Die a hundred times? In Swordbreaker you can do exactly that! This very basic, russian fantasy Visual novel, let´s you as adventurer explore one deadly castle on the search for the ultimate treasure. While the story is not really impressive, you have some different routes you can follow and three kind of choices for the persons you encounter (cowardly, hero like and aggressive). From over 300 scenes, there are over 100 death scenes, so one can imagine, that death really comes swiftly here. You have three lives per playthrough and the end also is relating to the kind of decisions you have mostly chosen. One playthrough doesn´t take that long, and as to be expected, the scenes repeat themselves after some time, but the graphic is well done, and the music is ok too. This with some (weird) humor, makes up for an enjoyable, if short story. Conclusio: Swordbreaker is a nice VN snack, for fans. What you get is ok for the price it is offered for and fun enough for a few playthroughs. C...

Swordbreaker is an interactive fiction adventure visual novel both developed and published by DuCats Games Studio. As chance would have it, a down on his luck battle-hardened adventurer receives an old scroll from a dying man just as he manages to take his last breath. Furthermore, the scroll actually turns out to be an old map with a clearly marked location. With no other prospects on the horizon, the hero known as the Swordbreaker sets out on a perilous journey across dangerous territory until said map leads him to an apparently abandoned old castle. What awaits our hero on the other side of the door? Could it be glorious adventure and untold treasures or terrifying horrors and certain doom? How the story of the Swordbreaker unfolds is entirely up to you in this clever non-linear story! The great thing about this visual novel is that it plays much like the old "choose-your-own-adventure" books from back in the day. For anyone not familiar with these books, it was a series that liter...

I'm a long-time enthusaist of gamebooks, and I've tried many digital ones. Pros: * Lovely art. * Simple UI, short paragraphs - easy to play through. * Lots of things to discover. Cons: * Subpar writing. Uninteresting, lacking any sophistication, sexist and sometimes misleading. Includes such things as: Wearing a dress makes you "a pervert" and leads to your death; trying to avoid harming an old toothless dog is "not manly" (and you have to kick it in the head), one of the three choices you get right at the beginning is "slap the ghost maid's ass", etc. * Most choices aren't informative, and lead to almost random consequences. * Bad translation from Russian. "The adventurer became animated because he needed money very much". There's a lot of potential in the presentation, but the writing ruins any chance of rising to that potentinal.

Genre - Choose your own adventure I was a lover of these type of books as I was growing up as they were a great alternative to board and computer games. This game tries to follow a similar platform but with a lot less reading and more art style. There is no combat system so each choice will either lead to one of three lives lost or progression towards the end goal. You don't have an inventory, but certain interactions will benefit you later on, or decide your fate. The first completion should be quite quick. However, there is scope to go back and try different paths for achievements but also the pure enjoyment of failing and succeeding by various means. It doesn't take itself to seriously and the parodies come thick and fast. As the price is fair for what you get. It is worth grabbing for a quick slice of choose your own adventure fun.

Well, the pictures are fantastic, and the music is...erm...decent, if a tad "inappropriate" at times. But the writing is, let's be honest, downright juvenile on the whole. Which would normally be a fairly fatal thing for an interactive novel, if the quality (and sheer quantity) of the illustrations didn't make up for a good deal else. The "story" itself also has its moments: at the very least, for every slightly naff idea, there's a half-decent one. So fuck it, I kind of enjoyed it. There's certainly a huge variety of choices on offer, though the "three lives, fuck you, start all over again" policy is a bit harsh considering how easy it is to die (and we're not always talking "logic" here, either...in the finest Fighting Fantasy tradition, trial-and-error is just as likely to get you kilt as it is to reward you generously). When all is said and done, though, you really can't fault the price. For three bucks, you get a whole lot of interactive novel, a bucketload of bad humour, ...

7.1/10 - A PURE/HARDCORE Choose Your Own Adventure Game. I have mixed emotions about this game. It was pretty awesome and was filled with an immense amount of content but you really have to work for it! There are literally hundreds or options, paths and story conclusions you can pursue as your journey unfolds. The graphics and translations are good and nothing prevented me from enjoying this title. It does start in Russian but can be changed easily... so don't stress. I wouldn't really classify this as a visual novel; there is no linear progression in the traditional sense and gameplay makes it difficult to create a fluid experience. I found that each session would last about 15 minutes; I would then make bad decisions, die and have to start from the beginning. This is where I start to get antsy and want to give up on the game in general. In order to advance in the story you will end up playing the first few stages 50+ times in order to pursue different paths in the story. That alon...

[b]Pros:[/b] + Great art. + A lot of choices. + Good ost. Even though there are not many tracks, they fit in pretty well. + High replay value. + Dark humor. + Some hilarious death scenes. There are unexpected ones, but most of them are obvious and easy to avoid if you use common sense and logic. + It's not expensive. + Dedicated devs. They are always willing to help (just check the discussions of this game). [b]Neutral:[/b] * It's a short game. If you are just going to do a single playthought it won't take you more than 20 minutes, even less if you end up taking shortcuts. For completionists: it took me 4.8 hours to 100% it. [b]Cons:[/b] - There are just 3 options: change language (rus/eng), turn on/off the audio or play fullscreen/windowed. - The audio is too high and you must leave the game in order to lower it. It would have been nice to have the option ingame. - You can't save middle scenes and load them later after a bad choice. If you want to change your path you must start fr...

Imagine TellTale game without necessary listening for dialogues, without (unskippable) animation (but game does have beautiful pictures), with bigger variety of story, where choices made does matter and for small price - this will be Swordbreaker. Game is good and mostly it's visual novel where incorrect choices lead to hero death. Game is all about remembering correct ones and can be completed in under 1 hour. Keep this in mind, because this may disappoint some people who think that every game should look like Mass Effect and cost less than 5$.

Swordbreaker, developed by DuCats Games Studio, is a unique visual novel with some of the strangest, yet interesting designs I’ve ever seen. The story is fairly simple. You play as a nameless adventurer who goes by the title Swordbreaker. After an evening at the pub, the weary adventurer witnesses a murder. The killer escapes, yet the dying victim hands Swordbreaker an old map before sputtering his last. The map leads to an ancient castle, packed with a limitless supply of treasure! Like most adventurers would, Swordbreaker sets off on a journey that’ll put his skills to the test, and change his life forever. The entirety of the game takes place in this castle, and it’s got to be the most bazare castle ever portrayed in gaming. Just about anything you can think of dwells here; Giant arachnids, aliens, ghosts, orcs, killer squids, warlocks, princesses, zombies, skeletons and so much more. There are over 300 different scenarios to encounter throughout the castle, all of which res...

A nice CYOA game with many, many ways to die, pretty cool art, 3 endings, and a lot of achievements to collect. For some reasons, it reminds me of Shadowgate, as a modern Visual Novel Adventure.