Limerick: Cadence Mansion Review

The creepy, dark halls of Limerick: Cadence Mansion aren’t exactly what I think of when limericks come to mind. Usually, I envision silly short poems with a bouncy rhyme scheme and a clever turn of phrase. Brief, humorous, and nonsensical. But in this first-person, action-horror adventure from Jenito Studios, poetry is deadly. Rhythm and rhyme come with terrors aplenty, tense boss fights, and a number of intricate puzzles. On Nightsonnet Isle, the titular Cadence Mansion awaits you with mysteries to solve and not-so-sweet poems to fill you with dread.

Limerick: Cadence Mansion is a mixture of a lot of games I love. Its setting and storytelling are reminiscent of BioShock and Prey (2017). There are also touches of Portal and the Amnesia series in regards to its puzzles. However — even with all these great comps — it manages to stand out on its own, as it leans heavily into poetry in its world-building. Your main antagonist is a marionette named Limerick, and you’ll go up against his monstrous Stanzas, dangerous manifestations of energy. Even the difficulty levels fit the theme, as you can play on Essayist (Easy), Proofreader (Normal), or Master of Writ (Hard). I went with Proofreader and was pleasantly surprised when that became my moniker in-game.

As the Proofreader, I must navigate Limerick’s mansion, solving his puzzles and fighting (or sneaking past) enemies along the way. It has a nice, balanced loop to it. There’s just enough action to kickstart your adrenaline and cerebral moments to give you a breather while also lulling you into a false sense of security. I also want to highlight the varied enemy designs. From the slow-moving Dissonance monster — what I like to call a giant floating squid — to the nightmare-fuel Epitaphs (you’ll have to see those for yourself), you’ll encounter plenty of creepy foes. Limerick is perhaps the worst of them all; I’ve always been irked by marionettes, and this one is just downright menacing.

Combat is engaging, giving you a BioShock-esque set of tools by letting you switch between using a gun or Psythermic energy to fend off your foes. You can also upgrade your weapons from workbenches scattered throughout the building. But when you’re not fighting, you might be sneaking past patrolling enemies. Some of Limerick’s monsters aren’t killable, so you have no choice but to stay completely out of sight unless you want to trigger a tense chase sequence. These stealth sections really slow down the pace, as you’re essentially just waiting behind cover until the coast is clear (rinse and repeat), but the threat of being spotted is enough to keep your attention.

In the inevitable event that you do get caught, you’ll get to use one of my favourite mechanics from this game: panic closets. The mansion is littered with these things, and they’re a unique spin on the hiding sequences you get in most horror games. Instead of closing the wooden door on a run-of-the-mill closet, these look more like elevators. To use them, you’ll power a battery, install it into the panic closet, press a button to turn it on, and then press another button to close the door. Once inside, soothing music will play while you regain health and energy. However, what this looks like in practice is actually very chaotic. I’m essentially smashing my mouse button to kickstart the power and then frantically pressing the red button to shut the doors. Thankfully, you can pre-charge the battery, so at least you’re not trying to do that with an enemy hot on your tail. While you can switch your difficulty to Essayist to cut out most of these steps, I loved how the extensive process added to the desperation in the middle of a chase. However, in the rare event that I switched my difficulty, I often messed up by closing the doors when I wasn’t fully inside the closet, which meant that it would be forever closed due to its infinite battery. So, if you’re playing Essayist, be warned.

As mentioned, Cadence Mansion is full of puzzles. Most of them are designated to their own room, and to solve them, you’ll use environmental clues, such as notes written on a wall or letters scattered about. I wouldn’t say the puzzles are particularly difficult, but they make up for it in variation. You’re not just going from section to section looking for valves or keys. Instead, you’ll solve weight-based puzzles, fill in the blanks of poems, or balance power levels using maths — and so much more. If you told me Limerick was primarily a puzzler, I’d believe you. And it’s a good one. But it’s also definitely a horror game at its core.

Puzzles, action, and terrifying scares all come together in Limerick Encounters — what I’ve started calling Limerick’s haunted house of horrors. These are unique survival situations where you’ll be hunted by monsters and the marionette himself in a small, dark arena. You not only have to run or fight to survive, but you also have to solve three puzzles… three times each. In my experience, I was often interrupted mid-solving, rushing to a nearby panic closet with Limerick laughing behind me. The environment is also dangerous, with sharp obstacles blocking your path, which makes running away even more difficult. All in all, it’s a great combination of all the game’s elements. But my only issue is the requirement to solve the puzzles three times over. It ultimately gets repetitive and drags down the experience.

With that said, this game certainly delivers on content, as there are also intense boss fights. You’ll face three of them throughout your adventure, and each is action-packed. You’re given a temporary boost of unlimited energy and increased movement speed, so you can just go all in with these battles. They were quite fun but also a kind of unexpected addition. I’m not even sure they were needed in this title. They almost feel out of place, as if they belong in a different game, but I still enjoyed them nonetheless.

If you like your horror games with well-crafted creepy sound design, music, and enemies — you’ll have your fill with Limerick: Cadence Mansion. However, if you’re in it for the story, you might be disappointed. Aside from a robot named P-BO, your primary way of getting the story is through letters left by previous workers who lived on Nightsonnet Isle and had a hand in Limerick’s origin. However, the more notes you find from various characters, the more they sound the same. They don’t have unique voices, so they all blend together, and eventually, I got quite lost trying to piece together the narrative of the past and my current conundrum of being trapped in the mansion. Overall, the storytelling is disjointed and vague. There’s definitely a sinister tale under it all with intricate lore; I just wish it was more direct with its delivery.

Limerick: Cadence Mansion is a solid action-horror adventure. It finds a satisfying rhythm, blending combat and puzzles seamlessly. From well-timed, precise jumpscares to detailed environments, you’ll find a carefully crafted, creepy experience awaiting you. Though it misses the mark with some of its storytelling, you’re still in for a thrilling time.