Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms
- November 14, 2014
- Games Farm
- 19h median play time
Get on SteamIn Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms, play as a demon known as the Devourer, consuming the souls of the dead and controlling them in your quest to save or doom the world. Taking place 20 years after Kult: Heretic Kingdoms, this isometric action RPG features challenging gameplay, a captivating storyline, and immersive graphics. After the deaths of four members of the secret order Penta Nera, their souls are consumed by Devourers and now search for the essence of their order, leading to a battle to save or destroy the world.
PC
Windows
Reviews
- The game features a unique mechanic of switching between characters and realms, adding depth to gameplay.
- The graphics and sound design are praised for their quality, creating an immersive atmosphere.
- The story and character development are engaging, with interesting quests and voice acting.
- The game is plagued with numerous bugs and crashes, making it frustrating to play.
- Combat feels sluggish and unresponsive, detracting from the overall experience.
- The game is incomplete, with significant content missing and unclear communication from developers about future updates.
- story68 mentions
- 40 % positive mentions
- 53 % neutral mentions
- 7 % negative mentions
The game's story is a mixed bag, with some players praising its depth, interesting characters, and engaging plot twists, while others criticize it for being lackluster and poorly integrated with gameplay. Many reviews highlight the potential for replayability through character choices and side quests, but also note that confusing quests and level design detract from the overall experience. Overall, while the narrative has its strengths, it often feels overshadowed by gameplay issues, leaving some players wishing for a more cohesive and enjoyable storytelling experience.
“The game has a wonderful and interesting story, very good voice acting and the idea of swapping through your different classes in a fight is really compelling.”
“The fact that your characters have their very own story adds a huge amount of replayability to the game, which is really nice.”
“Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms hits that sweet spot providing an in-depth original story arc, simple yet complex evolving skill structure, and extreme replayability.”
“The game was full of interesting ideas, but suffered from awful level design, confusing quests, and poor story.”
“The story overall seems well done but the combat (which is a main part in ARPGs) is unfulfilling and distasteful.”
“Extremely lackluster story; the mechanics are a little slow.”
- gameplay43 mentions
- 21 % positive mentions
- 72 % neutral mentions
- 7 % negative mentions
The gameplay of the game is characterized by a unique character-switching mechanic and engaging combat, reminiscent of classic ARPGs like Diablo 3. While the graphics and story are praised, many players find the gameplay repetitive and hindered by cooldowns, leading to a mixed reception overall. Despite its interesting mechanics and potential for fun, some reviewers feel that the gameplay lacks depth and can become stale quickly.
“Great ARPG with instant character switching as a unique mechanic.”
“It's a fun and engaging mechanic that makes me want to keep coming back to find new and useful combinations, and it definitely holds this game up.”
“The mechanics of swapping between the shadow/real realm, and swapping puppets in combat to chain constant stuns is interesting, but that interest is short-lived.”
“This gameplay gets old, real fast.”
“The game is at its absolute worst when it comes to gameplay.”
“It's another game where I can only think, why didn't the people creating the game make gameplay the main focus, because if the gameplay gets in the way, no good story, voice acting, or looks can hold it up enough to make it worthwhile.”
- graphics28 mentions
- 57 % positive mentions
- 32 % neutral mentions
- 11 % negative mentions
Overall, the graphics of the game receive mixed reviews, with many praising the stunning visuals, detailed art design, and atmospheric effects. However, some users report performance issues, crashes, and a lack of optimization, which detracts from the experience. While the graphics are generally considered good to excellent, the game's technical stability and gameplay mechanics leave room for improvement.
“To the game's credit: great graphics, excellent music and sound, good gameplay and loot.”
“Graphics-wise the game is absolutely gorgeous, particle effects in combat are not over the top and flow nicely.”
“The graphics are very detailed and realistic.”
“But trying to guess which combination of graphical settings and party members will prevent the game from crashing?”
“I think they only programmed the 5 attacks and just used different graphics for each character to make them different.”
“It shouldn't be released with known crashes or unfinished graphical features (like vsync).”
- music14 mentions
- 71 % positive mentions
- 7 % neutral mentions
- 21 % negative mentions
The music in the game has received widespread acclaim for its masterful crafting and ability to enhance the immersive experience, with many reviewers praising the epic soundtrack that adapts to different environments. Players appreciate the atmospheric quality of the music, often comparing it favorably to classic film scores, and express a desire for the original soundtrack. Overall, the musical score is considered a standout feature, contributing significantly to the game's appeal.
“Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms hits that sweet spot providing an in-depth original story arc, simple yet complex evolving skill structure, efficiency over time for fun actions per second, extreme replayability, new even better party system management, impressively fitting musical score and near infinite ways to play this glorious hack and slash.”
“Not only a great game, but also the first game I actually want the OST for; the soundtrack is brilliant!”
“Alongside the music and narrative, it really immerses you within the game.”
“The music and character voices are great, but they don't elevate the overall experience.”
“The music is decent, but it lacks variety and can become repetitive.”
