Forest Strike Review – IGN

As a fighting game fan, I have come to enjoy process. Spend a lot of time in training mode learning the memorized timing of button presses, and hopefully that practice will pay off when it really matters. That's probably why I discovered Forestrike, a 2D martial arts-inspired roguelite game that has a unique appeal by letting you plan out your approach to a series of combat encounters before actually executing them. It manages to evoke the feel of classic kung fu fighting choreography, combining straightforward hand-to-hand combat with clever moments of using the environment to your advantage, either using your enemies' own weapons against them or causing friendly fire by simply effortlessly stepping aside, all on a 2D plane with minimalist malicious art. The precision and memory required to accomplish these impressive feats can be brutal, especially considering how easily one mistake can lead to more mistakes and ultimately a failed run, but this clever concept still manages to pack a huge punch.

Forest Strike puts you in control of Yu, a young martial artist who is a member of the Visions, a faction that dutifully serves the Emperor and is dedicated to saving him from the manipulations of a man known as “The Admiral.” There's a surprising amount of dialogue in Forest Strike, as we learn more about the Order and the various masters who guide Yu on his journey between each run. In this way, it's a lot like the breaks between Hades runs, but instead of always looking forward to something new the characters have to say, I usually find myself eager to continue so I can get back into the action. The complete lack of voice acting certainly contributed to this, but the writing and characters themselves weren't enough to keep me interested for long.

Once you actually start running, the Forestrike flexes its muscles. It's structured like a combat challenge against increasingly difficult enemies, but before the real battle begins, you get to essentially practice using your foresight techniques. This allows you to find the right combination of attacks, dodges, and techniques to defeat all enemies in the most effective way. Defense resources such as blocking and dodge extremely Limited, and you'll rarely encounter more than one of them. It felt pretty frustrating at first, as I constantly found myself forced to expend my dodge or block on the first strong enemy I faced, meaning I wouldn't be able to avoid the last enemy's attack. But eventually, as I learned how enemies would react to my actions and how I could use these predictable tendencies to my advantage, a visual language began to develop.

If an enemy charges at me from the right, I can use my dodge resources to move the enemy to my left to the other side, placing him directly in front of the attack. If I encounter an enemy with spikes on the front of its body, I can look for a puppet enemy that will drop its head when killed, which I can then pick up and throw away to kill the spiked enemy from a distance. Figuring out this visual language organically is very satisfying, and I feel like I'm getting further and further into the run, not because my character is getting stronger, but because I'm just getting better, which is always a great feeling in a Roguelite.

What really makes the gameplay engaging are the different martial arts masters you carry with you on each run, which determines what techniques you're able to use. Talgun, the master of the Leaf style, who focuses primarily on redirecting enemy attacks so your foes can eliminate each other; Nodai, the cold-eyed style, who focuses primarily on blocking, regenerating health, and brute force; and my favorite, Monkey, who employs a wild fighting style that relies on surprise attacks with kicks, bananas, and lying on the floor so that their attacks go directly over those behind you.

Each style requires a completely different approach to combat puzzles, and I loved jumping between them and seeing the many different techniques that unlocked you to go further on the run. Each time you defeat a boss in one of the four areas, you unlock more techniques that are added to a randomly selected reward pool, which essentially acts as permanent progression, helping you gain the extra advantages you need to conquer each of the campaign's four areas.

A big problem with this formula is that the precision required in some of the later stages can get pretty out of hand, especially considering how quickly things can go off the rails with just one mistake. I've been in multiple fights where all the drills went perfectly, but in actual attempts I'd be just a tiny bit off on the timing of an attack, which would basically cause my entire plan to fall apart, forcing me to improvise the rest of the way, which usually resulted in death or near-death. It's just part of the design, but it doesn't stop people from getting extremely frustrated when they lose an otherwise great run and end up falling just a few milliseconds behind.

The sprite-based art style is intentionally minimalistic—much like Skeleton Crew Studio's previous game, Olija—and mostly charming. Despite the lack of detail, the sprites themselves are surprisingly expressive, the 2D art is great, and the live animations are great – but for whatever reason, the walking and running animations don't get the same attention, and are some of the most awkward animations I've ever seen in 2D pixel art. It's not a big deal since Yu actually just walks and runs between runs in the temple, but it's still a very strange quirk in a game that looks great.