The name 'Intergrow' might not mean much to most gamers in Europe or North America, but if you've spent much time with a Japanese 3DS it should ring a bell as it's the publisher responsible for bringing Western Nindie titles like SteamWorld Dig and Mighty Switch Force! to Nintendo's home country. Now Intergrow's teamed up with Rising Star Games — a publisher famous for bringing Japanese games West — to send over Sadame, an action RPG set in an alternate reality, demon-infested version of Japan's Sengoku (or Warring States) period. Though it's not without issues, Sadame still very much deserved the trip, and scares up some classic adventuring fun in an invitingly atmospheric setting.
In spite of its Japanese aesthetic, Sadame's gameplay actually shares quite a bit with Western-style RPGs like Gauntlet, Diablo and Rogue. After choosing one of four characters — a Samurai, Ninja, Monk, or Rogue — you'll head out across a set of discrete levels, slicing your way through hordes of monsters, ghosts, and the undead, picking up lots of blind-bagged loot, and eventually facing off against an enormous boss guarding the area.
On the ground this means a lot of hacking-and-slashing, and Sadame handles this classic combat style with intuitive controls. The Circle or D-pad moves your character, the face buttons handle light, heavy and special attacks, and by holding down the shoulder buttons as overlays you'll have access to two kinds of magic on the face buttons: Karma and Ki, both with their own energy gauges to burn through. It's a versatile setup, and in general combat feels decent, with the fact that aiming is locked into four cardinal directions giving it a 16-bit beat-'em-up vibe.
Unfortunately, it isn't always the smoothest system; regular attacks have just enough start-up between them to make things feel a bit sluggish, and while stringing together your character's pre-approved combo (lengthened with unlocks as you play) feels better, relying on this single sequence turns tactics into a matter of rinse, wash, repeat rather quickly. It's also very difficult to recover momentum once you get overwhelmed — with no recovery frames after you take a hit, enemies can keep whaling on you until the AI's randomly generated mercy sets in and gives you a second to escape. That said, the Ki and Karma magic attacks help shake things up, the stages are relatively short, and the boss fights in particular are a lot of fun, so while the combat is definitely repetitive it doesn't overstay its welcome in short bursts.
Though the core gameplay remains the same no matter which warrior you choose, Sadame does a very good job differentiating its four playable characters in terms of playstyle. The steadfast Samurai is the classic close-quarters combatant, wielding katanas and wearing plenty of armour for an excellent defense that lets you charge right in and attack. The Ninja excels at mid-screen distance, with a whip-like chained sickle and fast-flying shurikens, and a special ability that sets the cost of all spells to a very low 20 Ki, letting you hit hard with hexes. The Monk uses long-range staffs and melee-range relics, both massively powerful, and has an Aura ability that adds elemental damage to his weapons. Finally, the Rouge is a trap-setting trickster that can cut down foes up-close with her naginata or far-off with her bow, and specializes in buff/debuff spells — her magic also works quite differently, with spells active until you 'recall' them, freeing up the Ki used to keep them going.
That's four very different playstyles, all told, and to its credit Sadame goes the extra mile to making playing all four feasible via some very cool features that make use of multiple save files. Loot is shared across saves, for instance, and since much of the equipment you'll unearth is exclusive to (or at least better suited for) one class or another, you'll frequently find yourself with armour or spells for your Ninja after muscling through a stage as a Monk, or vice-versa. This creates a nice 'hand-me-down' rhythm that makes playing through as other characters feel less like starting over, and more like a series of productive side-quests.
Even better, you can actually call in characters from your other save files — or even heroes met via StreetPass, in an awesome move for an eShop title — as AI-controlled assistants who will fight alongside you. It's a fantastic idea, and it's a lot of fun seeing your carefully customized Samurai or Ninja back you up as a Rogue; it also helps make up for the lack of multiplayer that this four-character Gauntlet-like would otherwise be screaming for. All together, these touches help make Sadame easy to experience with all four characters more or less simultaneously, rather than saving them for New Game Plus, and that's definitely a plus in our book. And if you are set on doing another round in Sadame samsara, beating the game as any character unlocks successively harder difficultly levels each time, so you'll have plenty of challenge to work through if you like.
There's also plenty that goes into customizing each character as you play; along with a standard level-up system, you'll earn Discipline Points that can be spent on a Sphere Grid-style skill tree to tailor each hero to your playstyle. Equipment also plays a big role, conferring both stat boosts and Ki spells when worn, while your Karma spells are earned by besting the bosses.
