Bleak Faith: Forsaken Reviews

Good game. Does what the label says it does. Feel like it had a rough launch and maybe should have had another 6 months to cook. An unfortunate news cycle that was beyond the control of the devs I think also tarnished it, but I think this games deserves a lot better than it got. The updates and fixes have now got it in a pretty good spot and I look forward to whatever future projects come from this team. My only criticism; it's not that performant on steamdeck or other handheld devices. The game runs well-ish on desktop, but there is clearly still some optimisation at the low end that was left on the table.

this game is great, some aspects are a little janky and it has the tendency to lag once every couple hours but the game is beautiful and really makes you want to explore. There is so much to see in this game and each area has its own immense charm. Combat is fine, not as polished as some games... but you are able to upgrade any weapons/armor easily and swap between different things without a stat reset which is nice. I think this is also out on ps5, i bet it wouldn't have the lagging problem that seems to show up from time to time on pc.

This is a personal favorite, it’s not the most polished game, but it’s kinda visually stunning. The design of the bosses and the overall environment of the game is such a trip, you can literally explore everything and it’s great. I love getting lost in the Omnistructure. The combat isn’t the most fluid but it has come a looong way. I really enjoyed this game and I really want to see more. I top my hat to the developers for making the perfect nightmare.

I'm gonna give this game a positive review, but at the time of writing, I didn't finish it and probably won't. It has a *lot* going for it. I made it almost to the end (Mirage), but the annoyances just stacked up too high and I just don't care anymore. The armor, weapons, skills, and environments are really cool. I'd have liked a lot more color, but whatever. Controls are kinda jank, but I knew that going in and it wasn't a problem. The boss fights were still pretty fun, and the rank and file enemies aren't a problem at all The exploration was really good, but a map would have been a nice addition. I liked wandering around, but there are a few spots that are just, "Oh, you missed this one tiny hallway? Welp, an entire zone was back there." Idk what's going on with the story, but that's fine. In the end, what killed it most for me was the wiiiiiildly unbalanced encounters. I'd be in a zone, literally one-shotting normal enemies, only to have some big dude fly out of nowhere and delete 75% of my health with one swing, while I'm just chipping away at his. Like, am I supposed to be in this area right now or not!? Most of the game seemed fine, but as it went on, I just felt less and less powerful, despite upgrading and gemming my gear accordingly. The deaths felt cheap. In the end, the desert annoyed me so much, and the boss of the mirage is straight up irritating with no redeeming qualities (aside from looking extra cool.) It was the last straw. I'll just watch a video of the end of the game and call it a day I had fun with it for a while and I don't regret getting it, but pressing on and beating it would just be me doing so for the sake of it.

Good game, different compared to other souls-like games. Worth try becuse it was made by three Devs, soundtracks are amusing, graphics and environments are attractive and overall an indie that deserves support as well as the developers. You might consider getting it on sale, however, full price is okay for almos 48 exploration+100 completition without issues, glitches, crashes. There are cons, but are minor e.g. map layout designs, too much waste of space, lack of coherence and cohition of lore, however this work was influenced by a manga. Search for yourself. Recommended, but swipe away you thoughts from ER, DS and many more games alike before playing this one. Enjoy.

This is a truely strange souls like. I will say i enjoyed the time I spent playing this game but it wasnt made well enough for the combat to be engaging. Your mostly just cheese enemies in on cycle or die to a strange hitbox. I would recommend this game to someone who wants to look at it from a artist point of view because the art and design is amazing and truely unique but the gameplay just in there

