by Gamatroid
I recently played the demo of Into The Restless Ruins on Xbox Series S, and I came away impressed and looking forward to its full release in May.
Into The Restless Ruins is being developed by Ant Workshop Ltd and will be published by Wales Interactive. It is currently set to release on May 15, 2025 across PC/Steam, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation and Xbox.
Into The Restless Ruins seems to combine multiple genres that I'm not normally a big fan of. It brings together Vampire Survivor-like auto attacks, card-based power ups, and rogue-light restarts. Interestingly it also incorporates level building / room unlocking mechanics that remind me a little of the recently released (and very well received) Blue Prince.
The aforementioned cards give you various room layouts to place on the map, but of course only certain room sizes and connection points will work at any given time, depending on what the map layout is currently like. This gives the game a lot of strategy that makes it a lot more interesting than any of its individual parts might suggest.
You also have a limited amount of Build Points to use each turn, so sometimes even if you still have room cards to play, you may be out of Build Points to place them. Additionally, you need to consider your path through the ruins during each run, as you can run out of torchlight (instantly starting to deal damage to you and making it difficult to find the exit), and you can also run out of life points.
To combat these limitations you can place Camp Fire rooms to grant you additional torch light (up to your current limit), Armories to grant you additional damage power, and rooms that can refill part of your health bar. You need to consider, however, your actual path through the ruins so you don't place similar rooms to close to each other, or too far away, so that you can refill your torch and health at the right points during your run.
Connecting rooms to fog-laden rooms allows you to enter them, clear the fog, and collect the items in them during a specific run. You can then connect other rooms to them to continue your journey to the portal and end boss of a particular area.
The aforementioned auto-attack is not what I generally prefer in games, but being able to match the attack timing to incoming enemies just seems to add to the overall strategy during each run. While it's not my favorite way to play games, I didn't mind it here.
Once you have made enough progress during a run, the Exit Portal opens which allows you to exit the ruins without dying and retain as much of your collected loot as possible. If you start to run out of torch light, however, it can make finding the exit rather difficult.
Once you place enough rooms to reach the end of a set of ruins, you need to fight and defeat a Warden, which is the boss of each ruin. But of course, you need to make your way successfully through the ruins during a single run AND defeat the Warden in order to clear the level. This is easier said than done, of course, and the order you place rooms in can be the difference between an easier run, and a MUCH harder run, if the rooms aren't placed in an ideal order.
Upon defeating the Warden you are greeted by the mysterious figure you see at the beginning of the game, and she tells you some of her power has been restored, but of course there are other ruins to clear and other Wardens to defeat, in order to completely restore her powers.
I believe the game demo is available on Steam, PS5, and Xbox (sorry Switch owners) and I suggest if any of this looks interesting, you should give it a try.
You can see my demo playthrough on YouTube:
Overall I really enjoyed the demo of Into The Restless Ruins. The gameplay loop is interesting and satisfying, the different gameplay elements come together well, and the pixel art is good for the style the game is trying to convey.
The only place where the pixel art could be better, is the female figure at the beginning. She looks like a small pixel art character that has simply been blown up to be large, and lacks any detail as a result. Honestly that is my only complaint so far, although whether the gameplay loop keeps you hooked for hours, and whether the way future ruins will unlock will keep you interested remains to be seen.
So far, however it seems like this game is on the right track for a successful launch come May.
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