GRIME

GRIME is such a consistently astounding game that it’s hard to believe it didn’t just fall out of the sky fully formed. The world it’s set in is one of the most compelling in recent memory, the combat is weighty, satisfying, and incredibly difficult, and the ecstatic feeling you get upon conquering some of the bigger challenges rivals the same feeling you get in a Dark Souls game.

Grime is an exceptional Souls-inspired take on the 2D Metroidvania. An intricate, stone-carved world full of mysteries provides a sure-footed foundation for deep, finely-balanced combat and breathless, devious platforming. Best of all, it's a Souls-like that forgoes punishment in favour of encouragement, happy to lend a helping hand whenever you fall.

Ultimately, Grime is an overall successful transposition of the 2D Soulslike subgenre into a new and engaging world. Although it lacks the emotional richness of the best Souls games, Grime’s striking environments, solid combat, imaginative enemies and original mechanics all work together in harmony, and it clearly establishes a formula that is open to refinement and possibility.

Grime is, much like its central character, an odd amalgamation of ideas, from Souls based RPGs, to platforming punch em ups, all oddly twisted into something that looks like a little nightmare all its own. If you’re looking for something different but utterly beautiful, then Grime is worth your time.

For € 19.99 and a dozen hours or so, the game is definitely worth the candle.

Grime is a Souls-like experience that’ll cleanse your pallet between the more significant releases of the genre. It mainly acts as filler, but it also keeps your reactions to tense action gameplay in top shape for whatever you’ll play next. The atmosphere really sells the dreary adventure with the help of an excellent artistic design, a stellar soundtrack, and engaging combative mechanics. Still, there’s a noticeable lack of boss spectacle and challenge required to at least cause a few fist clenches.

Grime is a game of gaping contradictions. It is one of the most visually striking releases of the year… and also one of the ugliest. It’s one of the most imaginative games in some time… and also one of the most generic. For all of Grime’s talk about chiseled stone, the experience feels like a half-finished sculpture – occasional details reveal tantalizing glimpses of the creators’ vision, but it’s largely an indistinct blob.

Simply the perfect fusion between a metroidvania and a souls-like, a challenging RPG with real rewards for exploration and build decisions. In addition to this, the lore and story is great, and made me get affectioned to characters like Yon and Shidra. Highly suggested to anyone who is ready for a challenging immersive adventure.

GRIME offers a visually arresting world and a chaotic atmosphere that stands out in the crowded Metroidvania genre. However, beneath its stony exterior, some design choices create a friction that prevents the game from reaching true **** "Absorb" Dilemma and Combat The core "Absorb" mechanic, while conceptually interesting, unfortunately, hurts the game’s pacing. Instead of an aggressive, fluid combat style, it forces you into a passive "wait-and-parry" loop. Since the absorb timing is relatively easy to master, it can make major boss encounters feel trivial once you find the rhythm. In contrast, the character’s movement feels notably heavy and sluggish, which often clashes with the precision required in modern Metroidvanias.However, the combat isn't without its charms. The weapon variety is impressive, and the "Special Attacks" (Triangle button) are a highlight. Specifically, the aerial heavy attacks feel impactful and are visually rewarding, providing a much-needed sense of power in an otherwise slow combat system.Difficulty Spikes and Frustration One of the most jarring aspects is the inconsistent difficulty. While bosses can be overcome easily with the absorb mechanic, certain regular mobs feel overtuned—sometimes capable of one-shotting the player. Combined with the punishingly distant checkpoints (surrogate points), this leads to moments of genuine frustration rather than a "fair challenge." If you have a short fuse, be prepared for some nerve-wracking sessions.World Design and Exploration The map design is a standout feature. It is massive and provides excellent clarity; the way it tracks your explored paths ensures you never feel truly lost despite the labyrinthine structure. While the environments can feel a bit repetitive visually, the developer, Clover Bite, has done a masterful job of conveying a chaotic, primordial atmosphere.Progression and RPG Elements On the RPG side, the leveling system feels somewhat underwhelming. The stat upgrades and skill points often lack a tangible "impact," making the character's growth feel less rewarding than it should be in a 20+ hour journey.Verdict: If you are a hardcore fan of the genre and enjoy a chaotic, surreal atmosphere, GRIME is worth your time. But be prepared for a slow-paced experience and some questionable balance choices that might test your patience more than your skill.

Not sure how this got scored by my account as I do not own and have not played this game.

The game has great ideas and a half-baked implementation of it. I lost count of how many times I died in the game because one time I would land and take some damage and on the other I would die instantly. The "map" idea is also infuriating, some times I spent about 1 hour or more without finding the damn checkpoint, or 2 hours without finding the thing that reveals the map, it was a miserable experience at that. Is not like the game does not have good things, the combat is ok, there are markers to use on its map and there are some progressions that are also ok. It is "ok" at best, all because of the unnecessary frustration given by the map problems, the almost hidden checkpoints and the inconsistent gameplay experience. One time the ability slow motion works, and in others it just doesn't... I gave up.

Incredibly flawed game. They start off by showing you how to parry attacks, and then say that if the enemy glows red they can't be parried. Then there are random enemies that aren't glowing but also can't be parried. You die super easily, so you think you were just timing it bad, and so you spend 10 minutes running back to where you died from the FAR away spawn point only to die again because for no apparent reason you can't parry the enemy. This happened to me numerous times until I downloaded a trainer to give me infinite HP and discovered this is a "bug" that's not actually a bug. There's actually a whole other system based on color and percentage of the health bar (which only shows once you damage an enemy), which they don't bother to inform you about at all. You have to use a search engine to play this game. And sometimes it straight up doesn't work anyway. There are other platform games where dying is normal and not unenjoyable. This is not one of them. The only way for me to pleasantly get through this game is with a trainer. I don't think the map/navigation is done well. I spent most of the time wandering through a completely dark maze without coming across any beacons to light up the map. That means you have to go back and do everything again numerous times, because not even areas you traversed get saved/lit up on the map. It would be even more repetitive if I wasn't using a trainer, but as is, you have to traverse the entire map at least twice.This is such a weird game. I can't believe there are that many people who like doing this kind of thing over and over. You level up very slowly. Part of it may be because they expect you to do everything over and over, but "hunt points" seem very rare.There's at least one spot in the game where you will have to look online what to do. Even a super pro guy who does this for a living had the same problem (dash through the spikes). Unlike some other great platform games that have wonderful music, this has none. There are ambient sounds, and there's one part where even they get so annoyingly repetitive that I had to mute the game. There's another part where the ambient sound sounds like someone whispering "what an ****" over and over. I don't mind redoing map sections but it should be that the story leads you there again, rather than dying over and over or because now you can have a visible map to clear vs just having a black maze before.I think the way the map works is not good at all. It's either all or nothing -- it can light up parts you haven't visited, making it very hard to keep track of what you haven't explored yet. Usually there's some item you can get/buy in the last half of the game that will reveal item locations so you can go around and pick them up, but I came across no such thing in this game. There are lots of things in this game that seem poorly designed, poorly balanced, or literally broken. I got tired of listing all the flaws. The game is enjoyable enough with a trainer so that you can customize your experience, but I definitely wouldn't recommend it without one. It's the kind of game where they confuse being really hard with being fun and enjoyable.