Valdis Story: Abyssal City

I've never met a Castleroid I didn't like.

Valdis Story is actually two games in one.  I'll start with the integrated graphics version because it's very short and not fun.

In Valdis Story: Integrated Graphics, you play as someone whose brain has been ruined by drugs and now all you do is hallucinate wildly against a black background.  After about 30 seconds you die.  I don't know if it's supposed to be an art game or what, but I can't really recommend it.

This game is terrible.

If you don't have an integrated graphics card, or you opt into the igpu beta, the game is much more enjoyable.

If you've played a Castleroid or Metroidvania or whatever you prefer to call them, this review will be very short.  This game is a Castleroid.  If you like Castleroids, you'll like this game.  If you haven't played such a game, not only are you missing out on some of the best games ever made but now you have to read this whole review.  Nice going.

In Valdis Story: Abyssal City you play as either Wyatt, the badass swordsman with nothing to lose, or Reina, the monk who is a monk.  There are two more characters, Gilda and Vladyn, to be released at a later date.  I played both Reina and Wyatt up to the same point, albeit on different difficulty settings, and they both play very fluidly.  Reina is much faster and more combo-oriented than Wyatt, but even at lower difficulties she does a lot less damage.  As the "Advanced" character, Reina has the capacity for stunlocking enemies for quite a while as long as you keep firing off your many different attacks.  Wyatt, on the other hand, is more of your "kill most enemies in one combo" character.  I found Reina to be better against bosses while Wyatt is better against normal enemies, so each character has their own niche.

The actual gameplay is really nice.  Like in Dust: An Elysian Tail, a game you have no excuse for not owning, you traverse a semi-nonlinear world, gaining new abilities that let you access new areas and smiting evil with massive combos.  For example, the first ability you get is the ability to cancel whatever you're doing and return to an idle state.  You can use it to chain attacks together, escape danger, or use it in midair to shoot downwards.  That last one allows you to activate pressure plates you couldn't before, granting you passage to new and exciting locations.  It's a tried and true formula that basically everyone loves.  I don't know why there aren't more games like this.

Looks familiar, but I'm not complaining.

All the standard Metroidesque tropes are here and they're all done quite well.  There are some powerups that seem to exist solely to bar your passage until the creators deem it time to backtrack appropriately, but most of them are actual abilities that make your character better at both exploration and combat.  You also get new weapons and armor, much like in the new Castlevania games, although it's much rarer here.  The total number is maybe five or six weapons and around twelve armors.  That's not very important, though, as equipment is really just a stat boost disguised as something else.  The important part is when you level.  Each time you level, you get one stat point and one skill point.  Using these points you can build your character in myriad ways.  You can be a fragile bruiser, a spellcaster, a crit-based speedster, a tank, whatever you want.  It's an extremely welcome bit of depth in an already fairy deep genre.

How about the graphics?  They're good.  Really good, in fact.  They're not quite up to Castlevania standards, but this game was chiefly made by two people, so come on.  Again like in Dust, everything is hand drawn in a smooth, non-faux-retro style.  Faux retro is good sometimes, but games like this really benefit from graphics that have their own style, and these really do.  The music and sound effects also get a special mention for being high quality.  Most things about the game are quite professional-looking, though it's definitely apparent that the game was made by a small team.  I can't really point to any specific examples.  Maybe the fact that the game is a glitchy mess if you have integrated graphics.

Look at this monster!

Maybe the best thing about the game is the combat.  Every enemy has its own strategy and both characters have a multitude of playstyles to choose from.  See that big guy with the shield and glowsword?  You have zero chance of beating him unless you use your skill cancel dash to get behind him first.  Once you figure that out they're just annoying, but before that you're going to be wondering how the hell you're supposed to do anything about it.  Well, not you, because I just told you how, but other people.  On the opposite end of the spectrum, the first enemies you encounter are red grim reaper kind of things.  On lower difficulties you can just walk up to them and beat them to death, but on hard they'll take a more active effort to block and chain attacks and so forth.  On the highest difficulty setting they'll vanish if you're too slow and reappear behind you.  It's really neat, and I suggest trying a higher difficulty so you get the full experience.  There are things you simply never see on normal.  Also, unlike most games, higher difficulty doesn't mean "enemies are now fine with their heads being melted off and also do a billion damage".  The primary difference is that enemies are smarter, not tougher.  Personally I don't think having to sit there attacking normal enemies for a half an hour is fun, so to me it's a welcome change.

I should probably put some criticisms here so I don't end up like a GameFAQs "reviewer" who gives every game either a 10/10 or a 0/99999.  Well, the writing's not super.  Wyatt especially just talks like some generic anime character.  I like the overall story, what with the angels vs demons and all that crap, but the way it's delivered is hackneyed at times.  On the other hand, it's largely fine, so it's not like you're going to be bleeding out of your eyes while playing.  It's a minor detraction.  The angels are all obsessed with cleansing the world of darkness, the demons are just kind of there to be evil, and the humans are caught in the middle.  No surprises here.  I hear tell of a shocking plot twist though.

No you

Current price: $15
Verdict: Worth it

The game is about ten hours long for one playthrough and with more characters coming later the replayability is wicked high.  It really is like DLC or something for one of the DS Castlevanias, and at fifteen bucks you really can't go wrong.  I got mine at a flea market - I mean, the Steam sale - for $3.74, which almost feels unfair considering the amount of work that was put into this game and how fun it is.