A Bastard's Tale

Games should grab our attention as powerfully and as quickly as possible to get us hooked. Some games do it as early as the opening screen – inFamous' tragic press-start scene comes to mind. However, a great way to gain some interest is via the title – there's thousands of games out there on Steam, and a title that can make a player double-take will inevitably lead to sales. No Pest Productions certainly raised a few eyebrows with A Bastard's Tale – or A ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ 's Tale for Steam users – as swear words are shockingly uncommon in video game titles. However, the big question here: is the game as interesting as its title?

A Bastard's Tale is a story with a medieval flavour. You play as a knight in shining armour carrying a longsword (otherwise known as a bastard sword) whose goal is to hack his way through a horde of oncoming enemies before squaring up to a boss at the end of each level. This may sound like a generic old school hack-and-slash, but to call it old, generic, or even simple would do the game a grave injustice.

Where this game stands out from other side-scrolling hack-and-slashers is its control scheme, which turns out to be its defining feature. A Bastard's Tale offers unparalleled depth of control – in other games like this, one button is simply used for attack and another for block. Here, we use three apiece. A lets you swing your sword from the right, S lets you swing it overhead, and D lets it come in from the right. Z, X and C respectively let you block in those directions, allowing for a deeper sword fighting experience, in 2D, no less! However, while this configuration does allow for more choice and strategy instead of just mindlessly tapping one button, the set-up is initially more confusing than it is intuitive, leading to a lot of cheap and painful deaths.

A Bastard's Tale is a very short game – 5 levels at last count – but where it compensates is with difficulty. Mainly due to the fact that the new and dazzling control scheme it offers turns out to be rather cumbersome – in the time I've spent with the game, I've racked up about 70 deaths, a statistic that the game 'helpfully' flashes at you periodically. These controls are cumbersome in that because the controls are so tightly bunched together (look at your keyboard) that a game requiring the finesse that one would expect from a sword fight results in many wrong buttons pressed in the heat of battle. This means a steep difficulty curve that may scare off players who don't want to put in a time investment just to get good.

However, the controls aren't solely what make A Bastard's Tale the challenge that it is. The game is one of the most clearly retro-inspired games out there today, especially in design. This game is hard as a diamond, and could easily be dismissed as too difficult, but to do so would be to ignore its true nature. This is a game where you can't stand to take many hits, where you have to know your controls inside out, where you have to have enemy strategies and movements learned inside out. A Bastard’s Tale will accept nothing less than pure mastery to play it, and anything less will be dismissed as a feeble effort. If you want to beat this game and see the end of it, you need to put the hours in. The low amount of levels is a veneer hiding a deeper challenge that many gamers should ultimately appreciate.

The retro charm of the game extends to the graphics. Presented in gorgeous 16-bit pixel-art, A Bastard's Tale hits the mark like a sword in the heart of a blackguard. Everything looks sleek and shiny, bringing the medieval setting to life with colour, great visual detail, and also a range of clever visual effects. For instance, one of the enemies that can come at you is an angry villager wielding a pitchfork. When you deflect it in the right way, it will fly towards the screen in faux-3D, which not only looks great, but also asserts A Bastard's Tale as one of the prettiest pixel-art games on Steam today.

A Bastard's Tale doesn't sound too bad, either. Strictly speaking, the sound is the weakest part of the game – the music is passable but nothing to write home about; however, there are some lovely pieces of sound engineering to be found here. For instance, when your sword hits solid steel, it produces a satisfying metalling twing sound – the lack of which would make the game seem more flimsy. It also experiments with different audio levels – for instance, the sound of clinking footsteps gradually getting louder, creating the impression of being snuck up on. It's neat little ideas like this that make A Bastard's Tale a rounder and more satisfying package.

Make no mistake; A Bastard's Tale is difficult, and will leave you wondering if the eponymous bastard is the person who made this game. You will die a lot, no question, and the initial experience is likely to be rife with frustration, but this game will provide you genuine challenge matched only by 8-bit era games. If you're willing to give this game the respect it deserves, you'll find one of the best indie titles of the year.