Sundered®: Eldritch Edition

Fun game, my hands hurts tho

Incredible game. Intense but worth it. So many rewarding things and abilities that are gained along the way are so nicely done. Would liked more different areas but overall cool game.

I can see the appeal, but unfortunately metroidvanias just aren't my vibe. It's absolutely beautiful though and even though it wasn't my vibe I can still see why people like it as much as they do

+

Nice

8/10. Very fun albeit short game. I love the lovcraftian elements! I wasn't sure how well the medtroivania rouge like combo would work but they do it very well. Takes about 12 hours to beat, but there are 3 endings so its worth a replay or 2. definitely recommend if you have a rouge-like addiction like me! :D

ㅤ

---{ Graphics }---
☐ You forget what reality is
☑ Beautiful
☐ Good
☐ Decent
☐ Bad
☐ Don‘t look too long at it
☐ MS-DOS

---{ Gameplay }---
☐ Very good
☑ Good
☐ It's just gameplay
☐ Mehh
☐ Watch paint dry instead
☐ Just don't

---{ Audio }---
☐ Eargasm
☐ Very good
☑ Good
☐ Not too bad
☐ Bad
☐ I'm now deaf

---{ Audience }---
☐ Kids
☑ Teens
☐ Adults
☐ Grandma

---{ PC Requirements }---
☐ Check if you can run paint
☐ Potato
☑ Decent
☐ Fast
☐ Rich boi
☐ Ask NASA if they have a spare computer

---{ Difficulty }---
☐ Just press 'W'
☐ Easy
☑ Easy to learn / Hard to master
☐ Significant brain usage
☐ Difficult
☐ Dark Souls

---{ Grind }---
☐ Nothing to grind
☑ Only if u care about leaderboards/ranks
☐ Isn't necessary to progress
☐ Average grind level
☐ Too much grind
☐ You'll need a second life for grinding

---{ Story }---
☐ No Story
☐ Some lore
☐ Average
☑ Good
☐ Lovely
☐ It'll replace your life

---{ Game Time }---
☐ Long enough for a cup of coffee
☐ Short
☑ Average
☐ Long
☐ To infinity and beyond

---{ Price }---
☐ It's free!
☐ Worth the price
☐ If it's on sale
☑ If u have some spare money left
☐ Not recommended
☐ You could also just burn your money

---{ Bugs }---
☐ Never heard of
☑ Minor bugs
☐ Can get annoying
☐ ARK: Survival Evolved
☐ The game itself is a big terrarium for bugs

---{ ? / 10 }---
☐ 1
☐ 2
☐ 3
☐ 4
☐ 5
☐ 6
☑ 7
☐ 8
☐ 9
☐ 10

grind grind grind. if i want grind then i would play some mmo. what's progress even about in this game? developing some real skills? constant spam of horde of mobs do not show nothing. What is point of those horde?! if im close to finnish those mobs then another wave's appear and over and over, even when i fight with bosses those show up wtf?! poinless waves, pointless game

This is a mostly competent metroidvania with a satisfying Yggdrasil skill tree (which uses gold dropped by enemies), satisfying traversal and movement mechanics (WAY superior to Hollow Knight in this regard), and mostly fluid and satisfying combat.

It is weakened by its over-reliance on horde mechanics, which introduce difficulty by overwhelming you with on-screen spam. I'm not a fan of this design philosophy, and I especially didn't appreciate it during some of the boss fights, especially the final one, which might be the most unfun boss fight I have ever experienced. I watched a pro doing it on YouTube and still hated it. This isn't a difficulty or skill issue: I could fight this boss with an invincibility cheat and hate it no less. Being blown all over the screen while trying to use the unreliable grappling hook to get back to the boss's damageable node never felt like my skill was being tested. Only my patience.

I really enjoyed most of my time spent on this game, but the times I didn't enjoy it I REALLY didn't enjoy it, and that is relevant too. There is a lot to love about this game, but I would not recommend it to a friend.

