Episode 165 - Sex Henderson and the Boys - Lunacid

Banished into the depths of the Great Podcast. Welcome back to the podcast! Today, we’re talking about Lunacid, a game that is in its own words, inspired by old FROMSOFTWARE titles like King’s Field and Shadow Tower. And while you can definitely feel the influence, the game does enough to stand out on its own that it’s definitely worth playing. You play as someone cast into the Great Well, essentially an enormous dungeon, with escape being your only goal. This goal is pretty emblematic of the game, as well, as it is extremely vague and leaves the player mostly just exploring each area in hopes of finding clues to help them progress. This is a massive strength in that it preserves the mystery inherent to a lot of FROM’s catalogue while forcing the game’s exploration elements to the forefront, which the design is obviously very focused around. It also results in the game being a bit aimless, which depending on who you are can be a little frustrating, but with enough meaningful rewards to find to keep you playing. Weapons and spells are extremely plentiful, offering a lot of ways to interact with both combat and the world itself, with some specific interactions like unlocking paths as well as more player-driven things like being able to skip some obstacles and reach strange locations. Lunacid is nostalgic, thanks to its aesthetic design, but it is also a captivating world to explore that folds in more recent design trends to make something more transcendent than just a copy of its inspirations. We’re going to be talking about the games by which Lunacid’s design is influenced, the presentational choices from character designs to the music’s genre and style, and we discuss whether we were or were not in “the know.” Thank you for joining us again this week! This was a game I knew I wanted to do pretty much as soon as I’d heard about it, so while we aren’t exactly day and date with its release, it was one we scheduled as soon as possible. Did you play this game in early access or since it’s been out in full? Did you find it to be more or less similar to Dark Souls? Let us know in the comments below or over on our Discord! We’re sort of continuing on a trend for the next episode and we’re going to be talking about Lies of P, the Soulslike that features Pinocchio for some reason, so we hope you’ll join us for that!