Oblitus is a downloadable game on Steam.  It’s a 2-D platformer game with exploration elements and you use a spear to defeat nearby and long-distance enemies.  I had my friend Robbie Allen review it, so click here and find out if he thought it was good or not!

Ever really wanted to like a game, but just found that some mechanic completely ruined it for you? Yeah, Oblitus is one of those games for me. This game has so much great things going for it, it’s just a pity I can’t enjoy playing it.

Oblitus is a Metroidvania style game on Steam that has a lot of great things going on in it. The graphics are really beautiful and I love the tribal/mythical look and feel that it has. I love the atmosphere, the open free roaming areas, and the extreme sense of scale the game has, and I think the fact that enemies will actually chase you down when they see you is a really neat concept. What I DON’T LIKE is the manner of attack you are given in this game. You’re given a spear that you can either stab or throw.

The controls for using your attacks are really weird, though. You aim the weapon with the right analog stick and either stab with the shoulder button or throw it with the shoulder trigger. It’s a neat idea, but it’s flawed when all the enemies are extremely agile and chase you down as soon as they see you. This gives you little time to aim and you’ll often find yourself missing your target if you decide to throw your spear. This is made worse by the fact that if you throw your spear, you are left completely defenseless until the spear regenerates. This takes only a few seconds, and may not sound bad, but again when an enemy is quickly pummeling you, it makes it really frustrating.

Stabbing with the spear sounds like the better option, but getting close enough to use it puts you in harm’s way of the enemies. See, most enemies take multiple hits as well as have shields, so using the stab will have you trading hits with the enemies and they still maybe block a lot of your hits. So it’s hard to hit the enemies this way without getting hit yourself. Oh, did also mention you have to aim with this as well. You can stab without aiming, but with the shield in the way, you’ll find aiming a better chance of hitting enemies. Unfortunately this still takes more time than you’ll want to attack the enemies without being hit.

You are at least given a dodge roll that helps a bit, and you can jump really high and the controls of your movements are great, but they’re still not enough. I found the attack controls just so unintuitive and clumsy and I just couldn’t get used to them.

Oblitus is a game I REALLY want to recommend, but I just can’t. The attacking controls are just too much of a deal breaker. If you want a good Metroidvania style game on Steam, I’d recommend Strider, Dust: An Elysian Tail, Ori and The Blind Forest, or the lesser appreciated Bunny Must Die. As for Oblitus, I’m afraid I’d recommend passing on it.

Kid Factor:

I don’t think kids will enjoy this game much. They’ll find the difficulty and controls too frustrating to deal with.  –Robbie Allen

Tags: Reader Reviews!