Sword of the Necromancer
OpenCritic Rating
Top Critic Average
Critics Recommend
Sword of the Necromancer Trailers
Sword of the Necromancer - Launch Trailer
Sword of the Necromancer - Announcement Trailer
Sword of the Necromancer - Kickstarter Trailer
Critic Reviews for Sword of the Necromancer
Sword of the Necromancer is a fun roguelike, with a unique enemy revival system that sets it apart from other titles in the genre. Unfortunately, a lacklustre combat system and unoriginal story mean that it doesn't quite match up to the absolute best roguelikes out there.
I will almost certainly play a sequel if there is one but Sword of the Necromancer is a hard sell. It might be worth resurrecting, but not more than once.
Sword of the Necromancer manages to bring something new to the flooded rogue-like genre while providing a heartwarming story. It has a multitude of options to allow players to tailor the game to their liking. It's breadth of mechanics allow for tons of experimentation that will keep you coming back until you finally get the true ending.
If you are looking for a nice, light rogue-like to jump into that doesn’t feel mindless, this is the game for you.
Sword of the Necromancer is by no means a perfect game, but it's still enjoyable with a few issues here and there. Tama never feels like she's getting stronger and the monsters you summon are hit and miss as to whether they'll actually be effective in a fight or just randomly run around the room going nowhere near where you want them to. The bosses are also hit and miss when it comes to those that require strategy and those that just have you run away for a bit before getting in one or two hits and repeating. However, the story is great and well voice-acted and the soundtrack has a lot of nice tracks to listen to.
With nothing to offer besides some pleasant storytelling, we cannot recommend Sword of the Necromancer on any meaningful level. It's not horrible, but it's bereft of both meaningful content and any manner of unique execution. A sequel or heavily-modified relaunch could salvage the game into something much stronger, as the core idea of resurrecting fallen monsters is a decent one, but its treatment here renders it irrelevant. What a shame. This could have been something special. It's not a complete and total disaster – occasionally, when the screen is a little busier, you might feel a flicker of engagement as you dash between combatants – but overall, we'll be leaving this one for dead.
As much as I wanted to love Sword of the Necromancer (particularly after getting further into the story) it’s held back by so many annoyances that I didn’t have an amazing time playing through it. There are definitely some cool ideas, and the enemy design in particular is excellent, but issues with its core gameplay keep it from being the fun little experience I was hoping for.
