There Is No Light: Enhanced Edition Review Summary

Beautiful pixel art and excellent combat with great boss fights are marred by an ineffective healing system, no map causing navigation problems, and a confusing story.

Beautiful pixel art: Players consistently praise the game's pixel art as beautiful, stunning, and well-crafted, with detailed backgrounds and environments. The art style is a major highlight across numerous reviews.

Excellent combat system: The combat is described as fast, responsive, deep, and satisfying, with many calling it one of the best they've seen. It is considered challenging but fair, especially on harder difficulties.

Great boss fights: Boss fights are plentiful, well-designed, visually impressive, and require pattern recognition. Each boss is unique and engaging, offering a fun challenge.

Deep lore and worldbuilding: The game features a deep, compelling lore and world that players enjoy piecing together. The story and secrets add significant depth to the experience.

Immersive atmosphere: The game's atmosphere is consistently described as well done, great, and fantastic, contributing to an immersive experience. The combination of visuals, audio, and design creates a strong mood.

Healing system is ineffective and scarce: The healing mechanics are widely criticized as horrible, limited, and punishing. Healing items are rare, do not respawn, and can be lost on death, making them feel useless or frustrating.

No map causes navigation problems: The absence of an in-game map or compass makes exploration frustrating, especially in large or mazelike areas. Players frequently get lost and find navigation overwhelming without guidance.

Story is confusing and poorly told: The narrative is fragmentary, rushed, and poorly explained, often requiring tedious reading of documents. Players find the storytelling amateurish and the pacing unsatisfying.

Skill tree offers little value: The skill tree is considered uninteresting and offers very little meaningful progression. Upgrades feel irrelevant or cosmetic, failing to enhance gameplay.

Weapons unlocked too late: Important weapons are acquired very late in the game, making them less useful. Some weapons are considered terrible or only situationally beneficial, reducing combat variety.

Multiple weapon types available: The game offers a variety of weapons, such as swords, fists, gauntlets, and greatswords, each with unique mechanics. Some become available later in the game.

Souls-like gameplay elements: The game is frequently compared to Dark Souls, emphasizing patience, pattern learning, and difficult boss fights. It blends hack-and-slash with Souls-like mechanics.

Fast and strategic combat: Players describe combat as very fast, dynamic, and strategic, with dodges and evasions being key. The system is both brutal and responsive, making fights feel engaging.

Skill trees and weapon upgrades: Players appreciate the extensive skill trees and upgrade systems for multiple weapon types. Each weapon has its own progression, offering Souls-like depth.

Karma system affects endings: A karma system tracks positive and negative actions, influencing dialogue, the world, and multiple endings. Timed moral choices add weight to decisions.

Great performance on Steam Deck: Players report smooth performance on Steam Deck, with consistent 60fps out of the box. This makes the game highly playable on the handheld device.

Overall good performance: General performance is praised, with FPS staying high and smooth throughout the experience.

Low system requirements: A player noted that the game has low system requirements, making it accessible to a wider audience with less powerful hardware.

No control issues: No problems were reported with keyboard/mouse or controller input, indicating good input support across devices.

High FPS stuttering issue: One player experienced stuttering when running the game at 100-160 FPS, indicating possible optimization issues at very high frame rates.

Cannot recommend the game: Multiple clusters state they cannot recommend the game at all, even on sale or at full price, with some advising to skip it entirely.

Buy on sale recommendation: Several clusters suggest buying the game on sale, noting that it is worth the discounted price or a must-buy when reduced.

Recommended for Soulslike fans: Several clusters of players recommend the game to fans of Soulslike games, dark worlds, or games with difficult bosses, noting that it may take time to get used to.

Better alternatives exist: Several clusters suggest that better soulslikes or games with polished combat exist, recommending alternatives like Hades, Unsighted, or Death's Door instead.

Recommend for art and atmosphere: The game is recommended for players who appreciate great pixel art, Lovecraftian horror, dense atmospheric worlds, and narrative-focused experiences.

Community fair range: $5.00 - $12.00.

Game completion: 20.0h.

Story completion: 7.0h.

Session length: 3.0h.

Endgame: 4.0h.

The game is widely reported to have a slow and frustrating start with repetitive combat and limited healing, but some players find it becomes addictive after a few hours once they unlock skill tree abilities, get into combat flow, and choose the right build.

Reported time to anchor: 3h.

Hardcore Soulslike Veteran: Methodical, patient, learns enemy patterns, takes notes, and accepts repeated deaths as part of progression. Motivation: Overcoming punishing combat and exploring a dark, lore-rich world without maps or checkpoints. Stance: buy.

Art and Atmosphere Enthusiast: Exploratory, appreciates visuals, takes screenshots, may engage less with complex combat. Motivation: Experiencing the beautiful pixel art and atmospheric world design. Stance: sale.

Frustrated Casual Player: May give up early or struggle with the difficulty; prefers more forgiving mechanics. Motivation: Seeking a fair and polished game experience; the game's flaws prevent enjoyment. Stance: no buy.

Steam Deck: All Steam Deck feedback is overwhelmingly positive, reporting flawless performance at 60fps with no need for configuration changes.

Linux and Proton: The game demonstrates excellent Proton/Linux compatibility on Steam Deck, achieving stable 60fps out of the box with no negative feedback regarding Linux-specific friction.

External guides: The primary complaint is that the game lacks clarity in guiding players to side quests, with NPCs placed in obscure locations and no internal help, making external wikis necessary for basic quest progression. One politically charged review was disregarded for scoring as it does not relate to game mechanics.

Steam playtime tracking bug: A bug is causing the game to not count hours played on Steam correctly. This may lead to Steam playtime statistics failing to update for some players.