Bleak Faith is a tentative recommendation for hardcore fans of the genre. It is a unique Soulslike that has a distinct artistic flavor, some interesting ideas, and a great amount of ambition. The limitations of a three person dev team are evident, and it is certainly rough around the edges. However, there is something worthwhile here for patient Souls fans. Pros: + Aesthetic: 3D art, music, overall atmosphere and presentation are great and give the game a strong identity. If you like the sound of wandering alone through a decaying futuristic cityscape while melancholy post-rock plays, then this game is for you. If it clicks, this will be one of the main things that keeps you going. The levels all look beautiful, and there is a nice sense of variety to them. + Build Progression: There is a satisfying amount of depth and variety to build customization. Once I got a sense of how things worked I got really invested in my build. Perks and skills offer an immediate punch and can change how you play. There are plenty of options to make your build feel unique. Fleshing out a build as much as possible kept me around for NG+. + Overall item variety: Weapons have distinct move-sets with unique passives and abilities, there is a large amount of armor to pick up and fashion-Souls with, and accessory slots often have punchy effects that provide even more build flexibility. I also like the frequency you find cool new items at. + Systems: Crafting and armor gems add even more depth and variety. + World Changes: As primary objectives are completed and bosses are killed, more challenging enemies appear throughout the game. They also have unique drops, including armor and more valuable resources. This was an enjoyable feature. Negatives: - Lacking sound design: it's evident that this didn't get the same attention as other artistic aspects (the limitations of a three man team to be sure). But it hits you in the face *immediately*, and does the boss/enemy designs a disservice. - Lacking animation smoothing: animations serve the purpose, but there is an evident lack of smoothing, especially with movement, which can be jerky and awkward. This and the sound design are what give the game a sense of "jank" that has to be stomached from time to time. - Rough start: I found the first 30-40 minutes to be fairly rough. The first level has too much non-linearity, and too many paths and corners that do not progress forward. There are also an abundance of janky collision catches that make the the first level one of the worst in the game. - The levels are just too large (a common complaint). Across the board most levels could afford to be about 20-30% smaller, maybe more for some of the sprawling areas. There are some levels with some tight design though, such as the asylum, which was my personal favorite. - Mobius blade: Personally, I did not like this mechanic. It feels poorly used, and turns fighting large enemies into a repetitive slog. I admire the intention, and it was fun to use for one boss near the end of the game. However, it made me avoid killing large enemies for most of my playthrough. Other/neutral: • You get an abundance of healing items/loot from enemies. The flipside is that you get very few heals in combat. Once you kill all nearby enemies, your heals replenish. While you can upgrade it, you will have a max of 2 heals for a significant portion of game time, and this can feel abysmally small once you start encountering real challenges. The system is not perfect. However, it does make exploring the world feel unique and harrowing, and allows the world to be as large as it is with so few checkpoints. (In addition: you can place one checkpoint to respawn at between normal checkpoints) • Entropy is a stat that increases with each death. At a large amount of deaths (I think 400?) your character is permanently deleted. This is an absolutely crazy mechanic. However, most people seem to ignore it and do not get anywhere close to max entropy. In a follow-up I would absolutely love to see more things play off this mechanic. • There is a secret boss at the end of the game that you only get one life to reach and kill. After that, you're booted to the normal ending... Like entropy, this is bewildering. But you have to admire the tenacity of it. In a future game I fear they will make a secret boss capable of permanently killing your character. (And in a weird way I would love to see it) • The story is interesting, strange, and near incomprehensible. Crazy sh*t happens at the end. On one hand, this isn't a big issue—it is a Soulslike after all. But I wonder if the game could afford to throw the player a few extra bones to help clue them into what's going on. On the other hand, I think the obtuseness and density of the writing give it a kind of charm. I would rather have a boldly weird story than a generic one. I also admire the effort put into the journals found throughout the game. • Small but appreciated detail: Enemies drop each piece of their set one time only. This means you will not have an inventory flooded with boots and gloves if you want an armor set. The drop rate also seems decently high, so little farming is necessary to acquire the pieces you want. Conclusion and wants for the future: Overall, I enjoyed my time with this game and will remember it fondly. I really hope that the devs grow their team and continue on this path. With improved animation and sound design, and a bit more polish, a follow-up could stand up to the best Soulslikes. Other wants: • More modes of attacks: jumping attacks, back stabs, visceral attacks, etc. • More modes of traversal: Elevators and ladders are nice, but you made such a vast world. I would love to see more creative or original means of traversal, perhaps even some unlocked with progression, perks, or skills. • Multiplayer: Perhaps an unrealistic want, but this alone would greatly extend my game time. There is so much wonderful depth to builds, I would love the opportunity to celebrate it with co-op or pvp.