Awesome game 11/10 art and effects

this game is actually just really good, co-op is peak

Underrated Metroidvania

good game

I'm not a fan of metroidvanias, but I've spent some time on this. I like the art, and the boss fights feel huge. Skill system turns out to be good and "corruption" brings some twist. Other than that, levels sometimes feel too large and repetitive, and enemies are plain a bit. Another thing is that the game incentivizes you to grind to progress through the skill tree, and that's boring. 6.6

Interesting take at metroidvania genre. Movement is fluid and all skills have use through the exploration and battle. Character development (skill wise) feels rewarding. The map is very well done - it has markers for important rooms so you don't get lost after getting some ability required to unlock a door or jump to a far ledge.

The bad side of Sundered is the lazy enemy design. Formless blobs of tentacles shooting wall-piercing projectiles or darting through the screen at the speed of sound. Battle ends up being just random button smashing to dodge and attack most of the time. Some areas have infinite spawning enemies with infinite range - really frustrating. The only viable strategy for these areas is run away to the next room, but at some point there are so many enemies, projectiles and environmental hazards pushing you around (physically pushing) that you end up dead.

TL;DR: My opinion on Sundered is very mixed. It does some things right, and it can be a fun experience, however it messes up several key factors, and that ends up detracting from the experience massively, making it very frustrating and grindy. Wouldn't recommend unless you're willing to put up with some of its frustrating aspects in order to experience the good parts of the game (the Bosses).

This review is spoiler-free, i played the game for 20 hours and finished it once on Hard. I do want to preface this by saying that i don't think Sundered is a bad game, obviously a lot of effort went into it and it did manage to keep me engaged for most of its playtime. However i think the game commits several mistakes that detract from the experience overall.

Map and level design

- So, you probably know this if you've seen anything about this game, the map isn't designed by hand like most games of the metroidvania genre, instead, only certain key locations are, and all the areas in between are procedurally generated, changing every time you die.
- In my opinion, this doesn't work well, firstly, it makes it so all the rooms in a certain region feel very same-y. The design of the individual rooms is honestly not bad at all, however, the fact that it is randomized detracts from the work done to create these interiors.
- It also creates a situation where you can't really "learn" the map, instead having to rely on a minimap on your screen to locate yourself.
- This is gonna connect to a later point i'll make, but i strongly believe that designing a normal map like most metroidvanias rather than procedurally generating it would contribute massively to the theming of the game, and allow for a much richer atmosphere.

Horde Mechanics

- While you're out there exploring, sometimes you'll hear an alarm or a gong go off, which means you're going to be engaged by a horde of enemies.
- What happens next is that you're going to be engaged by 20-30 enemies at once, you can't escape them, since they'll teleport to any room you're in, so you have to fight them.
- It gets so bad, at certain points you can't even see your character anymore inside the mess.
- In my opinion, this detracts from the game massively, it feels like artificial difficulty, when you're in the early game, these hordes are so overwhelming you're almost guaranteed to die to them, no matter what you do, and the only thing that will help you against them is getting stronger by buying upgrades and getting more damage, health and bonuses. In other metroidvanias, enemies have a variety of attacks and interesting mechanics (some more than others, ofc) which you can learn how to avoid, dodge, punish, parry, etc, this allows you to tackle even complex late game enemies if you're dedicated enough. Sundered doesn't allow that, there are no complex late game enemies. They're all designed to be part of the swarm and get thrown at you by the dozens, they have at most 1 attack, 2 if you're lucky, even the late game enemies. By the endgame, you'll just be spamming dodge, and then spamming attack until you can build up an execution to take out multiple of them at once.

Bosses

- Here i'm talking about the actual bosses, not the mini-bosses
- The bosses are arguably the highlight of this game, they're incredible, really. The game gets it right: massive monsters that can barely fit in your screen with big attacks and specific weak points you have to hit. The combat system of the game really shines here, being a super soldier makes a lot of sense when you're fighting these monstrosities.
- There aren't that many major bosses, however the quality over quantity approach really pays off for these guys, their designs range from disturbing to terrifying, their difficulty feels like it is tuned to be just right (not easy enough to be boring, but also not impossible or frustrating), and by the later parts of your playthrough, the game conditions you to be really excited for these boss fights since you know they'll be great.
- There was really only one optional boss i thought was very disappointing gameplay-wise, however even in that case, the visual design was still astounding.

