Entrancing Creepy & Just for ME?!

Inscryption – PC (Steam)

Entrancing, Creepy & Just for ME?! (Spoilers Abound)

Unlike so many in the gaming space, I love card games! I generally love their integration into existing genres and firmly believe they will result in a net good for the industry; however, I have a huge gaming blindspot, horror.

It doesn’t even have to be THAT scary. Have never sunk my teeth into classics like Resident Evil, Amnesia, Dead Space, Silent Hill, none of it. Just not my thing. That being said, I knew Inscryption was going to scratch that itch for folks so I was hesitant to try Inscryption based on the screenshots alone. But I had to try the card game everyone was talking about.

At first, the game was largely as advertised. I’m sitting in a creepy, dark cabin across from a dark figure that I can only see the eyes of. There is a lot going on around the edges. Like the start menu not having a New Game option. I push through. I’m here for the card game. And it doesn’t disappoint.

There are some quirky bits where the cards talk to you but I’m not here for that. The combat system is simple at first. Four lanes, play cards to defend against there’s a hit the player behind the cards. The mechanics build interestingly. Sacrifice cards to play better cards. The game gives you generic ‘Squirrel’ cards who’s main function is to be sacrificed. A dark mechanic perfectly appropriate to the theme. I bear with it.

Roguelike mechanics emerge. Not my favorite but I’m here to get more cards! My game piece is walking along a wooded trail. This is a game piece I’m not familiar with. Most games would have had me create my own. Presumably for it to be more painful when my figure is lost. Not so here. My first game piece looks like a crudely carved miner with a pick.

From card game to card game I have to choose branching paths in the trail. I’ve Slain the Spire, I think I’m in well-worn territory. There is a shopkeeper, kind of. There is a witch lady who gives me a totem. There are random events. I happen upon a group of travelers who ask me to sit close to a fire. They speak in sinister tones and they are clearly starving. It seems that I can offer them up a card that they will get rid of for me. A useful mechanic I am familiar with but this feels different. As I mouse over some of my cards they beg me not to sacrifice them. Strange and weird but I’m here for the card game.

I get to the end of the first ‘level’ and am greeted by a prospector. The figure across from me dons a mask and speaks in a folksy and menacing accent. The world around the dark table changes and haunting music begins. The boss introduces new mechanics that my deck is not built to fight. I lose bad.

I expect to hit retry to reset the run, instead. I am sitting in a smaller room of the cabin and the figure appears in a dark doorway. He has an old camera and takes my picture. The screen flashes and a picture of my character appears on the card. I name him Lasagna and finally restart my run.

I don’t realize it yet, but my love affair with Inscryption has begun. I eventually stand up from the card game and explore the creepy room. I start clicking on things in the background like I’m 8 years old again trying to play Myst on my dad’s Gateway PC. I solve a few clues hidden in the house and leave a few mysteries untouched. I’ll look them up later if I’m curious.

The game reveals more and more sinister layers. For instance, card games scores are calculated using what appear to be golden teeth. One for each time you damage each other. If your side of the scale hits the bottom, you lose. You get items that can be used one time. One of them is an extra squirrel card in a bottle. One is a pair of scissors you can use to destroy an enemy card. One is a pair of pliers. I could not discern their use so I left them alone for quite a while. I was losing a battle wayyy to early and chose to use the pliers to see if it could rescue me. My character takes the pliers into their own mouth and pulls a tooth loose as the screen goes briefly red. I drop the tooth into their side of the scale.

This gruesome act doesn’t push me away as I would have guessed. Somehow, it creates stakes for me and my character. The game lets you exchange virtual pain in exchange for a small boon. I consider myself quite rational. Virtual pain should not have value to me, but it did. I didn’t want to grab those damn pliers again. I didn’t want my picture taken again. I wanted to beat this guy across the table.

And so I did. Eventually felling the Prospector and the bosses after. Like most card games, it continues to add layers on top of its mechanics but it also gets easier as you being to understand the synergy between certain cards.

The moment comes that I have been waiting for. I get the perfect synergy of cards, thanks to a witches totem thing and I become almost unstoppable. I’m worried I broke the game but sure enough. Victory after victory comes and I begin to smile smugly. Even the bosses of the game do not hold a candle to my deck. I reach the final boss in an epic conclusion that I turn into a cakewalk. I finally get a glimpse of my creepy cabin host and use his camera to get a picture. Game Over.

Nope. Something strange happens. I’m served up actual videos that document a card game influencer guy finding weird stuff in the woods. I’m intrigued.

In one of the videos he is walking through the woods and I am anxiously awaiting a jump scare. None come. The guy is cringey but I have bitten the hook. Maybe the game ends after these videos.

Nope. A new game begins. It is deck building again but now I’m the central figure of a pokemonesque RPG. A strange turn but I’m here for more card gaming.

I don’t want to belabor the point but I do want you to understand that this game is more than the sum of its parts. It is creepy but it entrances you. It only outsmarts you in service to the game. The extra layers that keep peeling back feel earned. And they don’t really stop until the very end of the game.

I don’t want to spoil any more specifics but Inscrpytion only began to wear out its welcome for me in its final act. The core card gaming portion remains strong throughout and the atmosphere the games exudes in unparalleled by anything in recent memory.

Some of the FMV stuff can’t quite keep up with the mastery of the rest of the game and some of the acting is a bit cringe, possibly by design.

In either case, this game did something I didn’t think a game could: brought me to creepiness on my terms and I am very thankful.

Do yourself a favor and give Inscryption a shot.