядит... провокационно. Хорошо гармонирует с музыкой историей. Отлично работает на атмосферу. [h2] Сеттинг [/h2] Эджи подростки сражаются с чем-то ради чего-то. Ноют и рефлексируют. Все это вокруг около оккультной, религиозной темы: пушки здесь зовутся "Парадигмами". В настройках сложности модификатор наносимого урона это "Грех", получаемый урон - "Наказание". Демоны, фамильяры, церковники, Мессия, шкала "порочности" - вокруг всего этого вертится повествование. [h1] Что не понравилось [/h1] [h2] Геймплей [/h2] В местном графоне часто не понятно куда идти. Ты постоянно на таймере при этом - медленно, но неумолимо накапливается шкала corruption. Значительно сильнее она копится когда умираешь или используешь местный devil trigger. Еще здесь как в солс лайках бегаешь от чекпоинтов, где сохраняешься и прокачиваешься. Менеджеришь "выносливость" и полоску "магии", пьешь бутылочку, паррируешь и "идеально уклоняешься". Это душно. [h2] Боевая система [/h2] Ни смотря на разнообразие пушек-парадигм, перемотку времени на начало боя, разные атаки прожектайлами от фамильяров, весь бой сводиться к тому, что лучше бы бить заряженной атакой зажатого Y и уклонениями. Чем ближе к атаке врага это делаешь, тем лучше. По настоящему урон наносишь только когда враг оглушен паррированиями, уклонениями или силой рандома. При этом нужно постоянно помнить за полоску маны и выносливости. Прямо в меню экипировки можно включить "Моды" отключающие расход стамины, маны, лимит расходников и ослабляющие врагов. Без стамины и маны играется бодрее и лучше, но это ощущается странно. [h2] Сюжет [/h2] Спроси меня, кто все эти люди и что на самом деле происходит в игре, за первое прохождение я так и не понял. Грустные детишки дерутся и рефлексируют. И все это аллюзия на подростковое взросление и всякие "вписочные" интриги или коррумпированость католической церкви? Я не знаю. [h2] Визуальный стиль [/h2] Да, он играет на атмосферу, но выглядит однообразно и не помогает в поисках пути выходов с локаций. [h1] TLDR [/h1] Не уверенный в себе солс лайк, нарисованный карандашом. Грустные эджи детишки ходят бродят, бьют каракули и друг друга заряженной атакой и парированиями. Музыка крутая и психоделичная. Со стороны выглядит интересно, но играется душно и однообразно. Если войти в состояние потока то какое-то удовольствие получить можно, но в целом не рекомендую.

This is the sort of game I wanted to like but didn't quite get there. It is an overhead game with an emphasis on dodging, parrying, sustaining a combo and breaking enemy defense as core mechanics and is set in a surreal dream like world. The fights and combos can actually be quite satisfying and fun to pull off. My main gripes with the game are twofold. The first is that the game presents a bleak narrative experience that is just over the top and unrelenting to the point of almost being a parody of it's own intention. I do respect the creator's vision but this just fell wide from the mark for me as there are only so many scripted sequences of characters tormenting themselves verbally ("I can't feel any pain" , "I am falling" , " I feel nothing") with convoluted metaphors that I can stomach before I start rolling my eyes and start feeling exasperated. My genuine thought as I was playing the game is that the monologues felt like they were lifted from a depressed goth teenager's diary or somesuch. The second is specifically to do with the dodge/dash/parry mechanic. This works reliably most of the time but seemed to fail occassionally for unclear reasons which feels aggravating in a game so centered around dodging and which can punish you so heavily for failing it. It also felt to me that for a game where you can projectiles and attacks coming at you regularly from all directions the game was very stingy with the stamina bar and the number of consecutive attacks and dashes that you could accomplish (to be fair there were equippable items that could ameliorate this quite a bit). I did make a decent attempt to complete the game ( the first run-through apparently doesn't grant you the full story and you need to finish a timed verison of NG+ to get the more complete or good ending apparently). However, the final straw was when I failed my first attempt at NG+ and the game started an unskippable and lengthy end-credits which was just far too much annoyance for me.

The dialogue reads like it was written by a Bernie Sanders voter that didn't like their parents. Thematically it's really cool, and some of the combat/encounters are enjoyable, but everything in the game world looks identical and non-descript, and the camera's always too zoomed-in, so navigation and exploration is confusing and un-fun. Control's also constantly taken away whenever you beat most rooms, which gets old fast. May give it another try, but I'm probably gonna refund it. You may like this game if you're a Redditor that doesn't like their parents, and thinks Dark Souls is hard.