Skald: Against the Black Priory

Skald: Against the Black Priory is a single-player RPG with a 1980s aesthetic. In spite of the Old School look, this is very much a New School style game (like modern D&D) where you move along a defined story and go from combat encounter to combat encounter. The story has a very Lovecraftian horror feel to it.

In ancient Scandinavian culture, a skald is a type of bard, which makes this a probable reference to the 1985 video game The Bard's Tale.

I beat the game on Easy difficulty in 33 hours.

THE GOOD:

• I was charmed by the game's story and its style.
• I enjoyed the combat for the full length of the game. It took me some time to master the various mechanics.
• Skald really feels like playing a 1980s or early 90s computer RPG, like The Bard's Tale, Pool of Radiance, or Ultima VI but with major quality of life improvements. Overall, the interface is pretty straightforward and usable.
• There's a journal that auto-tracks your quests and progress.

THE BAD:

• I thought the ending was awful, although—to be fair—it fits with the Lovecraftian horror theme. I just feel it could have been better explained and the player could have had more meaningful input into the ending.
• The game is fairly linear, with only the illusion of choice.
• The various character classes and their Feats are not well-balanced. Some choices are much better than other choices.
• The game rules are not really well-explained, making it hard to make good choices at game start without looking up guides online and getting potential spoilers.
• Many high-level Feat choices are utterly useless (like the axe's Decapitation ability, when literally all the enemies toward the end of the game are immune to fear).
• Using an active Feat sets all your actives on cooldown.
• Magic is pretty crap. In particular, the high-level spells in the game really stink. It's almost impossible to line up area-effect spells well. Spells don't do much even if you do line them up (with effects rarely lasting more than a single enemy turn). Magic-users can cast very few spells before needing to rest. I found myself using only a handful of actually useful spells the entire game.
• Archers are pretty underpowered as well due to the frightful rate at which they use ammunition and the lack of available ammunition.

THE UGLY:

• Indoor spaces and dungeons cause your character to be surrounded by darkness. It makes it hard to move around with the mouse and figure out where you're going.
• Occasionally, you will accidentally click on a different elevation level and your character will start running off far away.
• It's unclear at times what you can interact with in the environment and how. For example, certain entrances/exits are not clearly marked.