Children of Morta

good simple fun. Nice story with wholesome message.

Love the game, solid roguelike. But the game has slight stuttering and does not support ultra widescreens which is a disappointment in 2024.

I feel like I should give it some more time, but honestly after 3-4 hours I just really do not feel compelled to play more. The game supports single player, but VERY clearly is built around playing with a second player to make the most out of all the characters. If you don't, some characters just feel like they just straight up suck, and it feels like that's intentional so that the other player can cover your weaknesses.

But then the second boss happens and you literally do not have enough dodge juice to avoid their attack patterns, and the only way around that is to either A: Get another player so they you can play it properly and keep their attention divided so you have a fair chance, or B: Play on an easier difficulty, and I'm a gamer so that ain't happening.

The story is really good, I'm not going to just take a big dump on it, but I cannot recommend this game to anyone who is seeking a solid single-player experience like I was. Maybe if I finally get another friend to play it with, I might change my mind, but it really sounded like this game could be played single-player and you could have a solid experience with it, but I just didn't have that experience.

I played this a lot more on console before getting it on steam, always loved the amount of story progression and how it doesn't feel as grindy as some other rogue lites can feel

I cannot believe I have never played this game before now. Holy poop! It's so good. Cheers

I suggest experience it, has a very interesting story and gameplay
you will not feel tired

I play this with my wife and we both enjoy the game. We've completed the main story and family trials with each character.

While the gameplay kept us returning, it was the characters who we remember most. The developers got it right with a story rarely told these days, which is about family.

I can understand if it's not everyone's cup of tea, but its uniqueness shines on its own. We'll done.

One of the best, if not the best, pixel arts I've ever seen. Solid story with gruesome moments, solid multiplayer experience with low latency.
This is a game where the journey is better than the destination, but I definitely recommend this journey. Completed in about 13 hours, 7/10

This is a very enjoyable game. Each dungeon run (even the ones which fail) feels worthwhile because of the various ways in which the characters and the overall family can invest to improve their abilities. Each of the family members play differently, offering lots of interest and variety. Definite recommend.

A great roguelike with a decent story and excellent mechanics

good coop game so far. i'm still at the beginning so don't take my opinions too seriously. despite the cons, i still recommend buying it because it's well-polished and fun to play.

pros:
- very beautiful, well stylized
- fluid mechanics
- good and creative classes
- simple skill build-up
- intuitive UI

cons:
- when dead, you should be allowed to select a camera view of your partners
- "main house hub" controls should be fully shared or at least fully visible to other people in coop so they can suggest/read upgrades
- like i said, i'm at the beginning of the game, but i'm feeling that bosses are easier than the rest of the dungeon, even playing on hard mode. hope i'm proven wrong in the future

it would also be nice if it were possible to switch characters in the middle of the dungeon

Great story. Interesting game play.

I play this game with my wife and it is one that we both enjoy because the story is about family and working together and the way the story is interwoven between the deaths is great. Also we really appreciate the artwork, I think it's the best pixel-art I've ever seen - the game is beautiful!

Felky Fun Meter

|----------|| [10/10] Massive fun!

Good game, nothing extraordinary, but nothing egregious either.

Truth be told, I dont know how one more review is going to really convince someone to play this game, but here goes.

My brother convinced me to pick the game back up after a played about an hour and didn't really like it. I've played rogue lites before, and this one felt like more of an adventure than anything, which was really kind of nice.

The characters their motivations, story progression, and the obtaining unlock-able characters felt organic and properly paced. There was enough tension in the story that it felt like I had to continue on, but not so much that I felt rushed. Something I quite liked was that each character had their own play style, and even if you didn't particularly like them, they still contributed to helping power up your favourite ones by way of passive traits that are shared among all of them. Narration is well done as well.

All in all, I've played for 25ish hours, and beat the game. I like to farm and be really prepared, so it took longer than necessary, and I was pretty damn overpowered by the time I got to the Big Bad Villain, and I curbstomped him. Don't feel bad for him, he really, really deserved it, and it felt great to watch the ending scene.

The game is not too long, not too short, and I'm happy with what I've played. If you've got the money, pick it up, if not, wait for a sale and play it over a weekend. (Also I only played it by myself, so no idea hoe coop is.)

Thanks for reading, take care!

