The android, the world and the girl are your reference points in Kandria. A game full of the unexpected and with a lot of freedom awaits you. The action RPG invites you to explore.
No restrictions
Both on its official website and right at the start on its Steam page, Kandria boasts that the game has no skill limitations and you can go anywhere you want right from the start. The same blurb expresses the joy of not having to do backtracking and wandering around for hours trying to figure out where to go. You spend most of the time in this game trying to figure out where your next target is.
Kandria – An Unexpected Game
This is the best setting to start Kandria because it's a game where you keep thinking you've played something like this before. But then the game surprises you.
A stranger in a droid
At the start of Kandria, you have little idea what's happening beyond the basics. You are an android. You were discovered and turned on by a girl named Catherine. Also, between the time you last shut down and where you are now, the world appears to have been completely destroyed. That's not ideal. Also not ideal is that you will need some repairs and improvements because your memory is not very reliable at the moment.
Catherine
Catherine, of course, is over the moon that you're working. She cheerfully calls you "Stranger" and shows you off to the rest of the group of survivors. The main other members of this small group are Jack and Fiona. Jack is suspicious of you. Fiona is just as suspicious, but also unwilling to forgo potential help. The group is threatened by another group that is looking in vain for another suitable place to settle and is struggling with crop failures.
help from strangers
You begin to help gain confidence and search for a missing member of the group only to find that they have another settlement that is much larger and has plans of their own. It's clear to anyone playing the story that everyone is intentionally withholding information because you, or Stranger, is useful. Nobody trusts you but Catherine.
The characters
Not every character in the game is particularly deep or novel, but the majority of them are interesting. Fiona clearly shares Jack's suspicions, but also feels that Stranger offers her a unique advantage if she can convince the android to stay. It's all coupled with Stranger's observations of the ruins she explores, elements she recognizes well even as she doesn't understand what brought the world down.
New twists
As a surprise, the game keeps introducing new twists to its narrative. You always expect someone new to behave in a certain way. A new group are your enemies. Then you realize they're just trying to survive. You're trying to gain confidence while at the same time trying to figure out what's going on in the world. Of course, this also means that the plot is full of vague allusions.
deep below
The game looks like a Metroidvania title. It's a game that equips you with the movement skills you need to get almost anywhere. These options are open to you right from the start. That's partly a good thing, because it means you can go wherever you want right away. The map is large and if you don't know exactly where to go, you can quickly find yourself staring at the map, wondering what to do
An action RPG
Kandria is a side-scrolling action RPG with a large platform map to explore. However, it also uses elements of the Metroidvania genre in its overall design. Multiple stages await you in which you must carefully run and climb to avoid spikes, and if spikes hit you, the game will automatically reset you to the last place you were standing on solid ground.
Stranger's movement tools
Stranger starts the game with a whole bunch of movement tools. You use an eight-way dash that allows you to quickly cover a large distance. Between each mission, you must touch the ground or destroy a specific object in the landscape that will recharge your Dash in the air. With a small stamina bar, you can climb walls, slide down walls, and wall jump up for free. Your weapon is a power sword that transforms into various other weapons when attacking with a mix of light and heavy attacks.
The Tutorials
The game has tutorials, but they are quick text popups. The combat tutorial in particular is mostly more of a suggestion to try out different movements and directions that you use when attacking for different attacks. That seems a bit underexplained. The fight itself is pretty easy. Enemies have health bars and your attacks have an impact, although most enemies take a few hits to finish off.
the levels
The game has levels, but it is not clear what each new level requires. It took an amazing amount of time to figure out how to change outfits. The different outfits are not reflected in Stranger's portrait when he speaks. Things constantly feel inadequately explained, not to mention the aforementioned lack of navigation aids and the like. In the game, you're not entirely sure whether you should be in a place or not. You question your decisions.
The surprise effect
Most games are largely composed of well-known parts. If you've played a lot of video games, you know how they work. With Kandria, you get the feeling that while it uses familiar parts, it arranges them in a novel way. The concept works. It feels exciting in a way that new games rarely do.
The mood
The music to Kandria is great. This is one of the best video game soundtracks. It's alternately moody and atmospheric, distinctive and soothing even as you push the plot along. It tempts you to just sit and listen to the atmosphere.
The graphic
The pixel graphics that make up Kandria's game graphics are a mixed bag. On the one hand, the graphics for the environments are amazingly detailed, and every detail of the environment has a lot of character. The character portraits in conversations are expressive and beautiful. And the sprite animations look great too. Unfortunately, the way the graphics are designed makes it a little harder to tell the difference between background objects and interactive objects. This becomes a small problem. It's easy to find enemies difficult to see in the game. This just doesn't feel right and there are places where the front and background objects merge together a little.
A lovely world
Kandria is built from the known parts in a different configuration. It's a weird, clumsy game, and in many ways. The game was made to be like this and for you to try new things that may or may not work in the end. It brings moments of frustration and many moments of confusion. There are times when it's completely unclear what the game wants from you.
Conclusion on Kandria
All of that is mitigated by the fact that with every disappointment you know what's going to happen next. Where is the story taking you? It's a little weird and a little awkward. All these things went into the game to make it unique. Kandria is a strange game. It shows its value in being able to ask questions and pique your curiosity. It's unique in many ways, and that uniqueness makes it worth playing.
Here it goes to Kandria's Steam page
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