This game definitely exceeded my expectations. It's been on my radar ever since its first announcement and I was planning on getting it when it came out, but decided not to due to the mediocre reviews. Now that it has gotten a bunch of updates and improvements however, I decided to check back on it, saw the "very positive" score and thought, why not? As it stands now, I can definitely recommend Bleak Faith to anyone that is a fan of souls-likes, Nihei's manga such as Blame and those who can put up with a little bit of jank. The fact that this game was developed and put together by only 3 people is an achievement in and of itself, but making it as engaging and interesting as it is, is honestly a feat. Not only does the game look amazing, granted it is a bit outdated in terms of visual fidelity but it makes up for it with its incredible world design and atmosphere, it also plays really well. The level design is also fantastic, ranging from tight, multi-layered, futuristic skyscrapers and alleyways to vast landscapes, ancient cities and everything in-between. In addition to that, believe it or not, it runs extremely well, granted I'm using a 4070 Super, but locking the game at 90fps, I have never experienced a single frame drop or stutter, unless it was loading another area. If you're put off by the trailers and gameplay videos, it plays a lot better than it looks. You got parries, dodges, a bunch of different weapon classes that all feel unique and are fun to use, bows, magic, pretty much whatever you want. The armor and upgrade systems are all very well thought out and feel quite rewarding and it never feels like you're stagnating at any point throughout your playthrough. This game definitely excels at presenting itself, delivering a fantastic atmosphere and enjoyable combat, but it does have some issues. As mentioned, the game can be quite janky at times, though that's to be expected considering it was made by a tiny indie-studio. Not that it makes this point any less valid, it's just something to be considered and to be aware of. Basically you might occasionally find an enemy stuck in a wall or your character getting stuck on a ledge here and there, but I haven't encountered any game breaking bugs or glitches, or any that were so severe that I had to reload a save. Another smaller issue is the lack of enemy variety. I don't think it's a huge problem as the combat and weapon variety somewhat makes up for it, but just a handful more enemies would have been quite welcome. The story is also extremely cryptic, which if you've played souls-likes or read any of Nihei's work is to be expected, but I genuinely couldn't tell you what it is about after beating it and reading through all the text logs. All in all, I think "Bleak Faith Forsaken" is absolutely worth buying in 2025 and a great experience despite its flaws. 8/10

Completed New Game ++ with 100% achievements. Incredibly fun combat and rewarding exploration. The developers have come a long way to fixing the game through community feedback, and it definitely shows in the quality. Fantastic build variety, a lot of perks, abilities, weapons and armor synergize with one another. Maps are massive, feels like you're wandering through someone's fever dream. Story and lore is engaging, and the final area of the game is hauntingly beautiful. Gameplay rewards thoughtful allocation of attributes and gear customization as well as skillful readings of enemy telegraphs to block or dodge attacks. Boss fights are frightening and well-designed. Starting out may feel a bit daunting considering you lack the experience and gear to put together a good build. The beginning zones are a great introduction to the mechanics to ease you into the combat system. The game really starts to pick up steam around a quarter through when you can start customizing different statistics of your character through gear, gems, perks, and attributes. New Game Plus is where the game really shines if you put together a good build, or if you want to try something different they provide you a potion to respec your perks. Amazing game, time and money well spent. Looking forward to future projects from the developers.