Children of Morta requires too much grinding, making progression feel like a chore. The short duration of individual dungeon runs prevent any real sense of satisfaction. The story clips are unskippable and boring.

This is a wonderful charming game and especially great to play with a friend. The Bjergsons and their journey is so well done and the gameplay is fun to boot!

10/10 I love this game
mark is best boi

Writing an early review for this game feels a little strange. On one hand, I love a lot of the ideas they have. These types of games are great, and the flavor they've added to it is wonderful.
But at the same time the execution is lacking :/

Optimisation feels bad. Sometimes it gives me a whole lot of frames, while other times (in the same room, with no changes to the environment) it gives me half as many. It often looks like the frames come in bursts, so even though 40fps is not bad, it looks worse cause there's stutters in them. (running this on an NVIDIA GPU that's dealt with bigger games just fine).

Sometimes enemy archers shoot through walls (that I just saw my arrows on the same exact trajectory -to hit that enemy- bounce off of).

There's several categories of items you can pick up, but it's a challenge to keep track of what it means for something to be 'category a item', especially because clicking the 'tooltips' button only mentions "this is category a item' without actually telling you what that means, so now I need to look that up somewhere.

This one run I picked the wrong character, so I immediately went back to the house to repick that, which prompted another cutscene, cause the game assumed I did an entire new run, which meant I'd seen like 3 cutscenes in a row, while only having played two small dungeons.

Even early on in the story as I am at this point there were a couple things of dialogue that felt kinda weird, about the mother's relationship to the illness of a child in the story. Having gone through something similar with my mom, and having talked about that extensively with her; the framing was weird and uncomfortable.

I'm aware this genre of game requires you 'die' a lot, and redo dungeons before you actually finish them. But especially at the start there's a couple times it feels like they're just waiting for you to die so they can progress the story, which makes dying feel forced. "We made it so you can't win this level so you die and we can show you this cutscene" type of thing. I don't mind doing something multiple times. But it being a premeditated choice to have me die in order to progress the story is not something I as a player want to be made aware of.

I'm not sure why, but the gameplay gave me the impression the game doesn't know what pace it wants to work at. It's like it wants to fit the genre, but also wants to adhere to a style that won't allow for the same types of movement or pacing. And it keeps me from enjoying it the way it deserves to be.

I know most of these are minor things, and by all means, this game could very well be something for you. There is a lot to love. But all of it added up made it so that for me, personally, I quickly became uninterested in playing on.

Its nice at first, but gets really repetitive. coop doesnt work too greatly. nice story really, but i expected it to be a roguelike as in choosing different abilities per battle or level up, but no, they are tied to a character, which makes the game quite repetitive as you can only spam the same 3 or 4 abilities, dodge, spam abilities, dodge, etc.

Its OK, but i didnt find it particularly entertaining beyond that.

Well made game that is just not fun.

Narration is great, visuals are great, except the story is extremely slow and pretty boring. It just doesn't hook the player.

Combat is kinde fine, except it's full of annoying mechanics and turns into mess quite fast, lots of punishing mechanics and tons of monster with high HP makes it quite a slog.

Balance is pretty much nonexistent. You have 2 playable ranged characters which with enemy HPs/amount and lack of aoe play like "kite enemies for years till they die", and melee characters(I unlocked 4) which are not satisfying to play at all despite having bit more DPS and better aoe since you have too little windows of attacking on melee. If the game had twice less characters but they were balanced better each one, it would've been way better.

Powers are cool but there's close to no synergy, you just get power from relics/blessings, and that's basically all.

Progression is cool, you have levels of each character, and levels unlock powers, except as I said it's absolutely miserable to play on melee, so if you want your powers upgrades you have to suffer. And lvling is pretty slow.

I did act one, it was kinda fun while I was getting upgrades and all, but closer to the end of it everything slowed down significantly, act two made me want to just run from enemies and instead of killing them.

I decided to drop on act two because I'm not seeing fun to kite enemies for 30mins and doing that for six (or maybe more) more dungeons.

Cute roguelike with a decent story. Very unique art design. Worth a play.

Pros:
- Nice visuals and character design.
- Pleasing soundtrack and SFX.
- Good narrator.
- Bosses are ok.

