Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew Reviews
The definitive example of the stealth strategy game and a worthy swansong for developer Mimimi Games, as they deliver a charming and surprisingly accessible pirate swashbuckler.
Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew is a complex and very open game that will mainly appeal to players who loved Mimimi’s previous entries in the stealth action genre. All the mechanics are refined, and character choices open up a ton of options for each mission. Success requires patience and good planning, but improvisation often creates more memorable moments.
Mimimi Games shocked us all by saying "let's retire when we're at the top" after delivering their masterpiece with Shadow Gambit. It's a must-play game, the cursed crew needs our company.
Review in Turkish | Read full review
Mimimi Games is closing its gaming career in a big way. Pirate fantasy in the form of Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew is pretty, fun, enjoyable... just great. Unfortunately, it's not without its flaws, the monotony of the environment being the biggest one. Still, it is a game of unique caliber in its genre.
Review in Czech | Read full review
The sadly last title of Mimimi Games sends the German developer out in a blaze of glory. While there’s nothing really new or unheard of, Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew is an absolute love letter to the tactical stealth genre and blends in excellent, varied gameplay with a charming, albeit superficial pirate story and a vibrant, colorful look. The gameplay style may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but if you enjoy the idea of planning the perfect heist with a band of undead pirates, this is your dream come true.
Review in German | Read full review
It's beautiful, it's clever, it's captivating : we want more. 30 hours of pure delight.
Review in French | Read full review
It’s so tightly designed from end to end, smartly tying in its gameplay mechanics with its story in ways I think a lot of other games could learn from. While I think some players might prefer the structure of Desperados 3, the supernatural pirate theme, big environments and excellent characters make Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew the best game Mimimi has ever made, and a fantastic way to wrap up their career.
Mimimi has always made smart and elaborate games, so Shadow Gambit turned out to be a great stealth tactic. At the same time, it seriously added to the plot component and gave more freedom during the execution of various missions.
Review in Russian | Read full review
Shadow Gambit The Cursed Crew hits all the right notes when it comes to a stealth strategy game. It would have been an okay game even without the memory shenanigans regardless. But that simply wasn’t going to cut it. It’s clear that the developers wanted this title to be of the highest quality possible. And it shows. Shadow Gambit is a solidly entertaining game that has the same level of awareness as Guybrush breaking the 4th wall. I can’t recommend this game enough if you are into stealth strategy games.
Exceptional stealth-based strategy gameplay with fun characters, colourful visuals and an emphasis on playing your way in your own time.
Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew is a challenging tactical game with a fun story and characterful crew. The varied missions do a good job of giving you plenty of options for how to tackle them, leaning into different crew abilities. There's a few rough edges, but Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew's treasure hunt is well worth partaking in.
The coolest mechanic is the ability to pause the game and give each crew member instructions that they'll all perform in tandem with a tap of the triangle button. Planning a co-ordinated attack and then watching it unfold like clockwork is a pleasure that never gets old, and if you mess the whole thing up you can always just rewind time and tinker with your strategy until you get it right. These moments are Shadow Gambit at its best, and the game in a nutshell; it leaves you feeling like a tactical genius, even if it took you seven tries to get there.
With mildly eldritch themes, eccentric characters and tongue-in-cheek humour reminiscent of the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew has a little something for every type of player. It's not perfect, but Shadow Gambit is just plain fun, and if it can convince a gung-ho, guns blazing player like me to give patience a stealth a go, I think a lot of other gamers out there would do well to dip their toes into these waters.
Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew is one of the best works of its kind, with its deep tactical structure and the variety of strategies it offers to the player.
Review in Turkish | Read full review
But the non-linear nature of The Cursed Crew does have its virtues. There are some magnificent moments of discovery where you feel as though you’ve circumvented the level design by maneuvering the right character into the right position to bypass certain guard setups or parts of the terrain. Simply by spending so much time with the characters, you’ll hit upon certain combinations of abilities independently, fine-tuning new strategies all the way up to the end. It’s in these moments that you see what the developers are aiming for, and they suggest that The Cursed Crew could be a tentative step in an exciting new direction for the studio, even if those elements are more notable for how they might be refined in a subsequent release.
Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew is one of the best games of the year. From its clever gameplay concoction to its gorgeous presentation, excellent sense of humour, and rewarding character abilities; this is one outstanding seafaring adventure.
Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew seems to be another masterpiece from Mimimi Games and embodies their core values down to the last. You’ll get to live the life of a pirate from a top-down perspective, explore the various different islands, and experience a great story that’ll keep you sucked in for hours. Not to mention, the many different characters and mechanics keep things from going stale.
If you’re a fan of stealth or strategy games, you really should consider Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew a must-play. This is Mimimi Games at its finest, building on the mechanics it finely tuned in Shadow Tactics and Desperados III while also adding more elements, more freedom and more fun. You’ll quickly come to love this band of unusual pirates, and what each of them offers when out in the field. So much so that you might even be tempted to replay missions just to approach things from a different angle.
Shadow Gambit’s biggest pros are pirate atmosphere and excellent characters. The gameplay mechanics are typical for this genre, and some skills are from Desperados III or Shadow Tactics. It’s a really great game worth playing.
Review in Polish | Read full review