On it being a "Lovecraftian"-themed game

- Now, i'm by no means a Lovecraftian "expert" or anything like that, i do enjoy the books and i get excited to look for media that tries to explore themes of fear of the unknown, however i'm not a big connoisseur.
- With that in mind, i think the game does a decent job of exploring these themes, specially with the bosses and towards the ending of the game. Your sword (the Trapezohedron) is dubbed and talks to you in Eschatonian, which is a made up language created specifically for this game, which i imagine is inspired by R'lyehian. This is honestly really cool and adds a lot to the game.
- However, like i hinted at earlier, i think the procedurally generated environments really detract from this theming. It removes a lot of opportunity to create strange and alien-like locations, diminishing the feelings of mystery. I believe this was not the intention, and that the devs intended for the randomized maps to create a feeling of uneasiness and the randomness to emulate a sort of alien environment that is ever changing, however this, in my opinion, does not work, and ends up detracting from the atmosphere instead.

Some additional points

- The bonus system isn't that exciting, it reminds me of Hollow Knight charms and the Beads in Blasphemous, but a way more simplified version, there aren't that many interesting effects, with most of them just being stat increases, and you have to grind to get higher levels of these bonuses (which isn't really necessary to beat the game, at least not on Hard, might be needed on Insane difficulty).
- The cannon is your standard "magic"/long-ranged option in this game, however, as opposed to the spells in Hollow Knight for example, it feels very weak, and there are rare occasions where you'd want to use it, making all of the bonuses and skill tree perks you can get for it feel like a waste. I did find it useful for a certain boss, however outside of that, i barely used it.

It's good! I had fun with this game and loved the simplicity. Most of the negative reviews are just people spoiled with other top tier games in this category.

If you've played games like Hollow Knight, Sundered is a much simpler version of it. If you find Hollow Knight to be too difficult (many of my friends played it and liked it but didn't care to finish it because they found it too difficult) then maybe you'd want to give this a try.

Downside is this game is quite simple and doesn't really have a story to it, you are somehow trapped in this world in the desert and you need to get out, an ancient being here will help you escape by giving you powers that you'll discover, and that's about it.

World design is pretty simple but I did have fun exploring and acquiring abilities/shards/masks.
Combat is simple which can be a good thing for people not so good with complicated and tight combat mechanics. While simple, it does have a bit of challenge with boss fights for casual gamers I believe.
I really liked that once you reach the last part of the map you can learn an ability to mark all treasure locations on the map, this helps a ton at end game to collect and upgrade everything.

Get this on sale, game's only 12h long on average and up to around 20h if you want to 100% it (very easy full achievement). It was worth the experience for me, but if you've played games like Hollow Knight and think you can't enjoy any lesser games in this category then don't buy this.

I play a lot of metroidvainias and this one is definitely up there in my list. I love all the ways you can explore the map, I preferred the brute force exploration method though, just running from location to location whilst ignoring the hordes.

I think one of my favourite things is how skill upgrades (though potent like the dash upgrade) are kinda gimmicky, such as the double jump upgrade having a less practical use. I like this design because if you choose not to upgrade, you instead actually get stronger stat wise. it plays along a story line that magic is the shortcut and a side grade, the only true upgrade requires more effort and is not given but taken.

It feels like a really reduced metroidvania with a motivating progressing system.

Good game

gorgeous and satisfying, I played it with friends the 2 times I did a playthrough and we enjoyed ourselves both time. The game can be a bit hard, but it gives you the tools to progress. A nice tittle for me.

I didn't understand, why the true ending not telling you anything. Nyarlathotep was died, so did the crystal, what's the fate of Eshe ? Dammit, another Disclosure ending again.

Plays local-coop.
One of our favorite game of all time to play 2 on the couch.

TL;DR: It's mid. I'm not disappointed I played it and/or spent money on it, but wait for it to go on sale, and don't expect Hollow Knight or Nine Sols. The story is forgetable, combat is mash-tastic, but the skill tree/perks and boss fights make for a decent experience.

Full review: Overall, I'd say this is mid. It's art style is good, the skill tree is fun, and the perks you get are random, so you have to adjust your playstyle for what you have... until you have most or all of them, and you use one of a few combos that synergize together.

The horizontal movement is very fluid and fun, but vertical is just... sigh. Platforms are usually just at the top of your jump so you default to upslashing all the time to make sure you make the jump. Movement gets better as you gain more abilities, but vertical movement is annoying pretty much everywhere there's not a bunch of walls to wall jump from.