Cons:
- Very short main story. And it's not even a good one no matter how you look at it.
- Bad main hub and item system UI/UX.
- Overall combat feels way off and not fun, characters' and mobs balance is nonexistent and everything is designed in such a way that makes it irritating to play with or against, especially when you encounter problems with certain skills (like them clipping through the map)
- There are only 2 ranged characters (2.5 if you include roguelike-exclusive character) vs 5 melee ones.
- Character progression in combat is also not balanced, not in story mode, not in roguelike mode. You barely have enough playtime to fully unlock one character, much less fully upgrade them and then the main story ends; and roguelike mode just makes you feel miserable all the time.
- (Online Co-op) Servers are very laggy and might be the cause for certain soft-locking and gamebreaking bugs (which forces you to reload the save) that happen way too often and apparently have been there since forever and, obviously, haven't been fixed.
- Just plenty of bugs in general.

Early review after few hours. Visually, the game is stunning. The beautiful vistas in the background are truly eye-catching when they appear. The narrator's voice is soothing, which adds to the atmosphere, but unfortunately, most of the in-game dialogue isn’t voiced. While the music in the base is calm and pleasant, the soundtrack during gameplay is repetitive and uninspiring, failing to engage in combat.

The skill tree is quite basic, but that isn't necessarily a bad thing. However, upgrades and progression feel limited at the moment. One issue I’ve encountered is that the camera feels a little too close, causing you to sometimes get hit by enemies offscreen. The movement controls are unresponsive and feel clunky, with frequent animation locks. There's also a lack of indicators for ranged attacks, making it difficult to avoid projectiles, as the animations for ranged attacks are poorly telegraphed (so sometimes you dodge, and enemy autolocks and hit you). This leads to random, unavoidable hits from offscreen enemies.

Balance between melee and ranged characters seems off, with certain characters feeling disproportionately difficult to play, even on the lowest (normal) difficulty setting. This suggests the game may have been primarily balanced for multiplayer (will have to check later!). Oddly, even in single-player or offline mode, the game includes "free-to-play" elements like character fatigue (will lock you from playing your favorite charcter/weapon!), which feels unnecessary and adds no real value to the gameplay experience.

The dungeons include mini-games, such as ping-pong, to earn extra loot, but I found them more frustrating than fun. While the game does have a narration system similar to Hades, offering brief voiced scenes after each run, the scenes themselves often fail to engage the player.

In terms of settings, a brightness adjustment option is sorely missing. The game is quite dark, leading to situations where you walk into traps simply because you can’t see them. Additionally, you can't change the game’s language once it has started, which is another negative.

Overall, I can’t recommend the game at this time, mostly due to the frustrating gameplay elements. However, I’ll give it more time—probably until I finish it—and will update my review if my opinion changes.

I've tried to play it recently, but game keeps freezing on chapter select from old saves, starting new story, one freeze after first level, another one after selecting upgrade during tutorial (game reinstalled & files integrity checked), found forums from year before with same problem and no solution - i guess it is abandoned in unplayable state.

Children of Morta is a great option for those who are patiently waiting for Hades 2. The gameplay is as tight as Hades and the amount of variety is achieved through playing different characters each having a unique play style. The progression system and the well-told story will keep you engaged throughout many deaths.

It's certainly not awful by any stretch of the imagination, but it's just not very much fun either. Even on normal difficulty a lot of the enemies just feel like damage sponges which makes it a slog.

I came to this game after hearing years of positive reviews, and finally decided to pick it up on super sale.

At full price I'd say it really depends on what kind of player you are. If you're a rogue-lite lover, then I can see you really enjoying it. But if you're someone that dips in and out of rogue-lites once every so often and plays them solo (like me), then I think this is a great buy when it's on sale, especially considering that a single full run through is only roughly 10-15 hours (though obviously you can play a rogue-lite for far longer).

In general I think it's an easier rogue-lite compared to others I have played, though the initial couple of hours are quite punishing until you upgrade your attack and armor. I actually liked that the game humbled me at first, you definitely have to be a little bit more cautious than you'd expect, but with equpment upgrades you feel the power balance shifting over time.

I also really like the character playstyle variety. You can be a tougher brute, a ranged damage dealer, or a lightning fast meleer. There's something for everybody and each character encourages an entirely different style of play, keeping the game pretty fresh throughout.

