Ashen

I had this on Switch before getting it on PC. It's fun, don't understand the mixed reviews.

I do agree stamina consumption is bonkers though lol

It took me three attempts to get into this game, but I eventually realised I was just missing doing an important first step at the beginning.

I'm so conflicted on this game. The visuals, the music, the atmosphere - all of this is great. However, the game gets ruined a bit by a few questionable decisions (specifiaclly the listeners' dungeon and the final boss fight, as well as most of the dlc). Ashen gets *this* close to being perfect, if not for the problems mentioned above

"I could not play for more than a few minutes without the game closing up or crashing. After a quick Google search I found a weird solution to the issue. Many people also encountered this problem. After some reading it seems to be a software issue and not necessarily the game's fault. Again, I feel like this needed to be addressed nonetheless." - Upon Arrival

Dont even get me started on the "co-op" it does not work

---{ 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

---{ Game Size }---
☑ Floppy Disk
☐ Old Fashioned
☐ Workable
☐ Big
☐ Will eat 10% of your 1TB hard drive
☐ You will want an entire hard drive to hold it
☐ You will need to invest in a black hole to hold all the data

---{ 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

though the game isn't perfect, it is still a quite enjoyable souls-like
plays generally quite well on the steam deck!

про производительность не слово, её тут нет😀😁😂

This is a very fun game with many intricate systems, fun yet challenging combat, and is easy to play. I would recommend the game to anyone even people who don't usually like souls like game. My only complaint is there is a glitch where If your computer runs on 11th gen intel then you won't be able to play the game. It crashes immediately or after a minute. This issue has been present for at least 3 years since 2021 and still has not been fixed. Luckily there are multiple fixes that work to subvert this problem that are very easy and take almost no time. Just look up the fix and spend like five minutes setting it up then enjoy hours of fun.

While i have to agree with some points about the game feeling clunky at times, it is really a thing of getting used to it. It has a very distinct art style and in my opinion looks fantastic. Some moments in this game are very epic and especially the second to last boss while very hard is super cool designed. I had a great time and when i got frustrated it was really my fault. I'd say if you'd like to try a soulslike with an a bit clearer narrative i'd say go for this. Sadly with 15 hours its a bit short, although i definitely didnt search around in all corners for all the scattered items, but since most of it is cheap consumables i probably missed out on some cool items because it was too tedious to fetch them. I'd say get it on sale. All around a 7.5/10 in my book, very solid.

combat is a little janky sometimes but overall i really love it

good fuggin game

great game! I am playing this after elden ring, and I like the open world + soulslike elements. It feels a bit easy and perhaps boring at the very beginning, but does become more challenging later on

Let me begin by stating my thoughts about what I found to be good in the game:

- The minimalistic art is phenomenal. I would not say unique but certainly wonderful.
- Some incredibly lovable characters.
- Solid storyline.

Now, let me state what I think may not be the game's fault but I feel like it needs to be mentioned:

I have been a PC player for many years now. Never have I ever encountered a game that ALWAYS launches on my secondary screen. Each and every time this happened. No matter what I did, it always launched on my secondary screen. No bid deal. SHIFT+WINDOWS+Right arrow key and the game is back to my main screen.

I could not play for more than a few minutes without the game closing up or crashing. After a quick Google search I found a weird solution to the issue. Many people also encountered this problem. After some reading it seems to be a software issue and not necessarily the game's fault. Again, I feel like this needed to be addressed nonetheless.

Now for the absolute bad of this game:

Combat is absolutely horrendous. It is clunky and feels very, very slow. Stamina consumption is off the charts. If you though DS1's stamina was bad, this game's is worse.

Even though there are a lot of weapons, the variety is terrible. Your only choices differ from slight variations of axes or clubs. You can equip a one handed weapon and a two handed weapon and switch between them. It's terrible to be limited this way. I don't know why they got rid of being able to one-hand or two-hand ANY weapon.

You have to PAY to equip talismans!

There are no stats in this game. Your weapon's damage is level up like any other souls-like, though upgrading it. However, your health and stamina is only increased by completing side quests, or finding some items to make it go up (not by much through the items though).

