In today’s gaming landscape, everyone always wants to play the game that is the talk of the town at that moment. While yes, there is value and fun to being part of the conversation when it’s happening, there are times I love playing popular games much later on when the noise has quieted down some. The current case of that happening for me is Inscryption. Three years after its initial release, Inscryption hit Game Pass, and I finally decided to give it a chance. While I had heard people call the game great in the past, my expectations were timid at best.
A deck builder that is actually fun
For a little background in my tastes, card games are rather hit-and-miss with me. For example, I played a lot of Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel because I was able to make decks inspired by my time with the anime back in the original iteration of the show. My opponents, however, were using all these complicated mechanics that were added in the years since then that I didn’t understand.
I think that is where the line is drawn for me. If a card game is complicated or what I perceive to be too much to understand easily, I’m not likely to want to put in the time to learn it. In Inscryption’s case, the game never becomes something that I feel I need to get a new degree to understand. Yes, new elements are regularly added, but it’s always at a pace that I feel I can easily learn and apply to my deck if it fits on that run.
Moving along the path feels great. With so much randomness at play, the few times I have control over what happens feel great. Thinking back on the different ways I have built decks really shows how the game promotes growth in your strategizing skills. As more challenges and cards are added to the mix, you are forced to adapt constantly. One of the biggest realizations I have made is that getting more cards can be a blessing and a curse. If the RNG doesn’t work in my favor, I can bring on cards that don’t fit my deck’s style. That results in me feeling like I waste a turn every time I draw that card, pushing me to get rid of those cards permanently whenever I get the chance.
Inscryption might have the best roguelite system for me
The rogue elements also help with the progression and learning of how to play the game. Traditionally, roguelite games struggle to keep my attention. I never like losing all of my progress just to start over empty handed completely. The fact that Leshy’s map was always adding new stops with interesting elements to augment my deck meant I could really strategize as I went forward.
No spoilers here, but the way the second and third acts get away from that roguelite system really threw me off. The different card mechanics that you deal with away from when Leshy has control of the game didn’t sit right with me. I enjoyed going through to beat the main story, but now that I’ve been playing a ton of Kaycee’s Mod, which returns to the first act’s structure, I find it much more enjoyable in this format.
That isn’t to say that Inscryption has a perfect roguelite system because it doesn’t. There are times I feel I can have a perfect deck set up to go all the way and defeat Leshy, only for a random encounter to blow me away with things I couldn’t account for. Most of it usually has to do with the various challenge mods making the experience tougher on me, but it never feels good getting into a battle that I quickly find out is impossible for me to win with the hand I am dealt. That’s a problem you are bound to run into with so many random elements in the game. Luckily, Inscryption finds a way for the hope of the next run to be better to fuel me to keep going.
Leshy won’t let me put Inscryption down
Even with the random elements that can disappointingly put a premature end to a run I’m on, I have fallen in love with Inscryption. It’s one of those games where the hours fly by as I’m strategizing my way through. I’ll eventually hit a point where I say, “One more run,” and then I look, and it’s been an extra two hours.
So much of Leshy’s cabin is pure greatness to me. It’s dark and creepy, but the way Leshy acts is like a kid who genuinely loves the game he is playing. He’s putting on masks and getting lost in the various roles as your journey goes on, giving you a full show while giving you as many opportunities as possible to defeat him. Sure, he will outright kill you when he defeats you, but it’s that dark atmosphere that gives Inscryption such a unique presence.
As someone who traditionally doesn’t get into card games heavily, Inscryption has proven to be a brilliant single-player game that I find myself thinking about a lot lately. Sure, like any other card game, there is a heavy reliance on luck that can lead to runs that feel doomed from the moment they begin, but when you get that run where you can build a deck you legitimately love, there is no other feeling like it.