The animations in this game are awesome, they really nailed their aesthetic. Additionally, the family dynamic is unique and interesting; as the game progresses you not only get specific cutscenes but also new idle animations as the family interacts with one another in the house (or doing their own thing). There's lots of hidden detail throughout which just makes the game feel really coherant and vibrant.

The overall narrative/story is interesting and has a strong pivot point later in the game, but much of the narrative is hidden inside of journals so you kind of end up with a half-understanding of everything as a result, which tends to mean you care less about the world lore. As such, the family story (the most interesting one) gets resolved and then you go on to resolve the world story, which is where I think the game starts to lose its footing.

Thankfully though, those two things follow quite closely on from another meaning the game didn't out stay its welcome.

Incredibly boring. Everything is slow and grindy, in exchange for what, so far, seems like the most classic hero vs evil story ever. Maybe I'll change the review later, but so far (1/3 of the game gone I guess?) it's been a waste of money and time.

this game has incredible visuals, fluid movement and combat, and a beautiful soundtrack, the story is simple on the surface but seems to be more complicated if you dig enough. truly an amazing game worth and worth every penny

Fantastic roguelike with diverse character options and a solid story line

This is such a gem. Intricate pixel art style, fun hack and slash combat, nice story. Loved different playstyle from different characters.

Very nice pixel art and fun game play. Leveling up the family and progressing the story has been fun early on. Looking forward to unlocking the animal shelter.

NONEXISTENT SUPPORT

I bought game + DLCs in June and I had a game breaking problem, can't invite friends in multiplayer lobbies.
Contacted support, had a bit of back and forth and it was not solved.
Left the game there for two months, came back to it two weeks ago.
I have a MORE game breaking problem, game does not even start.
Support has not even replied to my ticket.
Negative review will stay here until the game is fixed.
No, I don't want my money back, I want to be able to play the game.
Fix it. Or at least talk to me. Show me you are not there just to get my money.

I'll start off by saying that I'm not a fan of roguelike games, but with a deep sale and development concluded now signaling a complete game I wanted to give it a shot.

Graphics:

Simply stunning - pixel art with a focus on atmosphere

Sound:

Detailed and immersive

Story:

Fantastic and sprawling as you go for each run

Gameplay:

Here's where the game shines on steam deck. Whether you are up for a five minute run or a 30 minute one - this game has a great ability to pick up and play.

With constant grinding you can upgrade your stats permanently and unravel more perks for all characters.

I strongly recommend this game. It's beautiful, accessable, bug free and simply a fun game to play.

Honestly the best roguelike game I have ever played, it has many characters with different types of progression, game gives you opportunity to try every character for Bergsons family bc wihout that u cannot progress, game itself is very good with high quality designs, but leveling system is such a big plus for roguelike games like that. I really enjoy the game and also need to mention that you can play online and local coop with friends, such a W for that in game like that

Great game mechanics and story. Perfect for the price and decent playtime. If you're looking for a wonderfully narrated rogue-like with fun co-op mechanics then look no further.

There is a lot I enjoyed about this game. The pixel art, especially the cutscenes, reminded me of the old Sierra adventure games from the 80s. I loved most of the story -- there was even one moment where I shouted, "HELL YEAH!!!" (although I may have used a word slightly different from 'hell') at the screen and was totally pumped to go into the next act. I think level progression could be a bit faster; I didn't enjoy the grinding at times. Nonetheless, I am happy I bought it and happy I finished it.

Pros:
great fun on co-op
beautiful art style
satisfying gameplay loop

Cons:
shorter than expected
Mediocre story (I especially feel the need to point this out as it's described as a central focus in the marketing - I'd say this is almost purely a gameplay focused experience with story that is fairly uninteresting and convoluted)
Probably not worth playing single player as it'd be unfairly hard and grindy

Overall, a really fun action rpg, but it felt like the ending came too soon - we didn't get any characters fully levelled before we'd beaten the final boss.
There is NG+ and endless mode if you still want to fill out the skill trees, but it's less motivating having seen all the story and locations.

Starting on hard difficulty, this game showed promise. The pixel art is stunning, and the narrator adds a layer of immersion. The diverse character roster, each with unique weapons, keeps things interesting despite some less enjoyable playstyles.

Unfortunately, the game's potential is squandered by several key issues:

Plot: What begins as an intriguing story quickly devolves into cheap drama, with forced plot points that feel uninspired rather than compelling. It was a genuine disappointment because initially the plot seemed promising and the interactions between family members were fun to watch.

