Inscryption is a video game that mixes a deck-building card game and an escape room.

How does it rank in a more and more crowded niche?

An inky black card-based odyssey that blends the deckbuilding roguelike, escape-room style puzzles, and psychological horror into a blood-laced smoothie. Darker still are the secrets inscrybed upon the cards…

Inscryption Game Play

Theme

A weird theme that wraps the deck-building card game into an escape room. It’s really creepy and I keep expecting jump scares. Haven’t had one… yet…

Visuals

Very simple graphics but it works in this creepy world. The simple art on the cards is fine but I would have liked them to have a bit more detail, even proper artwork.

The deck-building part is very clear with easy-to-read cards and graphics to show what’s what.

UI & Ease of Play

As with the graphic design, the UI also lets you know where you are every step of the way. This is really important for a card game.

Inscryption Summary

Positives

It’s a unique deck-building game with a different style of combat.

The escape room element makes it different from most of the other deck-building video games.

The back and forth of the life shown via weights being added and removed from a scale is really clever.

Negatives

I found both the combat and escape room really hard!

There isn’t really much help for either of these elements so I have no real idea how to improve or if I’m doing the right thing.

Summary

This game isn’t up there with Monster Train and Slay the Spire and wouldn’t be in my top 10 digital board games.

I think the quicker, more fun gameplay of those games is much better when relaxing with a video game as I often do. I’m not really one for sitting and trying to figure out a puzzle unless I’m live streaming on Twitch when I can talk through my thoughts to an audience. (or even get help;))

But it’s a good fun pick-up-and-play card game that you really need to play enough and learn to get a hold of the strategy.

Jesta ThaRogue