Witchfire is a difficult fantasy FPS roguelike that rewards persistence

thesixthaxis.com:

After a year of Epic Store exclusivity, the Witchfire Early Access has been released on Steam with a further 9-12 months expected before a full launch. While some may scoff at such a lengthy spell before full release, there is plenty of content to get your teeth into in the current build. Given the high difficulty level of the game it is also going to take most players a considerable amount of time to even scratch the surface of what there is to offer. Whether this difficulty appeals or not depends on what you want from a game.

If there’s one thing that immediately stands out, it’s that Witchfire already looks fantastic, the various environments benefiting from a dark and Gothic aesthetic that perfectly suits the medieval vibes of the game. Guns have a good feel to them with weighty sound effects and an atmospheric ambient soundtrack filled with chants provides the backdrop. While each area can feel a little constrained, the overall enemy variety is good, with most of them being forms of demonic knights or skeletons, but presenting a challenging mixture of ranged opponents and those that like to get close up and dirty. Mobility is the key to success and it is not unusual to get wiped out in short order if you get stuck.

To traverse the environment and engage in combat you have a double jump, a dash and a slide. Taking full advantage of all of these is necessary to survive and it may be worth rebinding some controls to suit. I changed dash to double tap movement buttons which felt far more intuitive to me than the default setting. Double jump can be particularly useful for finding a good camping spot to pick off enemies, but even this approach isn’t foolproof as teleporting melee enemies can easily reach you if you stay still for too long.

There are a range of classes that are suited to different approaches, from close up shotgun carriers to those more focused on magic and sniping from afar. Regardless of the class you choose you can change up your loadout as you unlock