Mortal Sin is a murderous roguelike with a boomer-shooter's sense of speedy style
Dragging you back for more.
Mortal Sin is a recently early access first-person roguelike that blends a boomer shooter's ferocious speed with an oppressive dark fantasy world. It's bleeding with style, but it starts off quite simply: a black screen and text that reads "You have retained your sense of self. And that is my gift to you. But who are you really? If not a part of me." That question echoed in my mind from then on.
A similarly cryptic, almost threatening message greets you at the start of every new run, which is appropriate, considering how unpredictably bloodthirsty this world's cave, dungeon, and forest levels are. In underground passageways, looking up will reveal an unnatural starry skyline. In the silence, you'll hear far-off whispers. Walking a little closer will reveal that a mountain of flesh was the source of those hushed noises, flailing out of the wall with an outstretched hand. Huge, vacant eyeballs similarly bulge out of the walls, rivaling Junji Ito's impressive collection of dilated pupils.
Every static-dotted sight is obviously beautiful, but also haunting. Every sign of life is skewered and distorted. Those eyes I mentioned a moment ago, for instance, look tangentially human. Step closer though, real close, and their pupils will reveal an empty cosmic blackness. Corpses are also sewn into the walls, overlapping like a Satanic recreation of Michelangelo's Catholic paintings.
Your first adventure - if you can call it that - through this grainy world is tough, proving those ominous fighting words true. Running through the first levels, with your initial sword-wielding class, reveals spikey traps hidden in every corner, screaming phantoms waiting to jumpscare you, and a room full of eldritch baddies looking to fight, and kill. On my first run, even after whacking and sometimes dismembering these humanoid horrors, they persisted. They crawled toward me with no legs, they ran around without heads, kicking the air - I once spotted a static torso, still alive, seemingly waiting for a final blow.
After a single death, the ominous text returned: "You reach beyond the veil. Poking and prodding for something greater. Some sense of purpose. What is it you hope to find?" I found myself thinking the same thing about Mortal Sin after that short-lived, horror-filled first try. It didn't take long to answer my question.
An hour later, the game had me in its grip - as if the fleshy fingers had caught me - thanks to its bloody, power fantasy-fuel combat. Many roguelikes focus on macro character-building choices, asking you to choose between bombastic spells or game-changing equipment. Mortal Sin instead prides itself on moreish melee combat that allows you to learn new moves and encourages you to keep up a damage-multiplying combo. What follows is a breakneck-speed massacre that has you chaining together roundhouse kicks, whirlwind sword swings, and blade-first runs.
My first eureka moment came from playing the punchin'-n'-kickin' Monk class. I had found the rhythm in combat, combo-ing my way to damage multipliers and splattering deaths, as if I was a young Doomslayer. A headbanging, throaty rock track accompanies some of the fights as you zip across enemies, dislocating their limbs and spiraling like a snowball of death.
The following death was this time punctuated by a revelation - the question of who I was, or who I had become, was clearer. "A seemingly endless struggle ensues. Two indomitable wills. Join me in this rhapsody of violence. And you will find that we are one." Its words were true: the roles had been reversed, or mirrored - I was now the bundle of murderous intent.
You go from this cosmic horror's playdoll to its oppressor. Suddenly the beasties were trapped in these walls with me, not the other way around. Those pesky traps were no longer life-threatening hindrances, they were opportunities, environmental hazards begging to be used. Wanting to taste blood. And I was happy to oblige.
Maybe this feeling of violent content will pass. Maybe Mortal Sin will continue to comment on this funny, strange, and potentially disturbing mirror throughout the rest of its runtime. Either way, I'm excited to discover more joyfully unbalanced builds for the rest of its early access journey. A devilishly good time.