A game I have been playing: Tunic

Tunic on the Nintendo Switch.

Explore a land filled with lost legends, ancient powers, and ferocious monsters in TUNIC, an isometric action game about a small fox on a big adventure. Stranded in a ruined land, and armed with only your own curiosity, you will confront colossal beasts, collect strange and powerful items, and unravel long-lost secrets.  

This game, wasn't even on my radar until someone mentioned it in a podcast back in March. I remember this because I was traversing my way through the dangerous city of Chicago. I was trying to get to the hotel where the convention I was attending was being held at. 

I added it to my PlayStation 5 wishlist, it wasn't even listed in the eShop, at the time. Fast forward to the end of last month, the game is available on the eShop, and the Switch being my preferred gaming console for these games, well, I got it on the system over the PS5. The game had been out I think six months prior on macOS, PC, and Xbox, but it wasn't until six months later that made it to the PlayStation and Switch.

Still, I had heard very little about this game. I heard it was a combination of a Zelda-like game and a Souls-like game. By this premise alone, I should have stayed away from this game, in theory. Why? Well, I suck at soul-like games, and yet I guess I'm a sucker for punishment because I buy them anyways, and I no longer have the patience for unguided exploring games like Zelda.

Tunic is an action-adventure game and right off the bat you can tell, it is very Zelda-like, especially the earlier ones. You are a fox and you wake up in this strange world, and gain, very little guidance on what you need to do. From what I have gathered so far, you battle your way through it, you must find and ring a number of bells and find some "gears" that should end up in a central place. Just like in Souls games, there is very little or nonexistent back story presented, you must unravel the mystery as you go. Enemies can be a little unforgiving, or so I was told. If you die you respawn at your last save point, and you lose some currency and such, just as expected in a souls-like game.

You have stamina and mana, as well as your health. You can upgrade your stats, although that is not well explained in the game. There, is literally very, very little guidance and lots of explanation in this game, however, I can't stop playing it.

What is amazing about this game are the accessibility options, it has a No Fail Mode, No Stamina Restrictions, and Reduced Combat difficulty. Well, guess what? I have all turned on! No shame, No regrets! So to me, the combat isn't frustration, if any, it would be my own impatience. But it's fun to just turn on the Switch and just go to town exploring and see what things I can do, which paths I haven't explored, you know just fox around with my sword. And believe there are lots of secret paths and secrets in general in this game.

I have gotta say, even though I had no idea what was going on, no guidance whatsoever. I'm clueless about what I am supposed to do, and yet I am having a good time. The game is charming and beautiful, the music is great, and I even have the soundtrack on rotation because it is that nice.