Gameplay: The endless, cookie-cutter dungeons grows stale fast. While switching characters adds some variety, it's clear that balance wasn't a priority. Some classes (like Sword/Shield and Hammer) feel underpowered, while others are frustratingly fragile or one-dimensional.

Mechanics: The skill system lacks depth, and the rage mechanic for certain characters feels tacked-on and unrewarding. Boss fights, while initially engaging, are quickly over once you learn the simple pattern of said boss.

Minigames: You can find mini-game rooms in the dungeon, such as ping-pong (the 1972 version), a gambling room (choose 1 out of 3 options to win) and a frustrating memory match room. All of these have underwhelming rewards which makes them nothing more than a waste of time.

Loot System: There is an abundance of relics, charms, and runes. Unfortunately many of them are useless or just not that great. The lack of a re-roll option in the dungeon shop is an obvious oversight by the developers.

Technical Issues: As you progress, bugs become more prevalent. Audio glitches, graphical artifacts, and frame rate drops ruined the experience for me. This game was released years ago and yet the developers didn't bothered fixing such problems says a lot about their priorities I guess.

Overall, I wouldn't recommend this game at its price point. Maybe if you have a few hours to spare and the game is on sale you can give it a try.

Short co-op game which you can enter dungeons and fight some bosses for the sake of your family. Especially a crowded one.

Really love the story and narration in this, as well as the artwork. Highly recommend if you enjoy rouge-likes.

Excellent story mode, Hades like combat, overall great game.

A narrative drive rogue-like, very hades-esque. It doesn't have the same build depth (not even remotely) or polish of Hades, but this game is still excellent.

A simple story but with excellent execution, its load with cliche family oriented emotional beats, all of which land. Combined with its unique and beautiful art style that permeates every aspect of the game, these made for a unique experience I'm glad I was able to enjoy.

I got it as part of the pathfinder bundle ($6), it was worth well more than that for such a beautiful experience.

10/10 co-op hack and slash with fantastic pixel animation. I wish there was more content or second title :)

It's... good.
It's a beautiful game with a nice concept that plays very trudge-y. There are some minor bugs I've encountered, and there seems to be a character meta, but my main issue lies in (and this opinionated) some poor programming decisions.
Such as Lucy's Tornado. Its suction power is a flat value, meaning that quicker enemies can completely ignore them (which is all of them in the late game). This could be solved by setting the suction power of the tornado as a ratio of an effected enemy's movement speed.
There is an amazing game in here somewhere, and with love, it can be perfected, but right now, I can only half recommend it (which is a negative ig since there is no maybe), but I would still give it a steadfast 7/10.

I think I have to say no to this game.

The story and visuals are fantastic, but the game doesnt allow for interesting builds which makes the runs feel very samey. Combat and game play is repetitive. Progression is slow and you will need to play the same levels over and over again. Game seems needlessly grindy.

Sort of a thin roguelite, I would stay away if you are looking for a dungeon crawler, but would recommend if you prefer story telling.

I havent tried multiplayer, but I suspect that would make the game a lot better.

I went and checked Children of Morta out after Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous dropped their free DLC a few days ago, and I'm so glad I did. Truly such a delightful and captivating game. I can't think of a better introduction to the roguelite genre than this one. I've been recommending it to friends nonstop since my first dungeon run.

Action RPG where instead of picking from varied classes, you're picking different members of an adventurer family to play as. I found each character to be engaging in different ways, and the story/setting was appealing. Co-op was pretty fun too, playing it via Steamplay worked pretty decently for both players.

However, as much as i enjoyed that, i think the game's roguelite elements don't really add to the enjoyment. It feels doesn't really feel like the items add to the experience, more that the repeated attempts at runs in a given level artificially increase the length of the game. If we get a sequel i would much rather have focus on permanent progression/skill tree upgrades over the roguelite stuff, as well as promoting more interaction between the family members (potentially having combo abilities or the like)

"Steps were taken without regret, for it was never possible to change a destiny unknown."

Introduction

Story

Gameplay Analysis

A family of guardians.

Roguelite Loop.

A build worthy of a hero.

Audio and Visual

Deck Performance and Specifications

Final Thoughts - Excellent