Combat if fun at first because of the fluidity of movement, but after a while it gets stale. I hate horde mechanics and that's what this relies on. The first times you make it through a horde, it's great. They are tough especially early on, but eventually they don't pose a threat and you want to explore, then a horde shows up... then another horde shows up... then another horde shows up... then another horde shows up. Some hordes are literally never-ending. It mostly boils down to mash attack and periodically hit dodge or your "finisher."

The Boss fights are really good though; they are actually unique, epic fights with a good sense of satisfaction when you complete them.

The story is meh. I played through it twice and it's just not gripping in the way Nine Sols or Hollow Knight are. You're in the desert for some reason, get pulled into some other dimension or other. If there's a reason you're in the desert, I didn't retain it after watching the start of the game twice, but I could almost novelize the Hollow Knight or Nine Sols story and lore. Evil thing says they'll help you escape. You collect elder crystals along the way and you can choose to "embrace" (evil) or "resist" (good). As with most binary choice endings, they end up pretty meh. They are significant playwise though as embracing enhances your core abilities, where resisting leaves your core abilities alone, but gives you other benefits instead.

It's not a bad game, but it's a "wait for a sale" and only if you've already played the much better metroidvanias like Hollow Knight and Nine Sols kind of a game.

Dull.

very fun.

Some floaty goodness

believe the hype

Exceptionally clever Metroidvania, with solid re-playability

The vibes and the reward cycle are almost perfection.

Very hard not to recommend this game. Great art style and some story behind, but core gameplay is a bit odd for a metroidvania. Enemies will randomly spawn instead of fixed position, so at times you will be running around with not much to do (which is a bit slow for my taste); while sometimes many enemies will swarm your screen so you are forced to fight them (which is not bad but can get annoying at endgame). Combat is a bit simple and spammy, movement is a bit janky and slow.

Overall not a bad game, but a bit weird to be a metroidvania. I'm sure many people will enjoy it, just not me personally.

I absolutely LOVED this game - I have nothing but good feelings towards it. Its one of those satasfying platformers that really scratched the itch for me on all levels.

The bosses were incredibly fun to fight and look at - its all so beautifully drawn and the animations, movement, combat - everything feels so smooth. You feel powerful, but it isn't easy. I feel like the scaling, perks, it feels well balanced between challenging and fun. Making some places a struggle where the win is that much more satisfying.

I also really enjoyed bits and pieces of the lore - but for me - it was just as confusing as I expected from an eldritch game. I played it blind, not knowing there was 3 endings - so I played it 3 times to perfection - 100% worth it, and I'd do it again.

I will be playing Jotun in the future, and I hope to see more like this in the future from Thunder Lotus Games!
Well done!

A very fun game with good level design. Easy to sink a few hours into this

OK game, but I will not recommend it, play at your own risks and enjoyment.


2/3 of the game it was a good experience, nothing outstanding but a solid game.

Last region and especially final boss (resist) is such a let down.

Endless swarm of enemies is so so game mechanic at best. And when they all really annoying, fill up all screen + there is environmental hazards to complement this dish = no thank you.

Final boss attacks extremely spammy and deal ridiculous amount of damage.
After I got really annoyed and lower the difficulty from normal to easy - it changed absolutely nothing (I deal and receive the same amount of damage, boss has the same extremely spammy attack patterns, what the point of easy difficulty?).

Worst part - with all this cool powers and upgrades by the end of the game you are supposed to feel like a badass, but it was completely the opposite for me.

reminds me of playing hollow knight for the first time, youre dropped into a strange place with no idea what youre doing with only this magical sword thing to fight with, gives me dead cells vibes as well with the upgrades after dying and all

You are not allowed to sleep on this game.
It's one of the most compelling and addictive metroidvanias I have ever played.
I was never bored, not once, didn't even play another game simultaneously.
It's up there in heaven with Aeterna Noctis and Hollow Knight and all the other awesome ones.

Dungeons are somewhat randomized, powers and abilities are unique, platforming and traversing is insanely fun.
Combat will grow on you.
It's quite unique with it's enemies spawning in hordes when the gong sounds.
Man, even the boss fights are unique.

There was one phase where I really was in trouble because I play on hard difficulty.
Whenever you enter a new area complex you will get rected but don't worry.
You just gotta push through and you will git gud eventually.

