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Bard's Gold

A scrappy but accomplished take on the whole Metroidvania shtick, Bard’s Gold marries tactical platforming action with great progression systems to create an effort that is highly worthwhile for fans of the genre.
Bard's Gold Game Cover
72%Game Brain Score
gameplay, music
graphics, story
79% User Score Based on 72 reviews
Critic Score 64%Based on 9 reviews

Platforms

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Bard's Gold Game Cover

About

Bard's Gold is a single player arcade role playing game with fantasy and historical themes. It was developed by Pixel Lantern and was released on August 14, 2015. It received mostly positive reviews from both critics and players.

Bard's Gold is a challenging platformer that let's you explore eerie worlds in a quest for a Goblin that stole your gold. Help the Bard to overcome the dungeon’s many dangerous perils and use your new-found treasures to improve your character and to buy new weapons and gear! Rogue-lite - Different layouts for each level is randomly chosen every playthrough. While getting the chance to memorize l…

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Bard's Gold screenshot
Bard's Gold screenshot
Bard's Gold screenshot
Bard's Gold screenshot
Bard's Gold screenshot
Bard's Gold screenshot
Bard's Gold screenshot
Bard's Gold screenshot
Bard's Gold screenshot
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79%
Audience ScoreBased on 72 reviews
gameplay4 positive mentions
story3 negative mentions
  • Challenging yet fair gameplay with a classic retro platformer feel and precise controls rewarding skillful play.
  • Engaging roguelite progression system with permanent upgrades, secret rooms, and varied weapons enhancing replayability.
  • Appealing pixel art style, catchy soundtrack, and level randomization creating a nostalgic and enjoyable experience.
  • Repetitive and sometimes frustrating due to unpredictable trap behaviors and inconsistent difficulty scaling.
  • Limited content leading to relatively short playtime, with some weapons and boss fights feeling unbalanced or too easy.
  • Lack of control customization and occasional technical issues like no pause in certain areas and unclear hitboxes.
  • gameplay
    21 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The gameplay offers a classic, challenging platforming experience with responsive controls, tactical double jumps, and progression mechanics like permanent upgrades and power-ups. While generally addictive and well-executed, some players find it frustrating due to occasional difficulty spikes and raw mechanics. Overall, it appeals to fans of straightforward, retro-influenced platformers seeking a rewarding but sometimes grueling challenge.

    • “There is a standard double jump mechanic at play here, but it affords a great deal of tactical use and makes for some tense leaps of faith.”
    • “The mechanics are incredibly responsive and you get the hang of avoiding traps and stuff like that really quickly.”
    • “There are lots of different mechanics to Bard's Gold such as permanent upgrades that you carry from game to game, weapons and power-ups that you lose when you die, and bonuses that you collect from fallen foes that help you on the way.”
    • “Very bad and slow gameplay.”
    • “It gets quite hard and has few annoying mechanics (for example in a secret level).”
    • “Gameplay is predominantly platform hopping and trap dodging while killing mostly harmless but inconveniently positioned enemies.”
  • music
    20 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The music in the game is generally praised for being catchy, enjoyable, and enhancing the overall atmosphere, especially the ice cave tracks and mellow tunes. While some players find it relaxing and fitting, others note that certain later-world tracks can become repetitive or slightly annoying. Overall, the soundtrack is considered a strong point, complementing the pixel art and gameplay without being intrusive.

    • “The music is quite catchy and I enjoyed the ice cave music so much that I bought the soundtrack.”
    • “The pixel-graphics are well-done, and the soundtrack enhances the tone and feel of this game.”
    • “The soundtrack is simple yet great, the controls are great, the difficulty is high, and the joy you experience finding something interesting or completing a difficult level is a great feeling.”
    • “The only criticisms I have for this game are the difficulty (too easy compared to other games in the genre) and repetitive music.”
    • “The music starts catchy and charming but the last two worlds have slightly annoying songs.”
    • “Music taste is quite subjective though, but if you ask me if it's atmospheric or immersive, not really.”
  • graphics
    12 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The graphics are primarily cute, vibrant pixel art with some modern lighting effects, successfully blending retro style with subtle enhancements. While generally well-executed and fitting the game's tone, occasional design choices can make certain elements like traps or enemies harder to see. Overall, the visuals complement the gameplay but are not particularly groundbreaking.

    • “Graphics are cartoony and vibrant.”
    • “The pixel graphics are well-done, and the soundtrack enhances the tone and feel of this game.”
    • “The pixel visuals have a few modern flairs like normal mapping for a nice touch of dynamic lighting juxtaposed against retro visuals.”
    • “The graphics are in cute pixel art form which works for the most part; however, some of the traps may feel 'blind' to you because of the art design.”
    • “The graphics worked well for the game, with a few minor exceptions where I would miss an enemy because he would be blending into the background.”
    • “Artwork is meh.”
  • story
    6 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The story in this roguelike is minimal and not a primary focus, with basic motivation given but little narrative depth, especially for bosses. Players generally do not expect much story in this genre and are not disappointed by its simplicity. However, some find the storyline lacking in engagement and detail.

    • “As the title itself states, your family treasure has been stolen, forcing you to embark on a quest to get it back.”
    • “I'm ignoring story because this is meant to be a roguelike, which I expect to have little or no story, which this has, and I am not disappointed, since this is not the main selling factor for a roguelike.”
    • “Downside is that bosses (including secret) don't have a story to tell.”
    • “[Lack of story, too slow-paced, repetitive sound].”
    • “As the title itself states, your family treasure has been stolen forcing you to embark on a quest to get it back.”
  • replayability
    4 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game offers solid replayability, especially for rogue-lite and platformer fans, with varied enemy strategies and increasing difficulty enhancing the experience. However, the inverse difficulty curve may reduce long-term appeal, and adding more achievements could further boost replay value. Overall, it provides good value for its price.

    • “Highly recommend it to rogue-lite/like gamers that enjoy platformers with replay value.”
    • “Enemies have different ways of attacking you, causing you to change your strategy all the time. Even moving further through the game, it keeps getting harder, adding more replay value.”
    • “I do think that this game could use some extra achievements to improve its replayability, but it's definitely a great game for its price.”
    • “Scratches the platformer itch for a while, but the inverse difficulty curve means that the replay value isn't great.”
    • “Enemies have different ways of attacking you, causing you to change your strategy all the time; even moving further through the game, it keeps getting harder to add more replay value.”
  • atmosphere
    1 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The atmosphere is generally considered lacking in immersion, with music and overall ambiance not effectively enhancing the game's mood.

  • grinding
    1 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game is noted for its heavy grinding requirements, making progression time-consuming and repetitive.

  • emotional
    1 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    Users express frustration with the emotional experience being negatively impacted by perceived unfair deaths, where they feel they died without clear cause or visible contact.

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64%Critics’ scoreBased on 9 critic reviews
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3h Median play time
3h Average play time
3-4h Spent by most gamers
*Based on 3 analyzed playthroughs
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Frequently Asked Questions

Bard's Gold is a arcade role playing game with fantasy and historical themes.

Bard's Gold is available on Nintendo Switch, Xbox Series X|S, PC, PlayStation 5 and others.

On average players spend around 3 hours playing Bard's Gold.

Bard's Gold was released on August 14, 2015.

Bard's Gold was developed by Pixel Lantern.

Bard's Gold has received mostly positive reviews from both players and critics. Most players liked this game for its gameplay but disliked it for its graphics.

Bard's Gold is a single player game.

Similar games include Castle In The Darkness, Rogue Legacy, Master Spy, Kero Blaster, 8BitBoy and others.