The Relic: First Guardian Reviews
The true dark fantasy of The Relic: First Guardian is all of the potential it squanders; an energetic action game marred by its own shambolic state and broken in too many inexcusable ways.
The Relic: First Guardian is a game with good ideas, but it ultimately fails to execute them. Performance issues, recurring bugs, and the lack of essential navigation features make the experience feel unfinished, leaving the impression that it needed more time in development.
The Relic: First Guardian feels like a case of a smaller developer overextending itself. It brings an aggressive twist to combat and features a host of bosses to battle, but that's not enough to overcome the game's flaws and weaknesses. A flurry of patches have arrived since launch, but you're currently still better off waiting to see if they can address more of the core issues.
The Korean studio doesn't quite hit its stride. Despite this, and provided the technical aspects are quickly fixed, The Relic: First Guardian is a dark ARPG that rewards initiative without ever becoming too frustrating or punishing; it's not a mere imitation of FromSoftware's work.
Review in Italian | Read full review
Relic: The First Guardian is not so messy as to be unplayable. In fact, the game’s combat can be excellent at times, and the use of Korean folklore twisted into a dark narrative is an interesting idea.
There are things about The Relic: First Guardian that I absolutely loved. The game's exploration also leaves something for you to find, and the game's combat is satisfying and rewarding. It's just a shame I had to suffer through major bugs that kept me from progressing or finishing quests.
The Relic: First Guardian is a purgatory of tedium and glitches dressed up to look like a heavy-hitter action RPG.
The Relic: First Guardian's unpolished edges almost undermine the experience, but atmospheric exploration through a haunting world will pull you through.
Between rough gameplay feel and mechanics, The Relic: First Guardian doesn't present itself with a bang, but with a wimper.
Despite the time that has elapsed and the patches applied on other platforms, The Relic: First Guardian remains a mess that can't address some of its shortcomings on the technically weaker platform it is running on. The combat seems decent until you reach one of the game's numerous boss fights, where the fighting suddenly feels messy. The story isn't that engaging, and it's actually made worse by the side stories, whose endings and constant repetition of facts overshadow some of the fairly intriguing narratives you would've found along the way. The presentation is also quite terrible in parts, especially the voice acting, which makes the game's long length all the more agonizing. There is still a kernel of a good game, and there is a chance that enough patching can make this a decent title, but with so many Souls-like games already on the system, even if you discount the ones created for the original Switch, there's not much reason to give this title a look.
Relic: The First Guardian has the foundations of a solid action RPG, with an impressive roster of over 70 unique bosses and a respectable variety of Relic-based abilities that keep major encounters engaging. Unfortunately, those strengths are constantly undermined by shallow combat mechanics, clunky animations, inconsistent voice acting, poor audio design, technical issues, and surprisingly amateur translation errors. Rather than a true Soulslike, this is a straightforward action game weighed down by an overwhelming number of avoidable flaws. With more polish, it could have been a pleasant surprise. Instead, it ends up as a frustrating experience that rarely allows its best ideas to shine.
Review in Persian | Read full review
The Relic: First Guardian is a work of violent contrasts, a crossroads where an almost moving authorial passion collides head-on with undeniable production and technical limitations.
Review in Italian | Read full review
The Relic: First Guardian may not reach the heights of the genre’s best titles, but it can still appeal to action RPG fans looking for challenging combat. Its strengths lie in its dark fantasy setting, combat system, and attempt to offer its own take on the Soulslike genre. If you can overlook some of its weaker aspects, The Relic: First Guardian can still provide a decent amount of fun.
Review in Slovak | Read full review
The Relic: First Guardian is an engaging new action game that takes cues from the Soulslike genre while incorporating medieval and Korean folklore into the mix. With its enjoyable combat mechanics and difficult but fair boss fights, The Relic: First Guardian offers many systems that will make Souls fans happy. However, its technical issues take away from the beautiful vision that the game sets out to achieve.
The Relic: First Guardian is messy, buggy, with a bad story, bad voice acting, it should be the kind of plucky Z-tier game I fall in love with. Instead it is marred by a lot of (presumed) clanker nonsense. There are better bad games to spend your time with.
The Relic: First Guardian shows clear ambition, but repetitive enemies, weak technical presentation, an awkward camera and inconsistent framerates run too deep for patches alone to fix.
Review in German | Read full review
The Relic: First Guardian is one of my personal disappointments of the year. And perhaps the worst part is that I don't think it's a game completely devoid of good ideas—it does have some.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
The Relic: First Guardian has been available on PC and PlayStation for a while. Accordingly, I’ve been waiting patiently to give this a go on Xbox. With Souls-like elements, unusual mechanics, and a rich and dark lore-filled story, this appealed to me. However, there are plenty of performance issues and bugs that hold it back. Project Cloud Games has developed this action-adventure, Souls-like title. It is a semi-open world game that encourages you to investigate every building, ruin, and cave you encounter. However, you must stay frosty throughout as monsters roam everywhere and danger is around every corner. This single-player affair focuses on bitty lore, impressive passive abilities, and seamlessly never-ending boss battles. The huge and often hideous bosses test your skills as you dodge, weave, block, and slice your way to victory.
The Relic: First Guardian is hardly a bad action RPG, which makes its failures all the more aggravating. Its fierce fighting, exciting parries, occasional exploration surprises and tougher boss encounters hint at the potential of a far greater game.
The Relic: First Guardian delivers an accessible mix of RPG and soulslike elements, backed by more than 80 bosses, dynamic combat and beautifully crafted environments. However, chaotic group encounters, a clumsy camera and repetitive mission design hold back an ambitious adventure that still needs further refinement.
Review in Spanish | Read full review