All of this comes together in a presentational package that nails the necro-Nobunaga aesthetic of Sadame's setting. There's no 3D effect, which is a shame — especially given the multi-layered backdrops seem made for it — but other than that it looks great; the backgrounds have a psuedo-Vanillaware vibe, with a decadent, hand-painted style that contrasts well with the pixel art of the character sprites, and the bosses are gloriously large beasts made up of interlocking puppet-like pieces. Though it's not as pretty or as overwhelmingly stylish, the combination of saturated colours, generous mood lighting, and the Sengoku setting reminds us very much of Muramasa: The Demon Blade. The soundtrack is nicely done as well, and while individual pieces aren't particularly memorable, the style as a whole fits the game perfectly, full of Japanese-influenced melodies filtered through a Mega Drive-style synth.
Conclusion
A fun action RPG with an infernal/feudal Japanese aesthetic and some great ideas, Sadame is a welcome eShop surprise. The core combat can get repetitive, and it lacks the fluid finesse of the best beat-'em-ups, but there's a lot here to love, including a particularly thoughtful implementation of its four-character hook. If you're in the mood for a hack-and-slash alt-history lesson, Sadame can definitely cut it.
Comments 24
Been waiting for a review, might have to get this now....love these style of games.
Wish heros of ruin would go on the Eshop so I can dump my cart
I'll wait for a sale like I usually do for indie eShop games. This definitely looks interesting, though.
Highly recommended. Kinda pricey, but it has got the goods.
@Stu13
This certainly looks like it has the goods. I will take your recommendation my good sir.😜
For some odd reason I have nearly 80 hours on this game. As simple and repetitive as it is I just couldn't put it down.
@Zipmon Did you get to the Doom difficulty? Man that was hard. Also you mentioned sharing equipment across files but a lot of that equipment can't be warn till the other character levels up the correct stats. Lastly did you see that there's circle and even plus shaped gems. As good as the rare, epic, and legend equipment can be common is usually the best and by far if you have the proper gems.
Rats. No 3D. Thats a no for me.
Nice review. Yeah, the look of it reminded me too of Muramasa. Might try it someday.
Would have been all over this had it had some sort of multiplayer component, shame really!
Really had me until I realised it has no local multiplayer. Waaaaay too many backlog games to manage this at the moment.
The look of Muramasa, gameplay reminiscent of a Mana game. Seeing how scarce things are in the multiplayer games I already own, I'm content with the AI partner. May have to pick this one up.
I will get it when NOA get their act together with My Nintendo.
I want to buy it. But I'm not going to buy anything else on the E-shop until MyNintendo starts.
@Spoony_Tech Oh man I can imagine! Dusk is hard enough for me haha! And yeah! I really appreciated the equipment needing level ups — that seemed like a good way to balance it so you were still getting perks from other files but without just breaking the game! I can totally see how you'd have 80 hours on this! Are you playing mostly with a certain character or bouncing around? I've been going with Rogue mostly, I love her weapon combo!
man, i can't believe it took one of you guys at Nintendo Life nearly a month or so to actually review this game.
it's about time and i'm glad it got a decent review in comparison to all the other "meh" reviews it got from other video game websites for some time now. thanks so much for taking the time to make a review for it Morgan.
@zipmon Well I beat doom with the rogue and she's a bit of a beast. I've got my Ninja up to the last area in dusk but need more attack speed. My Samurai is half way through doom but his short range really makes him difficult to use in certain areas. However he makes an excellent assist! I have him at level 46 I believe and have one piece of equipment he won't be able to equip for a very long time. He needs 235 of the first stat to equip it and he's only in the 150's.
@Spoony_Tech Nice! Samurai's definitely my fav assist too — I was using a Ninja assist for a while but then I realized I liked to keep a bit of distance for myself and let the AI be up close! =)
@CUBANEWYORKER My pleasure! Sorry it took so long! This year has been absolutely nuts for 3DS RPGs so far so I've had a full plate pretty much constantly — which is a great! =)
muramasa 0.1 edition
A demon-infested Japanese Feudal Era, huh? So then it's basically the world of "Inuyasha." It's too bad they didn't also give up options to play as a Shinto priestess with a karma-powered bow and arrows, or a half-demon with claws and a giant sword (or even just give the Rogue a giant boomerang).
Anyway, this sounds pretty good. Add to Wishlist...
Where's the price info?
@ga3tr0n Click on 'Overview' at the top of the page.
Thank you!
If this review came out a month ago, I would have bought it Day One. I'm sure I'll still get it, but will probably wait for a sale now.
A lot of fun! Deserves an update, to be sure!
Love all the tweaking you can do with gear - it actually really matters here; on many or most similar games, it doesn't matter.
Also love the heavy Japanese elements.
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