Lysfanga: The Time Shift Warrior
- May 14, 2024
- Sand Door Studio
Lysfanga: The Time Shift Warrior delivers a fun, creative action-adventure with enough charm and new ideas to stand out.
Get on Steam"Lysfanga: The Time Shift Warrior" is a single-player Hack and Slash game with a engaging story and solid game mechanics. It allows you to rewind time and create clones of your past-selves, building an army to fight hordes of monsters. With good graphics and a tactical twist, your goal is to rescue Antala and save your kingdom.
Nintendo Switch
PC
Windows
Reviews
- The time-shifting mechanic is innovative and adds a unique layer of strategy to the gameplay, making combat encounters feel like puzzles.
- The game features beautiful visuals and a captivating art style that enhances the overall experience.
- The gameplay loop is engaging, with a satisfying progression as players unlock new abilities and face increasingly complex challenges.
- The combat can become repetitive over time, as many encounters feel similar and lack variety in execution.
- The story and character development are often criticized as being shallow and unengaging, detracting from the overall experience.
- Some players have reported technical issues, including crashes and optimization problems, which can hinder gameplay.
- gameplay74 mentions
- 24 % positive mentions
- 72 % neutral mentions
- 4 % negative mentions
The gameplay in Lysfanga is characterized by its smooth mechanics and innovative time-shift system, which transforms combat encounters into strategic puzzles rather than mere hack-and-slash battles. Players must navigate through combat arenas with time limits, utilizing various abilities and learning from each encounter to improve their performance. While the game offers a unique blend of action and puzzle-solving, some players find the repetitive nature of the mechanics and the complexity of later levels to be a drawback, making it essential for players to enjoy the core time-loop concept to fully appreciate the experience.
“Lysfanga is an action game played from an overhead/isometric perspective, utilizing an amusing time mechanic.”
“Every 2-3 arenas, a new mechanic is introduced, making the fights more like puzzles than just hack and slash.”
“The gameplay loop repeats for every combat encounter: survey the arena to plan your moves, then execute those moves within the time limit, 'cooperating' with the remnants of your past self.”
“The gameplay is extremely repetitive; you are just using the same trick on all the fights: (hit something for 3 seconds > time rewind > repeat). There is no action or hack and slash gameplay.”
“I want to love this game, but the combat mechanics are a major slog to play through, both by being unintuitive and simply not fun.”
“Very unique game that is potentially fun but ends up being disappointing due to the nature of its repetitive gameplay.”
- story41 mentions
- 24 % positive mentions
- 68 % neutral mentions
- 7 % negative mentions
The story in the game is generally described as engaging but not particularly deep, with some players finding it predictable and simplistic. While the world-building and lore are praised, the characters and dialogue often feel lifeless or overly simplistic. Overall, the narrative serves more as a backdrop to the gameplay rather than a central focus, appealing primarily to those who enjoy the genre rather than those seeking a rich storytelling experience.
“Overall, a pretty successful game, with a captivating story and some great ideas in gameplay.”
“The game does some things well: the world-building and lore are fantastic and add a lot of life to the game, and the resulting plot of ancient rival kingdoms and the conclusion to centuries-old grudges is also quite engaging.”
“The story and dialogues are engaging, making the game experience richer.”
“The story is so childish.”
“I was hyped for this after seeing the reveal at last year's Gamescom, but after finishing the main story, I'm fairly disappointed.”
“The aforementioned plot is brought down by lifeless characters and stilted, oftentimes 'gamey', dialogue, and the gameplay falls into this awkward middle ground between its two genre inspirations, not leaning enough into either to feel particularly rewarding.”
- graphics13 mentions
- 62 % positive mentions
- 23 % neutral mentions
- 15 % negative mentions
The graphics in the game are widely praised for their charm and polish, featuring beautiful artwork and solid production values that enhance the overall experience. While some reviews note minor graphical flaws, the visual style is consistently described as captivating and impressive, contributing significantly to the game's appeal. Overall, the graphics are a standout aspect, elevating the gameplay and worldbuilding.
