Blasphemous

Sorrowful Be the Gamer
If you're like me—impatient, easily bored, historically bad at video games, and somehow still convinced you could enjoy them—Blasphemous is here to torment and ultimately convert you.
This game slapped me so hard with its spiked censer that I came out the other side a changed person. I now have patience (??), better timing (??), and an emotional attachment to a man in a pointy hat who never speaks but suffers so beautifully.
I died. A lot. So often it could’ve been its own achievement. I lost all my Tears of Atonement trying to retrieve my guilt, was impaled by every spike imaginable, and got relentlessly demolished by That Bull Thing™. I ragequit, came back, died again—and somehow loved every minute of it.
Graphics
Absolutely gorgeous. From bloodstained cathedrals to haunting pixel-lit skies, the art direction is visually divine. The Penitent One’s hat is a 10/10 fashion choice. There is drip in the penance.
Music
Dear god. The soundtrack drenched me in misery. Atmospheric and hauntingly beautiful, it drags you into the depths of Cvstodia with no hope of return.
Special shoutout to Miriam’s Challenge music—it genuinely made me lose my mind. I might be humming it in my grave someday.
Lore
Confusing at first, especially if you have memory issues or the attention span of a damp sponge (me). It’s all hidden in item descriptions, cryptic NPC dialogue, and the corpses of people who seem weirdly chill about being dead. But on my second run and NG+, it started to click—and I was hooked.
It’s twisted, tragic, and disturbingly beautiful.
“For twisted are, were, and will be, the paths of the Miracle.”
Trauma. Suffering. I love it.
Highlights
- Constant emotional damage
- Miserable, beautiful women (Laudes, I love you)
- The world hurts, but in a good way
- Actually improved my patience, somehow
- Killed by stairs. Repeatedly.
Verdict
10/10 would get spiritually destroyed again. (Which I will, time for my 3rd run.)
Sorrowful be the heart, penitent ones.

In the brotherhood of penitents. Straight up "blaspheming it". and by "it", haha, well, let's just say... Mea Culpa.

Great Game, the controls were a bit troublesome at first but I could get used to it rather quickly, also you can pet dogs.

🩸 Blasphemous — where even your conscience wants to press Alt+F4, but can't, because that's a sin
I didn’t play a game. I performed a ritual.
I didn’t beat a level — I overcame an inner demon named “timing that jump.”

You launch Blasphemous, and you hear… silence. Right away, you know: this won’t be fun.
No one smiles here. Not even the enemies. Especially not the enemies.
They look into your soul and whisper: “You didn’t come here for joy. You came here because you needed to suffer.”

🔪 Combat — a slap to your overconfidence

You thought you could play?
You thought a couple of sword swings and a dodge would fix everything?
You were wrong.
Here, you must feel your enemy like you're spiritually bound by mutual pain. One wrong move, and you're confessing before the loading screen.

🗺️ The map — a hellish mosaic of deliberate inconvenience

Custodia wasn’t designed for your comfort.
Doors don’t open where you expect. Checkpoints look at you with sarcasm.
Every path is a chance to fall, die, meet the unspeakable, and lose everything.
And yet you keep going. Because you want answers.
What you find instead… is another relic with a description like:

“A thorn from the crown of a martyr who suffered for those who did not suffer.”

📜 STORY AND LORE: “The Cursed Redemption”
In the world of Blasphemous, everything revolves around the Miracle (El Milagro) — a supernatural force that offers blessings… or curses. Sounds noble, but in reality, the Miracle is a cosmic power that judges everyone by its own twisted divine standards. Someone prays for healing — and turns into a tree. Another begs for forgiveness — and ends up sealed alive inside a bell. How touching.

🌒 You are The Penitent One:
A silent warrior in a spiked helmet-hood, the last survivor of the Brotherhood of the Silent Sorrow. Your mission is to undertake a pilgrimage through the mutilated sacred land of Custodia, slaying the sinful spawns of the Miracle and seeking meaning in an endless cycle of suffering.

🩸 Core Themes:

1. Guilt and Atonement — nearly every character has either committed a sin or suffers for someone else’s.

2. Sanctity and Flesh — many "relics" in the game are literal body parts of martyrs. Yes, you collect dried fingers, tongues, kneecaps, and mustaches. In Blasphemous, holiness is quite literally flesh.

3. Religious Allusion — distorted versions of Catholic rites, cults, miracles, and iconography. It’s not a direct critique of religion, but rather an artistic reimagining of religious archetypes through the lens of suffering.

🔮 Lore Through Items:
Like in Dark Souls, the game’s lore is hidden in item descriptions, NPC dialogue, and environmental design. Reading the description of a saint’s nasal blood will show you: every detail matters. Every item is a line from some ancient apocrypha.

🧙‍♂️ Characters — saints, sinners, and those who’ve lost the line between:

1. Deogracias — the narrator, like a monastic Shakespeare. Constantly appears to whisper something cryptic and stare into the void.

