The Black Grimoire: Cursebreaker Review Summary

Similar to Runescape, single-player: The game is frequently compared to Runescape, particularly Old School Runescape (OSRS), with many reviewers noting the similar gameplay loop, skilling system, and overall feel. It successfully captures the essence of Runescape in a single-player or offline environment, offering a nostalgic experience for fans of the classic MMORPG. The game also incorporates quality of life improvements over Runescape, making the grind less tedious.

High-quality, chill, and immersive: Many reviewers praise the game's overall quality, including its graphics, sound design, atmosphere, and art style. The game is often described as relaxing, chill, and immersive, with a lot of content for the price. Reviewers also appreciate the quality of life improvements and the absence of bugs.

Good writing, quests, and story: The game features well-written dialogue, quests, and an interesting storyline. Reviewers appreciate the game's unique humor and charm. The world-building is excellent, and the NPCs are engaging.

Balanced and enjoyable skill grind: The game features a balanced grind with gear acquisition and skill leveling. The skilling system is enjoyable and doesn't feel overwhelming. Players can level up skills through usage, and the game offers flexibility in how they progress, with options to grind or focus on quests.

Enjoyable with definite potential: Many reviewers express general enjoyment of the game, noting its charm, potential, and solid overall quality. Some reviewers acknowledge the small development team and are willing to overlook minor issues. The game is easy to pick up and learn.

Excessive, unrewarding grinding: The game is heavily focused on grinding, with many reviewers finding it excessive and tedious. This includes grinding for experience, crafting materials, and skill levels, often with little reward or engaging activities. The grind is exacerbated by slow progression and a lack of quality-of-life features.

Cumbersome inventory management: Reviewers consistently criticize the game's inventory management system. The limited inventory space, lack of item stacking, and cumbersome interface lead to frequent trips between crafting stations and storage, wasting player time and disrupting the flow of gameplay.

Poor quest system, lost progress: The game's quest system is criticized for lacking guidance, proper tracking, and the inability to retry failed quests. The autosave system can overwrite progress, leading to frustration and the potential for lost items or the need to restart the game.

Poor pathfinding, navigation issues: Reviewers noted issues with pathfinding, including jarring movements and difficulty navigating terrain. The lack of map markers for quests and resources also contributes to navigation problems.

Weak, slow-paced opening: The game's opening is criticized for being slow-paced, tutorial-heavy, and lacking a compelling hook. Some reviewers found the initial story and characters uninteresting, making it difficult to engage with the game.

Runescape-like with dynamic combat: The game shares similarities with Runescape, featuring skilling, quests, and a large world. However, it distinguishes itself with more dynamic combat, allowing movement while using ranged attacks, and a greater emphasis on dodging.

Single-player with social features: The game is primarily a single-player experience but includes optional online social features. Players can see and chat with others in the same area, creating a sense of community without direct cooperative gameplay.

Straightforward, challenging combat, respawns: Combat is described as straightforward, stat-based, and can be challenging. Enemies and gatherable items respawn quickly, which allows for grinding in specific locations.

Story-driven with simple quests: The game features a storyline with quests that provide direction and context for the player. Quests are generally simple and understandable, offering a decent challenge without being overly complex.

Varied combat styles, abilities: The game features different combat styles (melee, ranged, magic) and abilities tied to weapon types. Character creation involves choosing initial skills, and combat skills are recommended for starting weapons.

Performance optimization is inconsistent: Optimization is a recurring concern, with reports of stuttering, lag in populated areas, and inefficient GPU usage. Some players found that disabling online features improved performance. Optimization has reportedly improved since the demo.

Minor bugs present, not critical: Players have reported encountering minor bugs, such as inventory glitches and characters getting stuck, but these issues generally do not significantly impact gameplay. Game-breaking bugs were reportedly fixed quickly. Some players reported no major bugs.

Runs well on Linux/SteamDeck: The game runs well on Linux and Steam Deck, indicating good cross-platform compatibility. Players reported a smooth experience on these platforms without requiring modifications.

Unadjustable graphics settings: Chromatic aberration is forced in certain areas, and brightness settings are ignored in caves. This limits the player's ability to customize the visual experience and can lead to discomfort or visibility issues.

No input delay: Players report no input delay.

Great value, highly recommended: The game is highly recommended and considered a great value for its price, with many players anticipating future content and updates. Reviewers highlight the potential for long-term engagement and encourage supporting the developers. Some suggest that the game is worth more than its current price, while others look forward to future content releases and bug fixes.

Incomplete, grindy, needs polish: While some reviewers recommend the game and find it enjoyable, others express concerns about its incomplete state, grind, and balance issues. Some reviewers suggest waiting for further development or improvements before purchasing, while others acknowledge its potential despite its flaws. A few reviewers mention refunding the game due to specific issues like the control scheme or excessive grind.

Try the demo first: Several reviewers suggest trying the demo before purchasing the full game to ensure it aligns with individual preferences. Save data carries over from the demo, allowing players to seamlessly continue their progress if they decide to buy the game.

Difficulty spikes, prepare accordingly: The game has difficulty spikes at certain points. Reviewers recommend doing the stable quest for the pack mule as soon as possible and warn against attempting the marauder camp attack until the character has level 40 in all skills and appropriate gear.

Underrated, deserves more players: Reviewers feel the game is underrated and deserves more attention and players. They encourage more people to give the game a try.

Inspired by RuneScape, lacks survival: The game draws heavy inspiration from classic RPGs like RuneScape, particularly Old School RuneScape (OSRS). However, some reviewers find the game lacking in survival elements and consider it generic fantasy. The game is in early access, so these aspects may be expanded upon.

Social interactions in towns: The game features a social aspect by allowing players to see, chat with, and inspect other players in towns. Some reviewers suggest adding a global chat feature to enhance communication beyond local areas, making the world feel more alive.

Bestiary, gold, spell resistance: The bestiary helps players identify mob drops for targeted farming. Gold is needed to max traits and buy a good ring in Thornhill. Spell resistance is needed, aiming for over 50.

Item clarity, bank, item recovery: There are moments when it is unclear what an item does. There is a big bank to collect random things. If you die and can't get your stuff, there is a way to get items back.

Farming exploits and fixes: Players discovered that mobs can be force-respawned, significantly speeding up farming. Additionally, an exploit allowing unlimited GP was quickly patched, showing active development and response to issues.