While not a new concept (Resident Evil I am looking at you), your inventory is quite limited. In good old souls-like fashion, this is not explained to you. Something that is also not explained to you is the "storage" chest you get later in the game. Because of this, I found myself constantly dropping weapons or other items that I would lose forever to make space for new stuff. Perhaps this is my own fault for not checking around the hub area enough.

This game is supposed to be co-op. However, online play is terrible. So, I resorted to using the AI companions. They are terrible though. They die or make stupid decisions all the time, which makes this game much harder. Dungeons lack any sort of checkpoints or even shortcuts. If you die close to the end of a dungeon or by the boss, you HAVE to tackle the entirety of the dungeon from start to finish. This is terrible level design.

You cannot wield a shield if you wield the lamp, and the lamp is pretty much mandatory to navigate the dungeons.

Enemy aggro is terribly inconsistent. Some enemies have an aggro range of a small square box. You step on it, they come after you. You get out of said little box and they start rushing back to their default position, like quickly. Some other enemies, particularly the Resident Evil's licker looking like monsters in the 2nd dungeon, have what seems to be an infinite aggro range. If you don't kill them, they will follow you to the end of the earth.

I hate to be negative about this game. I know they put a lot of effort into the creative art and the story and characters but there is just so much wrong with it that I cannot recommend it.

Good for solo, almost impossible to connect with friend.

It game

good game i will say, but if ur game crashes its bye bye to say cause it get corrupted, i played 8 - 9 hrs ggs

I'm a sucker for Souls Likes and minimalism, and this game is delivering in spades. The setting is grimly stunning, the combat is simple but tight and challenging, the story is vague but charming, the voice acting is surprisingly fantastic. Plus there's a fun collision bug (feature) where the enemy corpses fly into the air sometimes. Definitely worth a try for anyone who wants an understated Souls Like experience.

This game has really helped me go through my extreme stress while graduating university and going into my Master's soon afterwards. It reduced my anxiety a lot and it just gives me comfort with it's gameplay and general atmosphere. It's such a beautiful game in terms of world-crafting, music, and sound-design.

I know it's a meme, but this game gives me as much comfort as Skyrim did back when I was younger. It's the Skyrim of soulsborne games for me. I'd definitely recommend if you want a relaxing souls-like.

great art bad gameplay dont recommend it

So ... it's a really good game. The environment and the art style is just amazing, the map is well designed, the areas as "populated" (content, buildings ...) and seem natural and well integrated. Combat is responsive, dodge and parry works well, the weapons add a unique style on their alternate attacks, character designs are all good, and they work well as companions as you explore... over all is a game i recommend even more the Dark Souls it self (if you haven't noticed yet ... it follows the dark souls formula ...), as it gives a more enjoyable experience.

Honestly, I'd recommend it. Enjoyable about 15/20 hours.

After a full run of the game, I just can't put a good review on it, and here's why:

The darkness is a decent addition to the game, but is for some reason working solely around a lantern ? That you HAVE to carry in your hand and cannot put on your belt or any other means ? You can definitely put it on the ground, but 1/3 it will get stuck and you'll have to leave the zone to get it back. But by the fact you HAVE to carry it in your hand or put it down to have light, you are basically preventing any gameplay for players with two handers, which increase the feeling that you just didn't want people to play with it, they are slower, deal significantly lower DPS compared to one handers AND cannot carry light at the same time that you fight ? At this point why did you even bothered adding it to the game ?! The same goes for the spear, why would you even do a single melee attack, knowing that you can't stagger enemies, you won't deal damages, and you are slower than anything in the game.

The game's weaponry is overall very scarce, you can only play maces or axes (taking only the melee into account), you will always have the same moves sets (5 to 6 variation all weapon confounded and often shared), especially with 2 handers, and most of these moves sets are abnormally slow compared to AI movements, yes, with a bit of reflexes and knowing the patterns of enemies you can predict and fight them accordingly, but as a souls like, it removes any kind of fun out of it, you know that even the weakest enemy can beat you up in a second if you are not focused and that no respawn point will be nearby (and when I say nearby, I mean *nearby*, even the first Dark souls that are notorious for the long run back to bosses don't have this kind of punishments). Some weapon patterns do not even work with relic powers you unlock later in the game or are flawed since they trigger and impact and at the very first frame of your heavy attack, the weapon hit the floor and trigger the explosion under your feet !

