The standard fantasy trope has been done to death, throughout many a medium. You know which one: a warrior, a mage and another template all band together to thwart some evil, save the day and whatnot. We’ve had Gauntlet, Final Fantasy and its parody webcomic 8bit Theater. We’ve had many an RPG and even the subversive ones. But we haven’t had many rogue auto-scrollers, which is where Dark Scrolls comes in.
Yes, as well as being an hilarious play on word of a beloved franchise, Dark Scrolls is an auto-scrolling platformer in the style of an old school, 8bit shooter/platformer. Simple, really.
And with that simplicity, does it have the replay factor?
The Curse Of Power
If you’re into quick games with equally quick reviews, then for once you’re in luck. Dark Scrolls is, in essence, short bursts of platforming fun in an even smaller snack of a game. But conversely, has rogue padding. Like the gameplay is the meat and the rogue elements the outer bit of a Scotch egg.
Although first, let’s get the framing device out of the way. You may have inferred this to be some kind of princess rescue, or dragon slaying scenario. Initially, it’s the latter, told in screenshots at the beginning. A warrior recruits a merry band of companions, slays gold-hoarding dragon, all is good. Except it isn’t, as the warrior finds presumably the titular Dark Scroll and uses against the rest of the them. How very Sauron-y.
The twist, which weaves into the rogue element, is that it doesn’t kill our rogue’s gallery stone dead. It resurrects them, allowing to get their revenge. Or the scroll itself, or the scroll and the treasure. It doesn’t really spell it out for us.
Right, Got It?
The gameplay in Dark Scrolls is rather simple, so much so that I don’t really need to think of extraneous padding to make it sound elaborate. In short, you move right.
You have to move right, as otherwise the geography may trap you and you’ll die. Players will hop across pitfalls, spikes, bouyant water sections and other hazards on their adventures, or be squashed. That’s the key point of an auto-scroller, reminiscent of Mario Bros. 3 levels and such.
Along the way, they’ll shoot enemies with whatever projectile their character uses, pick up coins for perks, before a boss fight at the end of the level. There’s also restricted wave modes, the occasional level-speeding-through cannon… oh, and a shop that utilises geese.
Go Forth, Trusty Barbarian/Mage/Dog
What makes Dark Scrolls fun is the variety of heroes that players can be. It starts with the three standard archtypes: Grizz the barbarian, Pigeon the sneaky rogue and Emrys the mage. Grizz is your standard, with an arcing axe that hits enemies at most trajectories. For me, my early go-to was Emerys. He fires multiple bouncing spheres, as well as a special being a projectile/hit-absorbing shield.
As players progress, they’ll unlock more wacky characters to make a total of nine. There’s Biscuit the dog, rescued in the first boss fight. Then there’s an alien, a saxophone-playing rat and a chef that throws steaks. There’s an Cupid-like Archer too, as well as a few more that I won’t spoil.
It’s one of those games that rewards trying again and again to unlock more, akin to death relaying more story in the Hades games. The reward is in the repetition, if you will.
Here Comes The Boon
Again to use a similar Hades analogy, Dark Scrolls employs a perks system too. That goose-affectionate store owner I mentioned earlier: he likes to pop himself in levels and sell players various boons. These range from fire-enhanced projectiles, coin-dispensing fairies and faster movement. These come at a cost, which you’ll earn from popping enemies, like they’re all sentient piggy banks.
When one buys a perk, it can be attached to the player’s star level. Each character has five, with the fifth being a Golden Axe-like special move. So say a player attaches fire to the third star, once reached, they’ll get ten seconds of hot projectiles. Then, if they’ve got haste attached to the fourth and activate quickly enough, they combine. Zipping about, lighting things on fire like a pyromaniac at a roller disco.
The good news is they’re not a one-time system either. Use the special attack, reset the star meter and go again. It rewards a less conservative player, as if to say, “Go nuts, you fill that screen you crazy diamond”.
Beats And Pixels On Point
I haven’t really mentioned the graphics or whatnot, like I normally do early on, because Dark Scrolls is as retro as they come. Well, retro with a little parallax scrolling akin to Shovel Knight, anyway.
That being said, I absolutely love the visuals tunes on display here. But then, I’m old, I like retro stuff. Dark Scrolls hits that itch for me, especially playing on an [old] Switch Lite and feeling nostalgic.
Admittedly it might lose a little bit of that charm on say, a 65″ OLED in the lounge. But that’s a personal choice and as I say, suits the Switch in handheld mode perfectly.
And the music, it’s all chiptunes and memorable hooks. But again, in an 8bit style, much like Alex Kidd in Miracle World, or to use a more modern contemporary: The Messenger.
Ganging Up
The other fun feature of Dark Scrolls is its multiplayer, and the simplicity of it all. There’s both local and online, with simple drop in/out for the former. There might be for the online, but it took me long enough to find a couple of games initially so I didn’t want to mess about.
But yes, the multiplayer is fun. Seeing you and a few friends bouncing about is a laugh, projectiles and mayhem all in one.
I’d love to go all in-depth about netcode, rollback and whatnot here, but it’d be slightly redundant. Dark Scrolls isn’t the most punishing of performances and if there are any latency issues, something is very wrong with your connection.
Go Forth And Bang Head Unto Wall
After all that, there’s not really much else I can say about Dark Scrolls. It’s a simple but progressively harder level-based adventure, with some branching paths. The rogue nature of randomly generated levels mixes it up a little, as does trying new characters and perks.
It’s the right amount of fun for players that want a quick little blast. Is it revolutionary? No. Is it pushing a complex narrative or subverting any genres or tropes? Also no.
But at the end of the day, we don’t always need that. Sometimes we need a cute little platformer filled with violence and projectiles. The value comes in replayability, if that’s your bag. If it’s not, you might find this not worth your time and money. If you do, however, jumping in solo or with friends/randoms will have you auto-scrolling your way to victory. Or death, more likely.
Dark Scrolls is available now on Nintendo Switch (review platform) and PC via Steam.
Developer: Doinksoft
Publisher: Devolver Digital