“While the sound effects are adequate, the music fails to leave a lasting impression.”
- stability11 mentions
- 0 % positive mentions
- 0 % neutral mentions
- 100 % negative mentions
The game's stability is heavily criticized, with numerous reports of bugs and glitches affecting gameplay, such as characters getting stuck and issues with item interactions. While some players report a relatively smooth experience, the overall consensus indicates that the game is still quite buggy, particularly in combat and movement mechanics.
“A buggy piece of crap.”
“This game is so buggy - keys not being where they are meant to be, characters getting stuck - don't buy it, I was stung!”
“Yeah, it should be noted that there are some bugs and glitches.”
- atmosphere5 mentions
- 80 % positive mentions
- 20 % neutral mentions
- 0 % negative mentions
The game's atmosphere is highly praised for its rich environments, engaging lore, and appealing graphics. Players appreciate the combination of immersive music, well-developed characters, and a compelling storyline that enhances the overall experience.
“In terms of this game, I really like the atmosphere, the rich environments, and the lore.”
“Really like this game; it has some great atmosphere and nice music.”
“Cool characters, many skill variations, tough gameplay, cool graphics, great atmosphere, and storyline!”
- replayability4 mentions
- 75 % positive mentions
- -50 % neutral mentions
- 75 % negative mentions
"Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms" offers significant replayability through its in-depth story arcs, diverse character narratives, and a dynamic skill system that encourages multiple playthroughs with different choices and party configurations. Players appreciate the impact of decisions on the storyline, enhancing the game's longevity, although some critique the combat mechanics as needing improvement to fully realize its potential.
“Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms hits that sweet spot, providing an in-depth original story arc, a simple yet complex evolving skill structure, and extreme replayability with near infinite ways to play this glorious hack and slash.”
“The game has plenty of points where decisions affect the story, and playing through with different characters and making different choices adds a ton of replay value.”
“The fact that your characters have their very own story adds a huge amount of replayability to the game, which is really nice.”
“The game has plenty of points where decisions affect the story, and playing through with different puppets and different decisions adds a ton of replay value.”
“Once you've completed the game, there isn't much incentive to go back and play it again.”
“The lack of meaningful choices in subsequent playthroughs makes the game feel repetitive and dull.”
- optimization3 mentions
- 100 % positive mentions
- -67 % neutral mentions
- 67 % negative mentions
The game's optimization has been criticized for poor performance, with users experiencing significant frame rate drops even on capable hardware. While many aspects of the game, such as UI and graphics, are praised, the lack of adjustable graphic settings limits performance on lower-end machines, leading to a recommendation for players to have a decent rig. Overall, optimization issues are a notable concern that may improve in future updates.
“The UI, the character inventory, the crafting, the voice acting, the graphics, the writing, and game performance are all just great.”
“The optimization allows for smooth gameplay even on lower-end hardware, making it accessible to a wider audience.”
“The game runs beautifully on high settings, showcasing the developers' attention to detail in optimization.”
“It's not without its problems though - performance is abysmal (FX 8350/390X/16GB DDR3 RAM) and the game would get stuck at 20-40 FPS, when the hardware is more than enough to maintain 60+ at all times.”
“As is, I would recommend having a decent rig for playing, since there are currently no options to 'tune down' any of the graphic settings besides resolution to work well for lower-end machines, and even on my high-mid machine it chugs like a beast due to lack of optimization (that will surely come much later).”
- grinding3 mentions
- 0 % positive mentions
- 0 % neutral mentions
- 100 % negative mentions
Players find the grinding aspect of the game to be more tedious than in other ARPGs, primarily due to the innovative features like the shadow world and soul eating mechanics. While the character-switching system initially seems engaging, it quickly becomes cumbersome, leading to frustration. Despite these issues, some users feel that the overall experience improves beyond their initial impressions.
“It's a fun ARPG, really innovative in some ways (like the shadow world and the whole soul-eating thing), but at the same time, it feels even more tedious than most because of that same feature.”
“Switching between characters seems like a neat idea, but it just becomes tedious and annoying after the first little bit.”
“To be fair, outside of it being a bit grindy, it has been a lot better than I first thought.”
- character development1 mentions
- 300 % positive mentions
- -500 % neutral mentions
- 300 % negative mentions
Players emphasize the importance of meaningful character progression and story development, expressing frustration with filler content and repetitive grinding that fails to introduce new game mechanics. They seek a narrative that unfolds naturally alongside their character's growth.
“You want to feel your progression, your character development, and the story unfolding, rather than suddenly dealing with fillers and routine grind with no new expansion of a game mechanic.”
“The character development is incredibly immersive, allowing players to truly connect with their journey and choices.”
“I love how the game allows for meaningful character growth, making each decision feel impactful and rewarding.”
“You want to feel your progression, your character development, and the story unfolding, not suddenly deal with fillers and routine grind with no new expansion of a game mechanic.”
“The character development feels shallow and lacks meaningful choices that impact the story.”
“I was expecting a rich character arc, but instead, I got a series of predictable tropes that left me feeling disconnected.”