The enemies patterns and attacks are often bugged, and will regularly go through walls and start their wind ups before seeing you if you don't wear the "no footsteps" perk, making even harder to handle simple random mobs, that as I said before WILL attack faster than you no matter the weapon you are using. And you can't really take the risk to use this perk since some other are vital if you want a chance to attack 3 times in a row without being out of stamina and unable to roll out of enemy's reach.

Wearing heavier and tougher armor throughout the game is basically useless, the mobs will still slap your ass as hard as others did at the beginning of the game, as if you were in rags and you can't do anything about that, so focus on the damages side. Don't even think of using a shield, you'll lose your stamina in 2 to 3 hits and become vulnerable to their chain attacks, and of course do not ever go in a fight thinking you can stagger the mob, even with a mace, with the +25% stun chance with a lantern in hand, the consumable increasing stuns up and ready and the +200% stun on charged attack provided by a relic. Because staggers, as I lived it, are an absolute myth of completely random with very low chances to happen, and will never be there when needed, the smallest enemy will just stab you with his 2 handed sword in a fraction of a second as soon as you bash his skull with all the stun bonuses you have.

And why the hell does your friend in coop takes the appearance of the NPC who's quest you've selected instead of the one he created in his save ? How does that makes sense ? The same as why the hell are we separated in the main town ?! Guys did you add the coop aspect at the last minute ?

Overall the game have great graphics, and the story is somewhat unique and interesting, it had a lot of potential but the overall gameplay, and especially the level design and the combat mechanics are lacking tremendously, to the point that we could even question the presence of specialised people focusing on that part of the game during production. Which is a real shame, because it brought the game down tremendously.

super fun

A Charming Disappointment. The gameplay is fun, except for some really long dull runs back to boss doors. What sucks is the loot. It's nearly all the same 5 items. Also, the trailer for coop is nothing like what you will experience. Coop is a joke, good luck getting it to work - it's random at best of times. If this had proper coop and just more rewarding exploration it would have been a top tier game. As it is, it's worth playing through once. Forget the DLC.

The game is so simple but also a bit challenging and the world is really pretty it has everything i would ever wish in any game the progression of the little village is also nice

The game is crashing, multiple times, at random places, during character creation, intro, settings menu..
No error message was given, just crash to desktop.
I use Core i9, 14th gen, 64GB ram, 4070Ti. All updated drives, other games and stuff work without issues.

Bought it for the co-op but the co-op is a terrible system where you connect and disconnect from your friend all the time, you personalize your character but to your friend you look like an npc from their game so no point in customization or fashion.

Underrated souls-like game, with a wonderful world, lovely music and voice acting, as well as enjoyable combat.

I'll preface this with I purchased this on Epic first, and have at least triple the play time there. I honestly love this game, and would recommend it to anyone who enjoys a souls-like game, it's not quite as challenging, or as deep with lore, but it makes up for that with charm, IMO.

The only real complaint I have about this game is the matchmaking for co-op, whomever your partner is basically takes over your in game AI partner, with no name above, or any real indicator there's a person in there aside from them running off to do something aside from being by your side.

If you've been considering trying it, there certainly won't be a better opportunity. You've wasted $10 on much worse, we all know that street meat still haunts your bathroom to this day.

