Blackwind Reviews
While it's packed with old-school hack and slash action, Blackwind's lack of variety and lackluster mechanics leave a lot to be desired.
It’s difficult to recommend on a story basis thanks to its generic narrative, and even harder to recommend on a gameplay basis thanks to the slew of glitches, loose controls, and boring progression. With more time and refinement, Blackwind could very well have been an enjoyable experience, but alas, it didn’t seem to be written in the stars.
Blackwind is an ambitious game that proves it can do it all – just not at once.
Blackwind is an enjoyable twin-stick shooter that features intuitive gameplay and a wealth of satisfying moves. That being said, if its campaign was structured in a more comprehendible manner then it would be a much more fulfilling adventure.
Heavy mechs smashing up alien threats is always going to be entertaining, but just be wary of expecting too much out of Blackwind other than straightforward action with some slight detours.
Blackwind has the right ingredients for an engaging and challenging game, but the lack of proper difficulty balance and camera frustrations prevent it from hitting the right marks.
It is accurate to say that BlackWind didn't present anything really inovating, but it combined several formulas (successfully) and presented a very pleasant experience. A title for players who like different styles and enjoy a gratifying gameplay, without many compromises. Nevertheless, we highlight the available difficulty modes (which are reflected in enemy fire rates and higher HP), which manage to adjust this title, from a more casual to a more frantic experience.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
Blackwind is a decent hack-and-slash action game with fast agile gameplay and a good mix of puzzles and platform sections. The story and cartoon-stylised cutscenes were enough to keep me invested in wanting to find out what happens next, and the voice acting was great. I often fought against the camera angle, particularly when trying to be precise with platform jumping sections, but the combat and execution takedown animations was great fun.
Failing to stack up anywhere near it’s contemporaries, Blackwind is a hollow exosuit complete with unengaging combat, mind-numbing exploration and puzzle elements, repetitious presentation, poor story and baffling design choices. There are plenty of potentially great ingredients to this package, but unlike the age-old adage, the sum is certainly no greater than the parts. A meek gust of breeze as opposed to the promise of a gale-force wind.
The potential for something fascinating was there, but unfortunately, the game's first hour gave us a false impression, as the promising combat model and exploration became a repetitive, prolonged slog way before the end credits. Too bad.
It isn't downright bad by any means, just like going back and playing the original God of War on PS2 isn't bad either. But that design is really only excusable in the context of its time. Blackwind will have some appeal to hardcore fans of early 2000's action games, but without those rose tinted glasses, there isn't much here to help it rise above mediocrity.
Blackwind has a lot of promise, but fails to deliver on it. Smooth controls can't make up for repetitive combat and bad design choices.
Overall though, Drakkar Dev and Blowfish Studios’ science fiction action adventure platformer mech based hack & slash Blackwind is a fun little adventure. You trek through the various areas that you’ll get to explore on the planet Medusa-42 as you play James Hawkins as he looks for his father.
What can I say, my ears always perk up at the suggestion of a game that in any way features mechs...
Blackwind is as utilitarian as a bank statement and painfully middle-of-the-road. It's tough to recommend that you play this game because we can scarcely remember anything notable about it from our own playthrough. Yet at the same time, it doesn't actually do anything egregiously wrong to make it instantly destined for the garbage bin. If you're looking for an entirely unremarkable and unoriginal sci-fi themed hack 'n' slash, Blackwind certainly ticks those boxes. Unfortunately, if you're looking for a meaningful way to spend your limited time and hard-earned money, this ain't it. We won't go so far as to say that you should definitely give Blackwind a pass, but we'd understand entirely if you did.
The issues in Blackwind aren't insurmountable and it's possible to have some fun with the combat, but it's clear that it still needs some work. An update with camera options, a proper map system, and improved jumping would be worth checking out, but the current game is still too rough to recommend.
Blackwind is a third-person hack-and-slash game about a teenager piloting an experimental mech suit to search for his dad and fight aliens. It’s fast, visceral, and mostly satisfying to play. Unfortunately, it also suffers from weapon imbalance, repetitive combat animations, and a few technical problems.
Blackwind presents a sci-fi platforming world that is fun to smash through and fly around its desolate landscapes. However, it sticks with its formula of killing enemies and unlocking areas so tightly that it lacks spontaneity and becomes too predictable too fast. Repetitive music, awkward dialogue and unvaried landscapes all lead to a pretty lackluster experience that even the fun combat can’t fix. Blackwind needs more time taking risks and experimenting with the very versatile genres it encompasses in order for it to stand out amongst the crowded population of action games.
With every aspect of Blackwind comes a new laundry list of issues big and small that make it feel like it should have been incubated a while longer.
After great first impressions showcasing fun gameplay and interesting characters, it quickly becomes a fascinatingly bad example of mech combat, lacking feedback, foresight, and fair play. Unbelievably boring offensive capabilities, a nonsensical story, and hilarious voice acting which tries its best to stand out. Unfortunately, it isn't enough to stand out.