The Swindle Reviews
The Swindle has some really cool ideas, and the sound and visuals make for one of the prettiest games out there. But, for players looking for something new or intrigued by the steampunk aesthetic, the randomized barrier to entry may be a bit too much.
Everything adds up to a game with good ideas that is sorely lacking in refinement – the punitive flaws of The Swindle's meta-structure and procedural generation could have been ameliorated with minor tweaks. This feels 80% of the way to a great game, but that missing 20% soon comes to dominate the rest.
It's a huge shame that The Swindle misses the mark so hard on its execution. The tools, upgrades, and challenges are all really fun to experiment with. There's a great game somewhere within the mess, but you'll probably stop having fun way before you manage to pull off the heist of a lifetime.
In the end The Swindle is an ambitious game that unfortunately just falls in at average
Size Five's The Swindle has come to Nintendo Switch but a new console can't fix the same old frustrating controls
My time with The Swindle was littered with failure. I blame myself for plenty of those attempts, but the game roots against you in a way that's nearly unrivaled in the past two decades of video games. Not since the Wet Bandits attempted to invade the McCallister residence has burglary gone so laughably wrong. Yet still, it had its moments and surely there are those that will appreciate this sort of beating more than I did. Perhaps it hearkens back to a time when games didn't hold our hands as much, and if that's the case, perhaps I've been coddled by quick-time events and cutscenes that do the hard stuff for me. I don't believe that's the case, though. 2015 is my 20th year as a gamer and I have played few games that challenge your patience as much as The Swindle. Maybe the game's robots have achieved sentience and human-like emotions. That would explain all the menacing satisfaction they seem to derive out of my failure.
The Swindle is an enjoyable enough game which I would probably rate higher on other platforms, but the additional shortcomings with the Switch version in handheld mode make it a little more difficult for me to recommend. If the technical issues aren’t deal breakers for you, and if you’re looking for something you can play in short bursts and which will let you progress quickly, this is a fine enough choice. If you can play it on another platform, I’d suggest going that route instead.
A Sonic-the-Hedgehog-esque money-as-health system would be my proposed solution, where every hit results in some dropped wonga as you limp back to the escape vessel, but until then, for all The Swindle’s good attributes, it manages to suck the fun out of its own good ideas so thoroughly in its early-game that many players won’t have the desire to soldier on.
While the game is indeed varied and its visual environment is very well designed, it can often become very repetitive as it compels the player to repeat missions again and again.
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The uncompromisingly brutal difficulty of The Swindle will turn many off, but for those up to the challenge, the reward of thrilling thievery could very well be worth the effort.
Well, I'm still ambivalent, even after working through things in what has maybe become a longer review than planned. For the moments where the procedural stuff just works perfectly, creating a bastard-hard but ultimately memorable level, and for the world itself, which is lovely, The Swindle is worth dedicating a couple evenings to. It won't steal your heart though.
The Swindle is a good game on the cusp of greatness, but falters from a structural identity crisis that is hard to ignore.
Despite its flaws and steep challenge, The Swindle on the Wii U eShop taught me how to become a greedy, stealthy crook — and I loved every minute of it.
The Swindle is a fun romp through Victorian London, and the feeling of getting away with the heists is one that never gets old, but the game is brought down by some questionable design choices and some technical issues. If it's a decent roguelike you seek, you won't regret taking a look, but if you're craving for the next Spelunky, take your thievery skills elsewhere.
'The Swindle' can be very satisfying, if you don't mind its cruel difficulty and regularly mystifying level design. It is not a AAA stealth game with all of its fancy checkpoints and low difficulty levels and no death penalty. It's not that those things are bad necessarily, it's just that roguelikes are intended to be a very different experience, one in which success is distant, pain is frequent, and every reward is a joyous occasion.
Overall, I enjoyed my time with The Swindle. While the random levels were a point of frustration, and the occasional frame rate drops maddening, the gameplay is solid and provides players with an interesting challenge in a wonderful setting. If you can get past its brutal challenge, you'll find a rewarding experience, even if it can be an exhausting one.
To that end, The Swindle is a usually enjoyable jaunt that's equal parts familiar and refreshing. It's by no means an easy game. The 100-day time limit can prove a huge frustration, but it does succeed in adding a significant portion of tension. Like anything irritating you'll eventually feel the urge to hit back - what's critical is whether that's enough for you to close the game forever, or the impetus you need for just one more shot.
It's hard to fully recommend a game with inconsistent controls, but The Swindle is awfully close to being excellent. There are a huge number of enemies with different behaviors and the randomized level generator is more than happy to put multiple kinds together in ways that require different strategies to handle.
Thrilling when it works, incensing when it doesn't
It's hugely clever, chaotic and funny, though there are downsides in the implementation of randomly generated stages and in some technical glitches and flaws. Despite some issues the premise, presentation, music and gameplay all work well together, making this a steal on the Wii U - just not the great heist it could have been.