Curse of the Sea Rats Review: A Fun Metroidvania Struggles To Swim

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Many games have taken up the mantle of the Metroidvania genre, offering players non-linear journeys through various areas that require unique items or abilities to complete. , from developer Petoons Studio and publisher PQube, takes on the title of a «ratoidvania» instead. The gamesets its scenario swiftly, establishing a curse that turns the characters into rats, a historical setting on the Irish coast, and a goal of saving a kidnaped child. Players do so by jumping and slashing their way through a variety of environments inspired by Ireland's geography, brought to life in vivid color and passable detail.

Navigating the world of and defeating its enemies feels familiar to games like , although the inability to move while performing a standard attack makes for stiffer fights. Player characters and enemies alike feature lively animations, but combat often falls back to locking swords in close quarters and relying on attack speed to come out the victor. Upgrade trees for each of the four switchable characters offer more stat boots than transformative gameplay, with interspersed special moves providing infrequent shakeups. A couple of regenerative abilities heavily incentivize the use of the characters that bear them.

These abilities and general leveling can make players who aren't racing through the game outpace its difficulty curve. Bosses can prove more exciting than regular enemies, but players gunning for anything near 100% completion can beat many later bosses without playing particularly well. These lofty goals are both enticing and achievable, with consistently engaging spatial progression and quests and secrets that shy away from being cryptic. Death can be frequent in stretches, butlacks the complications in