Blasphemous

From the moment The Penitent One drags himself out of a heap of helmeted corpses, you know you’re in for a ride soaked in guilt, iconography, and more barbed wire than a 90s wrestling pay-per-view. Equal parts Metroidvania and soulslike, Blasphemous feels like a fever dream stitched together from the margins of an illuminated manuscript. It’s gorgeous, grotesque, and occasionally aggravating, but that’s penance, baby.

Combat is a brutal ballet of dodges, parries, and divine retribution. Your sword, Mea Culpa, carves through cloaked zealots, shrieking saints, and nun-monsters with disarming elegance. Finishers are as glorious as they are gory, picture a man in a metal capirote executing demons with a sense of theatrical holiness. It’s morbidly delightful.

Boss fights? Equal parts ecclesiastical horror and pattern memorization marathons. One minute you’re dodging a crying baby with a serpent priest, the next you’re dueling a thorn-wrapped martyr with laser eyes. It’s biblical, in every sense.

The pixel art? Insane. Every blood-drenched cathedral and sorrow-slick dungeon oozes atmosphere. Cvstodia may be cursed, but it’s undeniably beautiful, like Hieronymus Bosch got ahold of a SNES dev kit.

Still, beneath its immaculate style, Blasphemous can stumble. Prayer abilities are mostly pageantry. Backtracking gets old fast. And when combat leans too hard into trial-and-error, the divine turns mechanical.

But the full package on mobile, DLCs, boss rushes, crossover content, and all, is a miracle in itself. With no ads, no cash-grab nonsense, and full controller support, this is the definitive portable pilgrimage.

Blasphemous may not always be fun, but it is unforgettable. And maybe that’s the point. After all, suffering is sacred.