(Follow [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/42150626-Jarl%27s-Game-Treasury/]my curator[/url] for more reviews like this) Bleak Faith: Forsaken is one of the most awe-inspiring games I have ever played. In many regards, it's a janky mess, and the story is even more cryptic than any FromSoftware game. When a certain NPC told me that she had no idea what was going on, all I could think was "Me too, girl." But the sheer ambition and scale behind it more than makes up for its flaws. I have played hundreds, if not thousands of games in my life. Countless mods for various games - Doom, Quake, Thief levels. My Steam library contains over 5000 games. And yet I have never experienced anything like Bleak Faith: Forsaken before. It intrigued me with its mysteries, pulled me in with its immense world, and will certainly stick with me for a long time. Bleak Faith: Forsaken is what happens when Dark Souls and BLAME! meet on a trip to the Balkans and have a baby there. The game's most impressive feature is the world design. I'd describe it as Byzantine Brutalism, mixing elements of gothic medieval and mediterranean architecture with brutalist concrete. The game takes place in what is referred to as the Omnistructure, a huge ever-expanding structure of disparate elements that connect into a convoluted maze of half-finished buildings that don't seem to serve any practical purpose. If you ever read the manga BLAME!, you can clearly see the inspiration this game took from it. Other than the game NaissanceE, which is also available here on Steam, Bleak Faith: Forsaken is the closest thing to replicating the vibe of that manga in computer game form. I often found myself staring in awe at the impossibly huge structures the game presents. It truly is a visually impressive spectacle, and when it comes to sheer scale, I don't think there's anything else like it. Towers rise many kilometers into the sky, connected by impossibly long bridges. Objects that look like they're just backdrops on the horizon turn out to be places you can actually walk to. The downside of the world design is that sometimes, it can take quite a while to traverse these huge distances, but the sheer awe this sense of scale inspires more than makes up for it. There are many games that are larger than this - your average Ubisoft open world, for example, or a proper open world RPG like Morrowind. Yet even the largest game worlds out there don't hold a candle to the sheer scale of a single structure that Bleak Faith: Forsaken conveys. It truly feels like you're exploring a cutout of the megastructure in BLAME!, and I absolutely love it for that. If you like exploration, this game is for you. You're going to fall in love with its strange, complex, convoluted, unexplained world and the many nooks and crannies you can crawl into. Gameplay-wise, it's a janky but solid Souls-like. There are a handful of boss fights, but they're not particularly hard (I died about a dozen times in the hardest ones, but usually in Dark Souls and its clones it takes me 20+ attempts to get through a boss so this one is clearly easier). Combat is very responsive, to the point that you can dodge-roll out of an attack animation, so you have to pay less attention to timing than in other games of this genre. Character building is pretty straightforward: there are 4 attributes to spend your skillpoints on, and killing bosses grants you perk essence which you can invest into up to 4 perks which give your character a passive buff. My favorite of these is vampirism, which makes you regenerate health in proportion to damage you deal. Every perk can be upgraded once to make it even more powerful and versatile. It's a cool system that allows for a variety of builds while also forcing you to specialize. Additionally, you can enhance your equipment with stones that add certain bonuses; the amount of these stones you can slot into an item depends on item level, and items are upgraded by a character just like how blacksmiths do it in Dark Souls. This allows for even more customization, and makes armor useful even for players who go for an agile dodge playstyle, as your armor can be enhanced with several passive effects. The controls are very fluid and responsive. Initially, movement felt a little too slippery for me, as if my character had soap on his boots, but once I got used to it I really liked how fluid it was. The game plays perfectly on mouse & keyboard, and was indeed designed with those in mind, unlike other Souls-likes which were designed for controllers and then sloppily ported to PC. The keyboard layout is quite reasonable, with one exception - why the hell did they make caps lock the button to open your inventory?! Other than that, the default layout is great, and you get 4 quick-use slots for potions, which can be used with the 1-4 number keys. The enemy variety is pretty cool. Most of them are humanoid, but there's a few interesting monsters and robots to fight, too. Some of them hit quite hard and require you to stay on your toes. Giant enemies are particularly interesting: you first have to cripple their legs, then climb on their back and stab them with a knife until they die, reminiscent of the enemy climbing in Dragon's Dogma. Combat itself is combo-focused, if you chain attacks together properly, you can deal a lot more damage and it costs less stamina to attack. The story is told through some journal entries you can find while exploring, as well as NPC dialog. And most of it is even more cryptic than your average Souls game, so you have to do a lot of figuring out on your own. Or just explore, enjoy the vibe, and accept that you're only going to understand half of it. All you need to know is that there's an anomaly which everyone is trying to get to, and so do you. The main selling point of the game is the world design and exploration. And for me, this is the most important aspect of any game, especially a Souls-like. Bleak Faith: Forsaken has a fascinating and unique world that will pull you in and make you want to explore more of it until you reach the end. A truly fascinating visual spectacle unlike any other. Trust me, you'll never see anything of this sheer gigantic scale in any other computer game. And for that alone, I can fully, thoroughly recommend it. There's no other game in this genre that reminded me as much of the original Dark Souls as this. Bleak Faith: Forsaken *gets it*. The devs - only three people, by the way! - understand how to build a fascinating and interconnected world.