I am a total beast now and cannot die anymore, that's how gud I became at the end.
Get this no matter what, 100% recommend all the way.
I love everything about this game and will surely replay at some point

This game is not for everyone, that's for sure.
Still, give it a try, especially if you like the art style of this sidescrolling 2d metroidvania.

At first, I didn't get into this game, being a strange mix of metroidvania and rogue-like with unusual elements like the horde mechanic. I think it's a quite niche-targeted product, and if you don't like either of the elements, this is most likely not for you.
That said, the more I played, the more I liked it, opening up the "second" area being the definite turning point where I was hooked.
The game is very much Lovecraft Lite, if you look for cosmic horror, this isn't it: it feels very much like a polished metroidvania with none too many mechanical suprises, the story is almost hidden. The Lovecraftian elements are there, but depending on your view of view, they range somewhere between aesthetics and strong influences, although the three endings all fit quite well.
Nonetheless, it is a cool story, the Lovecraftian elements work in the context of the plot, and the exploration-focused gameplay loops nicely. The horde mechanic is definitely the biggest diversion from genre conventions, and it does help to create a certain sense of anxiety throughout the start, since you never know when the next wave hits you. And waves can be anxiety inducing, feeling like there is no end to it. As you get used to it, you start liking it more, I think, although it loses much of its initial horror, and the reshuffling of the map upon death while still staying true to the general outline is also a nice touch and adds a lot to the game's appeal. Locking parts of the talent tree and only unlocking them once you get new abilities is an interesting approach I hadn't seen hitherto. Making the majority of the perks a combination of advantages and drawbacks certainly helps working out different playstyles. An additional major nice touch is the gameplay and plot affecting decision of destroying or using Elder Shards, heavily impacting how certain abilities work (turning an air-dash into a directional releport, or turning double jump into either gliding or triple jump, for example), although the game could've included at least one sign as to how destroying elder shards will affect you.
One 100% playthrough is achievable in something between 15 and 20 hours, if you do it entirely on your own.
The story kinda requires you to look for it, you mostly need to read and piece little pieces of lore together, be they story beats in "crystal" areas, where your "guide" the Shining Trapezohedron gives some insights into the events that took place in this area, or 'flavour text' in perk and skill descriptions. I liked this approach, but it's not for everyone.
Do buy this game if: you love metroidvania (especially the exploration-part), dig the Lovecraftian plot, like trying out different combinations to fit the abilities to your own playstyle, like piecing together lore like a puzzle.
Don't buy this game if: you dislike the death-is-part-of-getting-better aspects of souls-likes, dislike the horde mechanic, dislike metroidvania or non-linear exploration-focused games, want more unusual game mechanics, expect the story to be laid out normally.

In just a short time, Sundered has thrown me into a chaotic, hand-drawn nightmare where the enemies are endless, the upgrades are confusing, and the map hates me more than the monsters do. The combat is thrilling, but every battle feels like I've signed up for a marathon I didn't train for. Dramatic and relentless, it's less about victory and more about screaming, "Please stop spawning!" while embracing my inevitable doom.

Well-animated and fun Metroidvania. Navigation can be difficult at times and the beginning is slow going but if you stick with it this is a decent play. I don't remember much of the story, though.

Amazing metroidvania with great movement

XEAFGSJCHTULABACTJHDJDL (screams in eldritch)

If your playing on a 4K monitor, an absolute treat.

Developed by Thunder Lotus Games and released in 2017, Sundered is a side scrolling, hand drawn Eldrich inspired metroidvania. Will you choose to embrace the darkness or use technology to banish it?

In a desolate desert, the main character Eshe explores until shadowy arms rise from the sands and tentacles engulf her while dragging her to unknown depths. After a short tutorial, Eshe meets the Shining Trapezohedron, that speaking in a forgotten language, grants her the power to defend herself.

While exploring the ever-changing corridors, you’ll face strange creatures, robots, and even giant bosses, whereby defeating them you’ll gain new powers that will allow to visit places once out of reach.

With a stupendous art style complemented by a foreboding soundtrack and ambient noises, exploration becomes a reward on itself, since like most games on this genre, exploration and backtracking are essential.

Depending on choices made during the game, the story may lead you to different results, presenting the game’s main replay value.

