Record of Lodoss War holds a special place in my heart: It is the first anime I ever watched (that I knew was an “anime” anyway) and–as I now write professionally about anime–it’s safe to say it changed my life forever. So when I heard that a new game, Record of Lodoss War: Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth was on the way, I knew I had to play it.
Record of Lodoss War: Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth hit steam early access this past week. It’s far from the full game, but with a fair amount of dungeon crawling and two boss fights, it’s certainly enough of a cross-section to get a feel for the game.
The game is set at an unspecified point in the Lodoss War timeline–though certainly after the death of Ghim. Deedlit awakens to find herself in a mysterious woods surrounded by ruins and with no memory of how she got there. Alone, she begins to explore her surroundings only to catch a glimpse of what looks to be Parn after the world suddenly glitches. Chasing after the phantom, she travels through the ruins–encountering her past companions, all-too-familiar monsters, and even her rival, the Dark Elf Pirotess.
As far as the story goes, there’s not much in the game at the start of early access. Deedlit seems to be shocked to see Parn–which, given their epic romance, is a good story hook in and of itself. Beyond that, Deedlit has a few short conversations–the most substantive of which are the enigmatic ones with first Slayn and then Pirotess. Both strongly imply that Deedlit doesn’t have a clue what’s truly going on and neither seem to be keen on cluing her in.
The conversation with the most interesting implications, however, is the one with Ghim. A ghost of his former self (pun intended), he only repeats a single line before acting as the game’s shop and selling various items and weapons to Deedlit–though he doesn’t disappear on her like all the other characters she encounters seem to do. How and/or why he’s alive is completely unexplained though Deedlit is as confused by this as we, the players, are at least.
Before we dive into the gameplay, a quick side note. As the game’s official page lists it as “a 2D-syle Metroidvania (action-exploration) game,” I suspect many reviews of this game will detail how it relates to/borrows from various Castlevania games–most specifically Symphony of the Night. I won’t be doing that because I have an odd relationship with the Castlevania series: namely that the only two games in the series I’ve played extensively are Lament of Innocence and Harmony of Despair–far from the most eponymous games in the series. While I have seen many a speedrun of both the original trilogy and Symphony of the Night, I have no hands-on experience so I can’t really talk about how Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth compares to them on that level. I can only talk about it as an “action-exploration” game in general.
On the most basic level, the game is built like any other action-platformer: you jump from platform to platform, killing any enemies you come across. This, in turn, gains you new weapons with different speeds and strengths for you to equip. From there, you further explore and unlock a bow as well as a magic spell that auto-targets enemies.
The bow is the key to many of the game’s puzzle rooms–in which you must bounce an arrow off of several metal plates in succession to cut a rope and open a door. This rewards you with upgrades like a slide dash or a larger max HP.
But what really makes the game fun to play are the spirits you contract with–namely Sylph and Salamander. Sylph allows you to float a certain height above the ground and Salamander adds fire damage to your attacks.
However, while you can change between them on the fly, you can only use one at a time. And as you kill enemies with one element, the other levels up. When you switch to that element at its max level (level 3 in the early access version) it heals you of any previously incurred damage over a period of a few seconds.
Which spirit you are using also has an effect in battle. Some enemies are weak to wind or fire–so you’ll do more damage to them by equipping the relevant spirit. But the real trick is how the spirits affect Deedlit defensively. Like with the polarism shift system in bullet hell title Ikaruga, the element of the spirit you are using nullifies attacks of that type. In other words, a fireball does no damage when you are using Salamander and wind walls do no damage when Sylph is equipped.
So in general, you’re constantly switching between the spirits as you explore the labyrinth. Sometimes this is due to ease of traversing from room to room. Sometimes it’s in order to best fight (or not fight) the enemies you come across–balancing your attack power against your defensive safety. It makes for fun play with a lot of options when it comes to handling the various encounters.
All in all, Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth early access is a solid cross-section of what the full game will likely be. And what can I say: over the half-hour it took for me to complete my first playthrough, I enjoyed it a lot–so much that I’ve gone through it two more times since (one of which I recorded and put into this very article).
If you’re a fan of Lodoss War or are just looking for something to scratch that old “Metroidvania” itch, you’ll likely find more than a little to catch your interest. The controls are tight, the pixel art is beautiful, and the spirit changing system makes both combat and exploration a lot of fun. If the full game manages to keep up the standard found in its first early access release, we should finish out with a pretty darn good game.
Record of Lodoss War: Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth was released on steam early access on March 12, 2020.
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