Necro Story Review

Developed and published by Rablo Games, Necro Story is an open-world dark fantasy game playing a necromancer which can get you into that Halloween mood. Raising the dead to fight for you in a bid to show why you’re the strongest and find out what really happened to humankind.

You play as a necromancer who has been in a slumber for a long while. He is awoken by a white ghostly mage who confirms they are the last human alive, and it wasn’t their doing. His slumber has left him weak, and he is disappointed that he wasn’t the one who caused the fall of mankind. The white mage provides comic relief and tries to steer the main character on the right path without revealing too much of her real intentions.

There is a lot to be impressed about this game’s look and music. It very much feels like the universe of dark fantasy, and the sounds of the spells, the creatures, and the environments are all there and very immersive. Graphically it has a creative hand-crafted feel to it and a lot of the creatures you come across are interestingly drawn. The music, although gentle on the menu screen, has a western feel when traversing the map which is not grating but the battle music does seem to be the same each time which can get a bit old.

The game is a small open-world setting in that although you can go in any direction on the map there are trees and other obstacles forming walls leading it to feel a bit more linear. This is a small blessing as they didn’t include a journal or a map, so it is very easy to get lost and know which direction to go in especially if you’re picking up where you last left off. As you traverse the map the enemies are shown as a small black cloud and getting anywhere near them will draw them straight to you and they are much faster than you so you cannot outrun them.

The combat gameplay is a combination of turn-based combat and live-action strategy. By that I mean the combat is real-time, but you are laid out in a 3 by 3 square grid on either side of the screen. You do attack in real-time, but you have to wait for spells to recharge or to have enough mana to cast them. You have an aiming line to point at which enemy you want to target in the opposing lineup. You can also press a button to target either the front line or backline of the enemies. As you defeat the enemies their souls are released, and you have to aim your target line at them and press a button to hoover the soul up.

Eventually, some captured enemy souls become your allies in battle with different strengths and weaknesses. But to gain an ally you have to capture enough souls to complete a magic mirror. Then with the next soul you come across you can choose to capture the soul you want as a new ally by firing it into the mirror instead of sucking it up. But switching between managing the battle and capturing the souls can be tricky. It also doesn’t explain what the different coloured souls are either. Most of the time the souls are blue but occasionally I see a red, yellow and green soul, I think the game did briefly explain the difference but I think I accidentally skipped the dialogue and there is no way to find out if you didn’t take that information in.

The story is a little all over the place in that you know other things are happening and your necromancer clearly implies he is evil and hates humankind but the white mage seems to ignore that fact and is trying to lead him into finding out what happened to the humans and to find a way to help them. But regardless there are plenty of enemies to face and make part of your army and you can keep switching them in and out to make use of the perks of each of them to get the right balance. You learn a lot of unique styles of spells which are fun to master, and you can sign pacts with demons which allows you to morph into them during battle to give yourself a bit of an edge against tougher enemies. The downside is there is no avoiding combat as the space is quite tight. So, if you get lost and find yourself backtracking you have to keep battling until you find the way which you need to go. A map or some kind of direction would have been useful here.

Conclusion

Necro Story made some bold decisions on ways to make the game challenging. The soul-catching mechanic is particularly interesting and adds a unique twist to the gameplay. The variety of characters with random perks and the comical undertone of the story provides a refreshing take on the dark fantasy genre. However, the game’s lack of clear explanations for certain mechanics, like the different coloured souls and plot direction can be frustrating. If you enjoy a mix of real-time and turn-based combat with a spooky humourous story there is plenty of content to be had here.

This game was tested and reviewed on Xbox Series X/S (via a Game Pass Ultimate subscription). All of the opinions and insights here are subject to that version.