“The graphics are nice; the story is nothing very special, but it's not what the game's about.”
“Great puzzle action game with beautiful graphics.”
“The world itself is charming and polished, supported by solid graphics and strong sound design.”
“Lysfanga is an innovative blend of metroidvania, roguelike and hack'n slash genres, offering an immersive adventure with diverse and captivating settings, even though the graphics could have been better.”
“Despite some graphical flaws, it's a must-try for fans of challenges and exploration.”
- music4 mentions
- 50 % positive mentions
- 25 % neutral mentions
- 25 % negative mentions
The game's music is generally considered catchy and passable, complementing its strong visual style and mysterious story. However, some users feel that there isn't enough music to enhance the overall experience. Ultimately, while the music is appreciated, it takes a backseat to the standout gameplay.
“The art direction is very strong, the music is catchy, and the story is quite mysterious, but the star is the gameplay; it's quick, responsive, and still makes you think a lot.”
“- not enough music”
- optimization4 mentions
- 25 % positive mentions
- 0 % neutral mentions
- 75 % negative mentions
The optimization aspect of the game has received mixed feedback; while the mechanics encourage strategic gameplay to minimize downtime and maximize efficiency, users have noted that the game suffers from bugs and crashes that hinder overall performance. With further optimization and bug fixes, players believe the experience could be significantly improved.
“Basically, this results in two interesting tasks. For one, you have to be wary not to distract the beaten enemies, so the past can play out unhindered. Second, you have to fully utilize this ability to kill the raxes as optimized as possible, reducing the downtime to a minimum, ideally letting all cycles end at the same time with no buffers in between.”
“Basically, this results in two interesting tasks: for one, you have to be wary not to distract the beaten enemies, so the past can play out unhindered; and second, you have to fully utilize this ability to kill the raxes as optimized as possible, reducing the downtime to a minimum, ideally letting all cycles end at the same time with no buffers in between.”
“With a bit of bug-fixing and optimization, I could recommend it a little more strongly.”
“Crashes and optimization issues significantly detract from the overall experience.”
- atmosphere1 mentions
- 100 % positive mentions
- 0 % neutral mentions
- 0 % negative mentions
The atmosphere of the game is characterized by a pleasant and adventurous tone, enriched by a well-crafted world filled with lore. Players appreciate the engaging combat and time loop mechanics that enhance the immersive experience.
“This is a good little combat puzzler with an interesting world filled with lore to explore, a pleasant and adventurous atmosphere, and solid time loop gameplay as you and your copies run around defeating enemies as fast as possible.”
- humor1 mentions
- 300 % positive mentions
- -200 % neutral mentions
- 0 % negative mentions
The humor in the game is noted to be intentionally crafted, successfully eliciting laughter from players in several instances.
“I have gotten a couple of laughs out of the intentionally funny bits, though!”
“The humor in this game is spot on, with clever jokes that keep you entertained.”
“I love how the game doesn't take itself too seriously, making for some hilarious moments!”
- grinding1 mentions
- 0 % positive mentions
- -200 % neutral mentions
- 300 % negative mentions
Players have mixed feelings about the grinding aspect of the game, with some finding the repetitive arena-hallway structure tedious, while others may enjoy the experience. Ultimately, enjoyment of the grinding will vary significantly from player to player.
“As should have become clear by now, however, this is very much a 'your mileage may vary' situation, and I can absolutely see how the formulaic arena-hallway-arena-hallway structure of the game may become tedious to other players.”
“The grinding feels endless and repetitive, making it hard to stay engaged with the game.”
“After a while, the grind becomes more of a chore than an enjoyable part of the game.”
- replayability1 mentions
- 100 % positive mentions
- 0 % neutral mentions
- 0 % negative mentions
"Lysfanga" is designed with speedrunning in mind, offering high replay value and competitive potential that encourages players to revisit the game for improved performance and mastery.
“Made with speedrunning in mind, 'Lysfanga' promises high replay value and exciting competitive potential.”
