Tarnished Blood Early Access Review – You’ll Need Time

I’m enough of a Monster Hunter fanatic that the faintest comparison to it will get me interested in your game. Tarnished Blood is a game that came onto my radar due to one such comparison. I can’t remember now what the exact cause was for this comparison, and really the turn-based roguelite RPG from developers Juggler Games and Nakayama Games and publisher Galaktus is way more reminiscent of Darkest Dungeon than anything else, but that comparison also doesn’t entirely get to the core of Tarnished Blood.

What makes the game tick is the rather unique combat system. It’s turn-based, but probably not in the way you think. Because turns here aren’t just singular instances where you choose from a menu if you want to attack or maybe drink a potion, turns here are pockets of time with a timeline at the bottom of the screen that lets you scroll back and forth within the next few seconds of combat. You can see exactly what the monster will do where at what time, and you have to maneuver around that by moving, jumping, attacking, etc. The more actions you take, the further the growth travels that blocks you from continuously changing your actions endlessly. And when you’re happy with everything that’s about to happen in this turn, you lock it all in and see it happen in real time.

Become a time master and master the timeline

This combat system has plenty of potential but also gets real finicky, especially with some of these bosses where a lot is going on all at once. You can spend a lot of time on a single turn, or actually, you have to spend a lot of time on any single turn. If you’re someone who’s into trial and error to get that perfect combo, this will definitely be for you, but honestly, I found it rather tedious after a while. You need to be thinking about every single move during every single turn; there aren’t really any lower-stakes moments, which keeps the tension up at all times but also gets exhausting.

Outside of combat, you also have a lot of managing to do, and this is the part that made me think of Darkest Dungeon. While you’re in your camp, there’s a whole row of things you can do. Craft new gear with materials you collected (I’m guessing this is where the Monster Hunter comparison came from? ), train your characters, create new ones, etc. The last part is pretty important, because just as in Darkest Dungeon, you start with a few characters (from one of four tribes that you can choose) that can level up and get better gear over time, but realistically, you need to be ready for them to die because, of course, Tarnished Blood has instadeath. This, coupled with the combat system that is very unforgiving if you don’t pay attention for a turn, makes Tarnished Blood a pretty hardcore game.

Look at my little gang

So when you then feel ready to take on a new fight (you’re never truly ready), you first need to go through three random event encounters that are decided through dice rolls. Here you can get some stats, maybe a few items, or get damaged before the fight has even started. And once you get through the real battle begins. The boss designs are pretty cool, as the macabre titans that plague this world. Visually, that is, as mentioned before, some of them have a bit too much going on on the gameplay side of things.

I would never call Tarnished Blood a bad game; I don’t believe it is one, but it’s very decidedly not a game for me. And truthfully, I don’t really think it’s a game for many people. If you’re into the idea of micromanaging every one of your moves in combat, perfecting every turn after going through all the possible options, and just an overall punishing experience that leaves little room for error, Tarnished Blood might be for you. For everyone else, I’m expecting this to feel rather tedious.

Nairon played Tarnished Blood on PC in Early Access with a review code.

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