This game can be controlled by either keyboard or controller, having the option of local multiplayer up to 4 players.

As a choice for an incredibly well written Eldrich story, fluid movement, and impressive graphics, Sundered is a game I highly recommend.

If you enjoyed this review, I would like to invite you to visit Backlog log my curator page for more recommendations and reviews.

[08.12.2024 - 13.12.2024]
So, to start off, I have got mixed feelings. I love the art, the smoothness of animations, fights and gameplay, but it gets kind of annoying, especially on harder difficulties, it's not for me, the pacing feels lacking in the area of smoothness they fought. There are just better games similar to this one, like.. Dust an elysian tail, eh.
However, love that it has 3 endings and to get the platinum, you'd need to at least make a copy of your save, and keep those shards, finish it without doing anything, finish it then with destroying it, finish it with corrupting it, a spoiler for those who want or would ever platinum or see all of those endings without repeating the game over and over. Or just make a 2nd playthrough with 2 endings.
The story is sublime, there is none basically, just a bit to make you go through the world, nothing else, but voices, sounds are quite amazing.
Still I know it's an indie game studio, so I'll give them some credit there.
I'll give it 7, I've mastered almost every perk out there, got bored of it, so rushed through the final as I could, tho it took for my save around 17 hours with grinding, could easily finish this in under 10 hours, so keep that in mind. I've just wasted time nonetheless.
If you love handrawn games like the Sundered is, give it a try. But don't expect a ground breaking game of the genre, because it's not this one, not even close.
I'll give it a go to platinum, even tho I got kinda bored, exhausted.
Have fun, enjoy!

PS. Played and Finished it on the Steam Deck OLED.

Great game, solid lore, can recommend.

It's tough but it feels so good to learn what you gotta do to defeat each boss and figure out where to go
The graphics are also awesome and the music is so so good, really makes the enviroment feel real and beautiful but at the same time unreal and mysterious, I can't quite explain it
I uh couldn't beat the final boss neither have I gotten to the other two but I enjoyed the game regardless, will get back to it and finish it someday when I have more free time :3

Few games get me addicted nowadays, and this is one of them!

It was fun.... right up until the final boss. Then it just become BS.
So, the good. While I prefer games that focus on the skill you defeat enemies with, this game has a good premise of navigating the horde rather than defeating it. In other words, you gotta have a good kill/run ratio. Know when to stand and fight, know when to juke them. MOST bosses are pretty good, I don't have much to say on them. The platforming and metroidvania aspects are fairly satisfying, and I like how if you now what you're doing, you can basically fly.

The bad. Skill doesn't seem to factor much, and a lot of the time I felt like I clutched through sheer luck rather than skill. Par for the course when theres so many enemies, but you win some you lose some, luck has its own thrill after all. The rebirth perk which revives you doesn't provide invincibility, so it's way too possible to have your shields taken out before you can even move when you use it in a boss room. The late game bosses go from L&S being annoying but not too bad too the final boss (Which I will label N), resist final boss (Which I will label N&T), and dlc boss being outright bs, which is the main reason I thumbs downed this game. the DLC boss is straight up bs, only have a few attacks but having so little opening as to make it almost a "Can you tank as much as he can tank?"

The final bosses in particular are annoying as hell. First, N has a lot of area denial, and REALLY likes using them around the only spots you can do damage. That would be fine if they didn't A; keep the weak spots up in the air, meaning your fighting gravity just to hit them once, let alone navigate the attacks, and B; they move too, often forcing you to hit the ground again and waste time. N&T is worse than that, because not only does it have the exact same moveset as N, but it strips you of all but one move (That I rarely used) to fight him with, and adds so many suicide bomb enemies that towards the end of it, I literally cannot see, let alone aim my attack. The best part? If you die, you have to fight N first, again.

It left such a bitter taste that I've just given up on the game after about 8 tries. I was so angry that even if I beat it, no matter how good the ending was I would just sit there fuming.

It's a satisfying game because eventhough it has a roguelite feature, it doesn't take away your treasures and skills everytime you die. You could also kill the boss over and over while the game still confirming your triumphancy against the boss by giving a certain artifact exchangeable for a new skill.

I love the graphic design and the large bosses. If there's one thing that doesn't match the atmosphere of the game will be the pop graphic for Lovecraftian theme.

Still enjoy the game tho.