Skul: The Hero Slayer originally launched in January 2021 but for PC only. It now returns with a plethora of consoles ports along with several key updates made since the initial release. Reviews at the time were high on PC and the same seems to be true according to the aggregates on the various new systems.
It was developed by a fairly new indie developer, Southpaw Games, which is based in South Korea. That country keeps dishing out games and pretty soon it might become the next Japan. That’s high praise for this new indie roguelike. Not everything about Skul: The Hero Slayer is perfect so let’s go through the flaws along with the positives in this roundup.
8 Best: Skull Forms
The big hook of this game is the titular Skul putting on different heads. These skulls will grant players new abilities via costumes much like the power-ups in the Mario franchise. It makes combat much more enjoyable. The rarer the skull acquired, the more bombastic the gameplay will become, from a floating genie to an infused knight made out of flame. It’s always a treat to test out new skull players have never seen before.
7 Worst: Not All Skulls Are Created Equal
There are a lot of fun skulls in the game but there are also many duds. If Skul: The Hero Slayer was a co-op game, some of these form changes would make sense. For example, there is a soldier that uses a shield as a weapon. It typically has a skill that can grant players a temporary shield around their body. This is nice but the shield damage is slow and low making the class feel a bit useless.
If this was a co-op game, then having support forms like this would make sense to pair up with offensive classes. That might be why players can swap between two skulls at a time. Whether that’s the case or not doesn’t matter. Overall some skulls just feel like filler.
6 Best: Pixel Art
Skul: The Hero Slayer is one of many indie games that use retro-style pixel art. Thankfully the game is an example of how to do it right. It is a hardcore roguelike that can get brutally challenging. The genre often carries a dark stigma with it but despite that fact, Skul: The Hero Slayer is super bright and colorful.
It not only looks great visually but the style is also top-notch. The various skull forms were already praised gameplay-wise, but their design should also be praised along with the many monsters players will encounter.
5 Worst: Broken Up Story
Most of the story is told through interactions with various NPCs players will meet on their runs. The cast is colorful with some witty lines, but the overall narrative leaves something to be desired. It follows Skul who wants to rescue the Demon King from an invading human army. That’s the premise but not much time is given to expanding the story beyond that aside from a few storybook-like panels. It’s not a huge loss as gameplay is very solid.
4 Best: Crossovers And Other References
Indie games typically like to poke fun at themselves and other titles in the industry. For example, there is a class called the Warrior and it makes Skul look like Kratos from God of War. It’s not an official crossover but it is spot on and hilarious to boot. That, and many other unofficial cameos in the game, are great. Skul: The Hero Slayer features a real crossover though via Dead Cells. Players can find the Prisoner’s head and become one of the best classes in the game.
3 Worst: Restarting And Loads
When players die they have to go back to the castle. It’s here that players can use crystals to upgrade Skul permanently. Other NPCs may gift Skul starting items such as boons or skulls to equip.
After that players will dive out of the tower, fall for a few seconds and then land at the starting gate. It takes a bit longer to get going each round than what some players may like. The load times, at least on the Switch console, could be faster too.
2 Best: A Balanced Difficulty
As an action platformer roguelike, Skul: The Hero Slayer is not easy. However, it is not impossibly hard either. There is a lot of luck involved in terms of getting the right items and skulls to have a good run. That’s typical for most games in the genre though. However, there is an option in the menu to give more casual players a leg up with Rookie Mode. Turning this on will reduce all damage by half. That’s a nice accessible feature for those that are struggling a bit early on.
1 Worst: Missing Doors And Shopkeepers
On the subject of lucky runs in Skul: The Hero Slayer, the can feel off-balance at times. Levels typically give players two choices on doors. These paths offer varying bonuses from rooms filled more with treasure to ones with more enemies. Sometimes exits will only have one door with the other being destroyed.
This doesn’t count forced exits either such as boss doors or the shop area. Speaking of the shop area, sometimes vendors will be missing just like the doors. Exits and shopkeepers disappearing randomly, again, can throw off the balance in what can feel like a mean way even for a roguelike.
Skul: The Hero Slayer was first released on January 20, 2021 for PC. It was re-released on October 21, 2021 for PS4, Switch, and Xbox One.