Majestria: Incremental Survival

I'm pretty sad to say this one is a no, and I will be refunding.

The bones of this game are actually really cool. The upgrades during gameplay are really cool and unique and towards the end of a level you will be smashing hundreds of enemies.

That beings said, as far as I can tell, there's not an actual game here. All eight characters are unlocked at the get. There is zero meta progression that is the staple of both incrementals and survivor-likes.

The gameplay loop is kill some enemies, die, get some upgrades, kill some more, repeat, beat level. Then you go to the next level and are reset back to level one and do the exact same thing. So that means in the 15 minutes you spent on the first level you have basically seen the game. As far as I can tell there is no reason to go deeper.

The game begins in a tavern where you choose one of eight characters. They all fit the usual fantasy archetypes, with a wizard, several warrior classes, and a couple you don't see very often, like a gatherer or an alchemist. The differences between them come down to health, damage output, and two unique perks, but honestly, your choice doesn't have a huge impact. After that, you pick a blessing, which acts as another perk and can grant bonuses such as extra defense, faster mana regeneration, critical chance, and more.

The goal is to survive several waves against an endless horde of enemies. Your hero stands in the middle of the battlefield inside a magic circle and never moves. Instead, you aim by moving the mouse cursor, which also appears as a small circle that damages anything caught inside it.

Every kill grants experience, and leveling up takes you before a group of gods who offer three random perks. You can only choose one. The blessing you selected at the start slightly increases the chances of perks from a particular god appearing, since every blessing is tied to one of them. Each god has its own pool of perks, and every time you choose one, you also gain that god's boon.

For example, the Iron Sentinel increases your armor, while the Muse of Chaos infuses your magic circle with elemental spells. The strength of each boon depends on how many unique perks you have from that god. Since the same perks can appear again, you can pick duplicates to level them up and improve their effectiveness. Perks are also divided into rarity tiers ranging from common to legendary, although you don't actually know their rarity until after you've picked them.

You won't stand much of a chance at first and will probably struggle to survive even the opening wave. That's where the resurrection mechanic comes in. Every time you die, you restart from wave one, but you keep all of your gods' upgrades and perks. On top of that, your attack circle deals more damage with each resurrection. Eventually, you'll become powerful enough to survive anything, including the damage sponge of a boss waiting at the end of the final wave. Even if you die fighting it, you simply start again, gain more perks, and kee trying until it finally goes down.

Defeating the boss sends you to the next location, but you also lose everything and have to start over from scratch. In practice, though, this hardly matters because the inn lets you select any of the eight stages from the start. This is especially useful since the game doesn't have a save system. After a while, I started to realize there's very little sense of progression or purpose.

The only thing that permanently improves is your blessing, which gains a level after every resurrection. Everything else is already available from the beginning. The game also does a poor job of explaining itself. You can't even view your current perks unless you're on the gods' selection screen, and while most perks don't provide any extra details, a few reveal additional information when you hover over them, making the whole interface feel inconsistent.

In short, the game is enjoyable for a run or two, and given enough time, you can eventually beat every stage. The problem is that there's almost no sense of accomplishment. Stages aren't marked as completed, there are no meaningful rewards for finishing them, and there's little incentive to keep playing. I'd recommend picking it up on sale, but I wouldn't pay full price.