2. The Red Mother — a resident of the puppet temple, a symbol of infertility and sacrifice.

3. Esdras, of the Anointed Legion — a knight-brother, walking toward his own agony with a prayer in his eyes.

🎼 Sound — organ, whispers, clashing metal, and your nerves at their limit

This isn’t music. It’s a prayer in the void, sung by walls.

🧎 At the end, you don’t win. You… understand.

You didn’t save the world.
You’re not a hero.
You simply accepted the Miracle. And it accepted you.

🕳️ Score: 10/10.
I don’t know why I did this. But I know it was the right thing to do.

This was my first platformer and tbh i was never too interested in the genre, but the visuals alone in this made me wanna give it a try. And let me just say, the art is absolutely stunning, this is probably one of the most gorgeous and stylistic games i've ever seen, i have a love for pixel art, so this game just had me in awe. The animations, enemy designs, map designs, boss aesthetics. its such a visually striking game and i honestly cant praise the artists enough.
As for gameplay i enjoyed it for the most part. Some bosses were ridiculously difficult though, might be partly my fault for being kinda ass, but i felt the mechanics for some to be slightly unfair n cheap tbh. i.e the massive uncontrollable knock backs, enemy attacks mixed w unblockable projectiles, stunlocks, enemies attacking while flying off the screen etc. Overall this game is FRUSTRATING, like hair pulling levels of frustration sometimes, almost as if the devs purposefully made it to be as annoying and non forgiving as possible, whoever decided to add insta-killing spikes, i literally dispise u with all my heart lol.
One of my biggest gripes tho was how the game handles optional content. I’m someone who prefers 100%ing games, and trying to perfect this was an absolute nightmare. There were so many moments where i couldn’t obtain an item or missed a key moment, because i either did something unknowingly that conflicted with it or waited too long. You don’t need these to progress, but missing out on them was super annoying. for example, I spent nearly two hours fighting two bosses and got a left and right eye as my reward, only to find out I was too late to trade them in, so all that effort felt so wasted.
Another downside was how much I had to look up stuff. Figuring out certain quests was a borderline chore at times because of how cryptic n vague some of them were, plus the many obscure secrets and hidden areas that felt impossible to find on your own unless you got super lucky, like hitting a random blank wall to unlock a hidden room. It just isnt realistic and so many will miss out on cool items.
I also found it quite strange how dummy linear the game wants you to go in order for you to achieve a "good" ending, it feels nearly impossible to get this ending w/o looking it up. On top of that, the "bad" ending was pretty disappointing imo. Checked out the good ending on yt and it looks 1000x better, which sucks even more knowing that like 90% of the players will probably only ever see the bad one in their first run. It just don't make sense to me at all.
I still had a fun time overall tho. Despite the frustrating parts, many of the boss fights were still enjoyable, navigating around the map while finding new items n areas was a bit annoying in certain areas but still very fun, story was a bit confusing at times but still super cool, music was also surprisingly good aswell, and I’ll honestly never forget how stunning the art is. This game definitely has its issues tho, and i honestly just wish they didn't make this game so purposefully frustrating and punishing for the average player, but ig that's just the way it is 7.5/10

I don’t usually like Metroidvanias or Souls-like games, but this is a masterpiece I regret not playing sooner.

The game draws heavily from Spanish Catholic culture, which I love. One of the areas is even literally based on the real-life Mezquita of Cordoba. The music is also great and fits the atmosphere perfectly. The medieval gothic vibes in this are simply immaculate and don't give Hot Topic at all.

I'm admittedly not great with super difficult games, but this was still very playable and enjoyable for me.

Here are some tips if you’re a casual but want to enjoy this game (and I suggest you do because the setting is worth the effort):
– Explore in this order: Mercy Dreams → Cistern → Mountains → Olive Trees → Bridge. After the bridge, go down first and save the Rooftops/Wall for last.
– If you want to make the game even easier, look up a map to find hidden HP and MP upgrades.
– Pick up everything, and if you can’t reach something, mark it on the map for later.

If you can’t beat a boss it’s probably because you lack upgrades or haven’t figured out its attack pattern. Most bosses in this game are actually a breeze (and I'm not good at games).

The only critiques I have is that some quests are time-sensitive or require doing things in a strict order, and a lot of content can be easy to miss without a guide. That’s typical for the genre, though.
What really annoyed me were the lantern jumps. Also the Miriam levels were designed by a demon.

This game made me realize that I had been spending years not being satisfied by the games I was playing. I got in a loop of only playing games that rewarded a very consistent amount of dopamine whenever I played them, cough cough Fortnite cough. Or chill games like minecraft that don't necessarily direct you to do anything.
I picked up Blasphemous on sale because the artstyle was up my alley. But the tone, the story, and especially the gameplay were all so top notch that I had to keep playing it.
I realized exploring the dogmatic world, getting my ass beat, and powering through the pain gave me the kind of experiences that I had as a kid. (I was raised Catholic.)
Overall amazing game, challenging but very rewarding and extremely fair game design. Art style sells it. My only thing was the music could have been more interesting.