Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew Reviews
This spooky age of piracy has charming supernatural characters and visuals, but the hardcore stealth action on offer is an uncompromising, often unwieldy beast.
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.
Being a real-time stealth strategy game, I know the crewmates I choose can make or break a mission.
Playing Shadow Gambit feels like peeling an onion - as I progress from the outer layers to the core, taking down enemies in the city, and each achievement is small, often mixed with discomfort and bitterness.
Review in Chinese | Read full review
Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew is so close to being Mimimi's best. There are enjoyable diverse skills that make for some of the best stealth tactics gameplay we've ever seen. Enjoyable too is the colourful and often humorous side stories, along with plenty of feats to seek after for completionist obsessives. It may not have the most interesting main-story quest structure or be the most stable and bug-free at the moment but when Shadow Gambit gets moving it soars and sails, providing an addictive and fun tactics adventure.
Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew is an exciting stealth strategy game that allows players to build a crew of varied personalities worth exploring. While the levels may be complicated and take a large chunk of time per mission, it’s enjoyable enough that fans of strategy and past Mimimi Games’ titles will likely enjoy the new time-based mechanics that allow for the ultimate strategy gameplay.
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.
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
While I wish it allowed for more freedom, Shadow Gambit is an admirable meeting of stealth and strategy with just a drop of immersive sim.
Standing out with its original universe, likeable cast and satisfying stealth strategy gameplay, Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew is a well-executed new venture for developer Mimimi Games.
It's beautiful, it's clever, it's captivating : we want more. 30 hours of pure delight.
Review in French | Read full review
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.
Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew can't offer anything new to the classic gameplay style of Commandos/Desperados, but thanks to a nice setting the game still feels quite fresh, which is more than enough.
Review in Russian | Read full review
I really like this niche that Mimimi has taken on in their games, and they seem to do it better with each go. Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew takes the character-driven stealth tactics I loved in Desperados and applies a ghost pirate theme to it in ways that are nearly always fun to play and beautiful to look at. It’s tough as nails and I wish I could experiment more before big choices, but I also think the concept allowed Mimimi to do some silly and spectacular things with its gameplay. Shadow Gambit sets a new standard for this studio, and I’ll be playing it until we get to see how they top themselves next.
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 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 cerebral but hugely characterful stealth tactics game filled with creativity and depth. And fun pirate stuff.
With a great supernatural pirate theme and excellent character synergy, Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew is another outstanding stealth strategy game from Mimimi, though revisiting the mostly unchanged islands throws a small cloud over the otherwise vibrant treasure hunt.
mimimi games successfully weaved fantasy and magic into pirate's age. While the UI and mission structure is a bit disappointing, unique art and attractive sound design, as well as strategy features with various sailors are making it a higher standard for 'stealth strategy' game.
Review in Korean | Read full review
Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew is a very entertaining game that, although not without some control flaws, kept us entertained for several hours. If you are a fan of tactical titles and have enjoyed games such as Commandos or Desperados, this game is definitely for you, but fans of the stealth genre will also find plenty to like. All in all, an excellent game that everyone should give a chance to.
Review in Italian | Read full review