Mandragora is a beautiful ‘Soulsvania’ and I can’t wait for the official release

With MobileSyrup being one of the jurors for The Game Awards, I got the opportunity to try out many more games than I would usually play during the year. Surprisingly, though, one of the titles I had the most fun playing this year wasn’t part of the ballot and isn’t even out yet. I pre-ordered the game, Mandragora, and with a pre-order comes instant access to the first playtest. This isn’t the first time I tackled this game as I also played the demo, but the playtest had a lot more areas to explore. A new Spellbinder class lets me finally wield magic, which is how I typically play any game I get my hands on.

Mandragora is what some people are calling a ‘Soulsvania,’ which hosts aspects of both a Souls-like and Metroidvania. Other games that fit this category include Salt and Sanctuary and The Last Faith. Games like these have role-playing tropes you find in Soulslikes, like save points (like Dark Souls‘ bonfires) that reset all enemies, except bosses in an area. It also has different classes, a levelling system, a central hub where you can enchant and craft equipment, a variety of weapons and skills to collect and gruelling bosses whose moves you really have to learn to defeat. But it also has a Metroidvania-style map and puzzles, and you earn different movement abilities as the title continues. The playtest only had a ground pound movement that let you break through the certain highlighted areas in the ground, but I also noted that there are some areas you’ll be able to grapple to and others that you might be able to double jump. You would have to return to these areas in the game, similar to other Metroidvanias like Hollow Knight and Ori and the Blind Forest. Some areas also seem to have an entrance to what the game calls the ‘Entropy,’ another plane you can’t access in the Playtest.  

Turns out, I really like Soulsvanias. One of my favourite games ever is Bloodborne, which was made by FromSoftware. And earlier this year, I fell in love with Metroidvanias because of Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown and I have been tackling tons of titles in this genre ever since. Mandragora is a great mixture of both styles, and I enjoyed coming across new bosses that test your mettle and cool spells and weapons. I didn’t have access to some of these in the playtest as you could only play to the Vanguard class, which gives you access to a sword and shield, and the Spellbinder class, which uses ‘Chaos’ magic to weaken your opponents. Despite only having these two classes in the playtest, you can collect ‘Active Skills,’ or spells depending on the class, for some of the other classes, and I want to play the ‘Astral’ class, which offers star-themed weapons and spells that damage your enemies, but also provide extra shielding for your character.

I also really liked exploring more of this beautiful 2.5D world. Mandragora is a side scroller, but since it’s 2.5D, it offers more depth than others in this category. There’s an amazing sense of detail, and monsters are scary; my chaos spells were purple and looked so cool, and when you first enter a new area, the background is captivating and lures you in. At one point, a goat seems like part of the foreground, and your character comments on it, and it runs into the background, bringing a further sense of depth and realism—the blend between the two styles is interesting. And when you get into a boss room and the choir starts singing, it gets you amped to fight the upcoming boss or whatever challenge is ahead.

When I first started playing, it felt Soulslike, but I had to keep in mind that it was also a Metroidvania, which means some parts I’d have to return to and that the map is truly your guide to completion and keep track of locked doors, and chests you need to return to.

Combat is fun, with weight behind the swing of your sword. At some point, I found a mace that made my character heavier, and surprisingly, my swings felt more impactful. However, with a heavier character, it took more stamina to dodge roll. I couldn’t run anymore, and when I fell from a high platform, there was an audible ‘thud.’ I wish there was an easier way to see that your weight class changed, though. I lost all of my ‘souls’ because I didn’t realize the difference in weight and drop in stamina at first.

Mandragora did have some faults, though. While the bosses were fun, some had minions, which are annoying to have to deal with on top of fighting the boss. I found multiple of the exact same boss, which I found tedious to deal with by the third time — how often do I have to fight a glowing rat and its minion? And when you fall from too high, you die, which is a Soulslike staple, but it felt odd in Metroidvania and resulted in many environmental deaths, which is incredibly annoying.

I really enjoyed this playtest of Mandragora. The full game doesn’t launch until April 17th, but it seems like the perfect birthday gift to myself.  There’s going to be another playtest before the release date and I can’t wait to try that out as well.

I played the playtest on my ROG Ally X, which handled the game well, and I didn’t notice any bugs or frame drops.

Mandragora is launching on console and PC, and you can pre-order on Steam or Epic for instant access to the playtest I just tried out.