Blade Chimera review – Stylish, but somewhat lacking substance

Team Ladybug and WSS playground have been behind a number of amazing games in recent years, having worked on a number of metroidvanias based on existing IPs. However, I’ve been waiting for them to finally tackle something completely original — the last time we’ve come close was Pharaoh Rebirth, which existed before Team Ladybug even had that name.

Blade Chimera does this in two ways, not only featuring a new setting and story, but one that’s quite different from the usual fantasy-leaning worlds they tackle. It features the excellent sprite work you’d expect from these teams, and a few interest ideas to spice up the metroidvania formula. However, it still plays a few things a little too safe in some areas to match either’s greatest hits.

Taking place in a futuristic Osaka, you play as the amnesiac demon hunter Shin as he deals with new threats across the city. During his latest hunt he comes across Lux, a demon that ends up becoming his unlikely partner as he aims to take on the demon hordes and discover his lost past.

As with most games from these developers, most of the story is rather brief and pretty easy to follow. You have a religious organisation with many secrets, demons that might not be what they seem, and of course the aforementioned amnesiac protagonist that’s likely tied to everything in some way.

Most of the plot is predictable, though for most of its runtime I’d still say what’s there is enjoyable. However, Blade Chimera doesn’t take that long to run through (around 8 hours for full map completion.) Because of this, there are a few times where the plot has to be rushed along — well, more than it already is.

This happens midway through, involving a rebel group. They’re written inconsistently, intended to come across as morally grey but they do a number of unsavoury things that are, at best, explained away in a couple of sentences.

The second is the last hour or so of the story, where things just seem to happen at a rapid pace without any proper build-up. It’s especially odd in regards to one enemy who acts like a big deal after appearing, only to die without much fanfare in a cutscene.

Blade Chimera’s pacing overall can be weird at times, bleeding over into gameplay. At its core, this is a mostly conventional metroidvania. Shin controls well, having access to a decent variety of weapons including a number of guns. Rounding out his arsenal is Lux, who transforms into a sword that can be used for both combat and platforming.

It all works well enough, and you encounter a good variety of demons to take on across Osaka — I’m reminded of modern Castlevania, where you’re often surprised by weird and wonderful enemy designs. And yet, Blade Chimera also falls into a couple of pitfalls I’ve seen in a number of metroidvanias, along with some completely unique ones.

For starters, many of the areas lack any interesting geometry or level design. Some are just long corridors filled with enemies, whiles others have better layouts but instead blend together visually. Secrets often do little to spice things up either, often just placed slightly out of reach later so you have to come back with a new ability.

Speaking of abilities, the way they’re handled in Blade Chimera is odd to say the least. Rather than fighting bosses or finding certain items, the majority of your movement abilities are obtained via a skill tree. And yes, this skill tree includes things like a basic double jump or sliding.

It’s a weird way to handle such a key part of the genre. I almost get the impression this exists to force you into fighting enemies and leveling up, since you could otherwise just skip enemies in most areas (money is rarely an issue, and most enemies drop little of importance.)

This is not the only place where Blade Chimera decides to deviate from genre norms in a less-than-satisfying way, with another being the game’s fast travel system. Rather than only being able to travel between specific points, you can fast travel to nearly every section of the map at any time.

On the one hand, this does help with backtracking. On the other, it means that level design can lean even harder into linear corridors, since there’s no need for much interconnectivity or shortcuts. Linearity isn’t exactly a new issue for Team Ladybug’s games, but I was hoping Blade Chimera would make this aspect more involved for their first fully-original title.

In fact, it feels like a lot of the game just feels “alright”, rather than something spectacular. From Lux’s transformation abilities being rarely used outside of some set-pieces, to an overall lack of difficulty, Blade Chimera almost feels scared in making the player deal with any sort of challenge or friction.

Blade Chimera Review – Final Thoughts

Blade Chimera is far from a bad game, but it’s one that doesn’t fully play to the metroidvania genre’s strengths. Exploration is mostly linear, and the game’s unique gimmicks are underutilised in some unfortunate ways.

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Blade Chimera was reviewed on PC using a code provided by the publisher.

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