This week’s genre-mashup is the Roguelike Soulslike. Here you can dodge and block, as well as perform light and heavy attacks as you make your way through levels of interesting, varied enemies complete with “Door does not open from this side” shortcuts — all while collecting “Seeds” from various divine beings that give you bleed chance, revives, defence-on-hit and the like. So far so predictable, but that makes it all the more painful that Serpent’s Gaze has some of the best Soulslike level and enemy design in the indie scene…
After a brief tutorial going over the basic attack variety of Serpent’s Gaze, you’re plopped into a quaint desert hub, a mysterious portal-like door at the far edge. Here you can change class and weapon (which are independent choices, for maximum build variety) as well as connect with other players for multiplayer. There’s no tedious summoning system here, simply join the lobby and start a level together.
Classes and weapons with drastically different vibes
From the off, Serpent’s Gaze is promising. The sheer volume of classes and weapons already meets the level of some of the more competent roguelikes out there, and defeating certain enemies unlocks even more to play with.
You starting build is made up of two things:
- Your class. This gives you your base attributes which are used for scaling, as well as one unique ability per class. The Trickster that I favoured could hurl a fireball, for example, while the default starting class could raise a damage-buffing tree in an area.
- Your weapon. This gives you your base moveset for light attacks, one unique heavy attack, and one unique special attack. One example is the twin swords which fire off arcs when you do a heavy attack, and teleport you when you use the special. Another is the fire greatsword which has an overhead heavy attack, while the special will continue attacking over and over until you’re out of stamina.
Mixing and matching class abilities with weapon choices boasts an impressively diverse set of builds. Upgrades are flavourful and actually represented in game. For example, changing your heavy attack with the starting greatsword to deal 200% more damage but not pierce does actually change the projectile into a single bolt instead of a sweeping arc. During one run I was building stacks to turn enemies into trees, and the death animation was reminiscent of Death Blight from Elden Ring. It’s all gloriously soulful.
So where does it all go wrong?
Soulslike DNA executed beautifully, then buried…
Within the first few levels it’s clear to see the level designer is accustomed to Souls games, and more than that actually knows how to create the same vibe without straight up copying. Levels are generally linear, but with branching off-shoots and little closed loops for extra combat and exploration. I never felt lost, but also always had areas to look at, go back to and explore further.
After a short stint of desert town and a little meander through some caves, you arrive at a courtyard with large marbled pillars and a greatsword-wielding brute. Atop the pillars are archers, who you can send tumbling down after destroying the pillars. This is a nice touch, albeit a little underbaked as it stands (One hit will destroy the pillar, rather than it having a health bar or needing a certain size of weapon).
Once you’ve cleaned up these ruffians you can hoist a large gate which links back to the start of the town. Practically, this means you can now get from the town entrance to this miniboss without having to go through those dingy caves…
However, the shortcut closes between runs. This is a roguelike, don’t forget, and permanent progress is restricted only to weapon and class unlocks rather than changes inside levels. With no reason in the same run to ever need to backtrack, shortcuts like these feel woefully out of place. They’re well placed, well designed and thematically fit the worlds…but they have absolutely 0 purpose inside the game.
Note: Just before this review was uploaded, the devs at Feeble Minds patched shortcuts to stay open permanently between runs. This added element of permanent progression elevates the experience immeasurably, and is a good sign of fixes and tweaks to come.
Punishing deaths without player choice
The levels being so interesting might be seen as a good thing in a soulslike. In this roguelike state, though, you repeat them too much for that interest to stick around. Bear in mind there’s no randomisation in the level layout, only the enemies within. There’s also no randomisation in the order you play levels, as they are laid out logically inside a coherent world (Sound familiar…?). All these design choices make an incredible Soulslike. But in a roguelike?
The main difference is the punishment of death. In a traditional souls game you’re losing currency and going to a checkpoint. Roguelikes don’t have checkpoints. This means you’re back to square 1, with basically nothing to show for it, and any excitement to go back and try again will shortly be quashed as you were three levels deep into a run and now have to trudge through the first two levels again for the privilege of another attempt at what killed you.
Sure, Hades works the same way if you die to the final boss, but that game has multiple overlapping dialogue progressions, weapon unlocks, run modifiers, boss configurations and a fast-paced loop that keeps you hungry.
In Serpent’s Gaze, on the other hand, there’s no respect for the player’s time or any real player choice as to what to do after a failure. There’s only so much that changing a class or weapon does, and that first desert town starts to feel like a punishing chore rather than an interesting gameplay section. The ability to start from a further level but at the cost of an extra curse would at least give players the choice to try and continue where they left off, or practice more for a “Full” run later.
Even just allowing those in-level shortcuts such as the town gate to stay open between runs would facilitate infinitely more playability. As it stands, the whole system is just too repetitive. And that’s coming from a fan of Survivors games…
Classic co-op moments and joyful exploration
Once you’re past a boss and in a new level all the joy floods back. Not only are there unique post-boss events that add some much-needed spice to runs, but the new levels themselves are unique and engaging.
I fondly remember one level that is simply a giant bridge, and all the while you’re being assailed by humongous arrows from the next bridge along. There are interior segments, sections atop the bridge and jumping puzzles on woodwork underneath as well. The traversal, enemy and environmental threat variety make this level alone one of the best indie Soulslike experiences I’ve ever had, which is why it being stuck behind that damn first town level every run is all the more frustrating.
Another example is an encounter in the first town level. You round a corner and enter a room filled with what look like balloons with wide-grinning faces. Oh, and they’re holding spears. Their little chirps and erratic movements when they die (In basically one hit, the poor things) makes the whole encounter a wonder. The surprise, the panic, and hilarity of victory. It’s just a shame we do the same encounter every single run, and the brilliant design loses its edge…
I can envision a game where these levels seamlessly link and create a single world, where roguelike mechanics such as the seed buffs are moved onto armour pieces and equipment you can find in the world or farm enemies for. Exploring this game, facing these unique challenges and enjoying the level design would be so much easier if all the roguelike guff was removed. It’s a blast to uncover Serpent’s Gaze’s levels in co-op, and the shortcuts within levels even seem to imply that this was meant to be a coherent soulslike, but then the roguelike elements are completely at-odds with that design.
After the short Kingsfield-esque experience Fly Knight was one of my fiance’s and mine’s favourite games of recent years, I can just taste the potential for Serpent’s Gaze to be that good.
A strong start to early access that will help carve its identity
I can’t say what direction early access will take Serpent’s Gaze, but I hope one of two things — I hope that either it fully commits to roguelike design and creates a randomisation element for levels, with less repetition and more meaningful roguelike decisions.
Or, I hope that it drops the roguelike elements entirely. The bridge level design alone is enough to make Serpent’s Gaze stand as a souslike without the crutch of also being a roguelike, and it’s a shame to see that talented level design squandered.
Either way, Serpent’s Gaze is one to keep an eye on. If this early access content is anything to go by then the devs at Feeble Minds are truly capable of something genre-defining in the co-op landscape.
Serpent’s Gaze is available now on Steam