Can't recommend this game, the atmosphere may be nice, the artstyle and music pretty interesting but the main focus, which would be combat is one of the worst. Apparently its not trying to be a souls like but it ends up being a poor's man one. If you thought DS1 was clunky,this is worse than that ,with tanky enemies that do not staggers, stupid ai companions that many times die , many times broken hitboxes, enemies that deal much more damage than you, there's barely any weapon variety when it comes to moves(its like 2-4 same animations for the amount of items) , limited storage inventory forcing you to throw away at one point items, one of the worst endgame boss in a game ever forcing you to cheese while once you die,you have to go through a pathway where ai companion might end up dying or you taking pointless damage(its literally over 1min to get back to the boss if you die)while most bosses in this game while some being interesting they're way too easy, no build variety, no real replayability, a lackcluster ending, input buffering resulting in your death many times, attacks that are slow and cannot be cancelled, hell I went on forever and could still go on to mark the negatives,so avoid this game. Cannot comment about online since I didn't try but from what I read its a mess as well so....

its time for Ashen 2 ...

:)

gg

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good game but disgusting runbacks to bosses whoever thought of that you need help. killed my fun i dont even want to kill the dlc boss because you have to go through the whole dungeon :)

I personally adore this underrated souls-like. Its a game with many flaws that I always acknowledge when replaying, however its strong areas have so much to love that for me its easy to overlook them.
Starting with flaws: The combat can feel slightly stiff compared other modern actions adventure games, the lock on can be finicky, multiplayer is inconsistent and runs in the background to place another player in the shoes of your AI companions (I turn this off), the run back for he final boss is pretty long, AI companions with often die to gravity in the first real dungeon and finally there's only a handful of bosses to fight.
Now for positives: The art style of this game is lovely, the areas feel distinct and while some are a bit dark others are outright gorgeous. Speaking of dark, the caves and dungeons are sparsely lit making you rely on an offhand lantern you can also place on the ground if needed, they ooze atmosphere and the lighting and sound design always make you feel on edge. Companions while sometimes buggy are well voice acted and add such a charm to the hometown areas and adventuring. As you complete quests for/with these companions the hub town itself will grow as they build houses and make it a home. By endgame you'll have a lively village filled with all your friends. The two major Dungeons of the game are a real challenge to tackle for the first time. They are long, mainly without checkpoints and filled with enemies and darkness. While some people may not enjoy how punishing they can be, I found them to be rewarding to finally conquer.
All in all Ashen is a solid souls-like with issues in some of its execution that weigh down an otherwise fantastic experience.
A sequel would go so hard, also Jokel MVP.

'Gender' is called 'style'. When switched to female, she wears a beard. Heavily sucks DS dick in the intro.

Apart from those, the Game is just boring. There is no leveldesign, AI is exploitable in all the wrong ways, NPC bugs out and prevents you from opening a door. Then you ask for a refund.

Save yourself the hassle.

not a very popular game but its very fun. its pretty basic but the visuals and set designs are amazing. the ai companion system is pretty good but kinda pisses me off sometimes making stupid descisions. overall i love this game

Recommended.
Ashen is a fantastic co-op Souls-like game and a perfect introduction to the genre. Excellent for playing alongside a friend, harder to recommend solo. Joining each other’s sessions by spinning in circles is a must! The game’s art style and story twists are captivating, and the harder difficulty mode, Children of Sissna, adds an extra layer of challenge. Standout bosses like Ukkoto, Garoran, Sissna, and the DLC boss Riak make each encounter memorable.
"May your light guide you through the darkness."
“Together, we are stronger than the darkness.”

Love it. A relaxing souls-like, and my first souls-like game. I played through it on Nintendo solo, was difficult but pieced my way through. Then played it Co-Op on PC with a veteran From Software player, he enjoyed Ashen as well!

Ashen is a good game.

Ashen is 'indie Dark Souls'. It's smaller, less complex and that makes it a great introduction to the Soulsbourne style but it's going to come off as lacking if you're expecting it to be as deep and complex as a AAA production.

It's understandable why people already deep into Soulsborne games would find this lacking when directly compared to Fromsoft's back catalogue but it's a pity more folks can't judge it on its own merits.

The clean, minimalist art style is an amazing visual metaphor for the overall tone of the rest of the game - it's beautiful for what it is, but don't go in expecting tremendous depth and complexity because that's just not what the game is about and you are needlessly setting yourself up for disappointment.

I think of this game as 'babies first dark souls' and I mean that in the most positive way possible.