We know how the story goes, the hero rescues the princess from the evil villain. Its a story that’s set in stone…or is it? What if we decided to reverse the roles and you were the villain kidnapping the princess? This is the world of Nefarious.
Nefarious stars Crow, a villain with aspirations of conquering the world. His plan is simple; kidnap various princesses. I cannot explain it but Nefarious is just one of the most charming games I have ever played. Every bit of it, from the amazing artwork, to the excellent animation and humor is just excellent. So much love and dedication was put into this game and the effort paid off. All except the controls, but I will get into that in a moment.
Nefarious takes every cliché and trope about video games and reverses them. You don’t have boss fights, but instead you are the boss fighting the hero in a reverse boss fights.. These parody almost every genre of gaming and leave nothing untouched. There is a problem however, in that the controls in these fights are often extremely frustrating. Some fights change the gameplay up too much and do so too quickly, giving you little time to adjust to the sudden shift. You will die numerous times, but keep at it. There are also issues with the hit detection in regular gameplay a few times, and some jumps just feel off.
If you can look past this though, it is a decent game with amazing music and some really catchy tunes. You can collect more music and the music is a cut above the usual indie fare. It just feels so good, and I can’t explain it, it just works well. Combined with the overall animation, Nefarious feels different in a truly original way. The game builds its universe organically and has in fact spawned a sequel in the form of a webcomic. I suggest people check that one out as well for some hilarious writing.
Nefarious is a good if imperfect game and has a very unique premise. If it weren’t for some control issues it would be perfect, but as it is, just be aware it has some flaws.
Disclaimer: A review key was provided
Reviewed on Switch