I am once again wishing we had a neutral rather than binary yes/no for Steam Reviews.
I feel bad giving a review so early into my playing of a game, however the more I stewed on my thoughts, the more I realised I just wasn't having fun. The below were my thoughts at 3.5 hours, and while I may pick Verho up again, I think the core take away for me was it was a poor man's moden King's Field; the more I play Verho, the more I feel its lacking a polish that Lunacid had.
Sure, Verho has voice acting, and its pretty good voice acting, while Lunacid doesn't, but its missing a certain polish in the combat that Lunacid had. While Lunacid let you hold and build your attack, Verho expects a lot more perfect timing from you. Which means there is a greater skill ceiling than Lunacid ever could have. Combine this with weapons seeming to scale more in line with Dark Souls with some weapons scaling A in Strength and C in Dexterity, the combat feels a bit... I don't know the word to describe this right now, but not as enjoyable. Both have strafe attacking like that of King's Field, alongside adjusting where you're looking to ensure you hit but maybe it comes down to the enemies.
I have tried the random mode - Oh my God, I am not ready! - so I have seen a variety of enemies outside of the starting areas I've visited on my main playthrough. Once you're outside the starting area, also while within the starting area for an optional boss, the enemies start doing weird things. One telegraphed move from one of the early bosses shows up in those random enemies I mentioned earlier where there is a windup, and then BOOM! Area of Attack on the ground. So you naturally would jump to avoid it, yeah? But that's the thing, the timing on it feels bad - like you jump when it lands (take damage), and you land a few seconds after the attack hits the ground (take damage) - almost like the timing window is buggy or incomplete. In fact, one of those randomised enemies I jumped up to high ground to avoid getting hit. It hit anyway. So I stayed on the ground - it stil hit. So I jumped. It didn't hit the first time, but the second time.
Another gripe would be the environmental hazards or enemies like the bats and mites. They're meant to be mild inconveniences, but can inflict bleed on you. They also take 1/4th and 1/8th of your health in damage on the Crusader starting class respectively. And the way they move is not great. You must simultaneously back away and swing to hit them without being hit yourself for both. With the mites constantly hitting you in a forward march, only turning if they are hit (and only sometimes) and can lead to a death by a thousand tiny bites because the mite didn't run away, and you stil need to charge up your attack to be able to hit the enemy for more than 1-10 damage (normally 50 or more depending on your weapon). Meanwhile the bats do more damage and fly off, encouraging ranged attacks...or back stepping.
Back to the environments...the reason I'm not feeling them is they're small, and have environmental damage that happens after I've been over the environment and taken no damage, with the first example being the poison swap where you can fetch a ring. The swamp moves up and down. I notice this, and wait to see what happens as I stand on a platform that moves gradually upward, completely engulfing the platform. Okay, cool, I've just learned that the environment is somewhat safe to stand on. Next time I do the exact same thing, instant death. Something similar happens in a lava cave. I jump across, can see I'm standing on the lava environment, I'm fine. I go to make a jump from one rock to the next and make it? You better believe that's instant death. In the Temple in the Secret Halls, there is a portal. I stand on it, once more nothing happens. I'm low on health, have a level to spend, and really want to try that greatsword in my inventory with 1 more stat in Strength before I can use it, so I take the path I took to get there and step over the portal and I can only assume this is what damaged me gradually because the area was completely annihilated of enemies earlier.
So yeah, all my deaths have felt cheap, and not deserved.
Music is not inspiring to be honest. Fitting, but not great; a Dark Souls tier soundtrack, which is to say...just a good soundtrack at best. If I come away not wanting to listen to it independently, and would not be able to enjoy the music outside the games environment, its not a great soundtrack in my opinion.
Also, the main character grunts at everything, and its at least not the hyper sexual sounding male character from Dark Souls, but its not pleasant. I could turn it off, but then I wouldn't know that I'm taking damage from the environment for an unknown reason.
I'll also touch back to the voices here; they are good, not great like a lot Verho - Curse of Faces is. But a good voice actor is so much better than a mediocre voice actor, even without proper direction. What I have heard sounds well directed and well paced, alongside properly mixed voices. I hope that the developers Kasur Games learn a lot from this game here because they're [i]so[/i] close to having great voice actin.
Another minor greivance is the awful head bob. You can't turn it off, even with the setting that allegedly turns off head bobbing. [b]So if you're suseptible to motion sickness, do not come near this game.[/b]
So where does that leave me?
I don't know. Maybe I'll finish it at some point at a later date, or maybe I won't. Not really sure, because its got a lot more polish than KIng's Field (which I yearn for) but its stil not quite enough to reach that Lunacid itch. Like I feel like there should be more to explore; more secrets to find...and yet I'm coming up short. So yeah...we'll see.
[b]Who is this game for?[/b]
Definitely recommending it if you like King's Field, Lunacid, Dark Souls, Demons Souls, Elden RIng, but also a buyer beware sort of situation. Same for those who enjoy metroidvanias like Hollow Knight, Blasphemous, Salt & Sanctuary as I strongly hold the belief that there is a lot in common with Dark Souls and Demons Souls ethos in a 3D environment games like Verho and these particular metroidvanias. I can easily see you enjoying this as a first time foray into this type of RPG.
I'd also probably give a minor recommendation for those who enjoyed The Elder Scrolls games, Dread Delusion, and Kristala, as while Verho is much smaller in scale compared to those, the combat feels closer to those games, and also has the aesthetic charm of some of them (Morrowind and Dread Delusion in particular).
[b]Who is this game not for?[/b]
If you don't like stiff combat ala The Elder Scrolls, or are not a fan of janky head bobbling, I'd absolutely stay away from the game.
I'd also not recommend it for people who aren't fans of modern systems like deaths costing progress rather than being a semi-checkpoint system.
[b]Who is this a wild card game for?[/b]
My wild card recommendation is Ultima Underworld and The Legend of Grimrock of all things, specifically for the atmosphere. They're not very similar in gameplay or aesthetics, but there was something about Verho that makes me think of these games in a good way.
[b]Closing Thoughts[/b]
Verho - Curse of Faces is a game that captures some but not all of the things I'm looking for in a 3D dark fantasy game. It is a strong contender to scratch the itch for a modernised King's Field style of game, but unfortunately comes up lacking if you've placed other games in a similar vein more recently.
Its not a bad game by any stretch of the imagination, but it is a bit lacking compared to others more recently released.
Kasur Games did a good job with Verho - Curse of Faces, but its just that; a good game.
