Realm of Ink is a Asian-mythology themed Rogue-like. You play as swordswoman Red who must travel through the Realm of Ink to free herself… or something. The narrative really isn’t important. What is important, is that when you die, you travel to this Inn, where you can buff yourself, buff your pets, change difficulty, and even change forms to a different character with a different weapon.
And die you will. The game can get difficult depending on the difficultly, but regardless of level, the final boss has “a billion” hp and has 2 different forms. Most of the levels is going to room to room, picking ones featuring the rewards you want. The you get a safe zone where you can heal and power yourself up. Then you face a mini-boss. Beat them, you have second set of rooms, then another Safe zone, then a 2-form boss. The final world is just the final boss.
Realm of Ink plays kinda like Hades, or I’ve been told, as I’ve never played Hades(heard I should). There’s weak attack, strong attack, two ink relic powers, and super relic power. Plus you have pets that can change depending on your abilities selected. There are also curious and elixirs, which buff your abilities in various ways. As far as currencies, you got ink stones, which power up your abilities. Silver is used to buy curios and heal in the safe rooms. Finally there’s heart blood, which is used to earn permanent buffs at the inn. Then there’s a special currency earned when defeating bosses to unlock forms.
I liked Realm of Ink, but not enough to give it a Must Play. I’ll give it a Recommended with an seven score. Wish there was more in-game narrative. And honestly, some of the bosses take so long its downright boring. Also, performance on the Switch 2 is downright awful, with lagging, crashing and pixelated video, however, I assume this will get fixed eventually. So, you cannot go wrong playing Realm of Ink, its well made game and well worth your time if this interests you!
Overall: Realm of Ink is a decent rogue-like that is well worth the time and energy if this interests you!
Verdict: Recommended
Score: Seven
eShop Page
PS. My Lovely Empress, based on Chinese Mythology, is a very different game.
