EDIT: Spoiler discussion of Infernax is now open. Say whatever you want unmarked in the comments. Apologies for my tardiness.

Post before edits below:

Welcome to the Unsanctioned Unofficial Game Pass Game Club. Our fifth game is Infernax. The target completion date is March 14, 2022.

We ask that until that date you use the forum software to mark any spoilers, either story based or mechanical, in the discussion below. Ideally the bulk of the discussion will occur after March 14, but if you want to comment before then you are welcome to so long as the spoilers are marked. We ask that if you leave a comment before that date you also come back to the thread after it to read other people’s comments and respond to them, though of course we cannot force you to do so.

All are welcome to participate regardless of whether you have stated a preference to or not and there is absolutely no commitment. You do not have to finish the game to participate but please let us know if you have not.

You can find out more about the Unsanctioned Unofficial Game Pass Game Club or suggest future games for it here.

What is Infernax?

It is a Castlevania like with some Metroidvania aspects that is highly influenced by the NES classic Castlevania II.

How long is Infernax?

How long to beat lists it as 6.5 hours long.

Infernax rules. Surprised how much I liked it and how well made it is.

This game is great! GotY so far.

I started this a couple nights ago and I think I am just not in the mood to play this style of game on top of Elden Ring since I find them a little similar besides the glaring 2d vs 3d difference.

But then I found this video that shows what happens when you enter the Konami Code in at the title screen, and now I am just going to play the game this way since I can still see everything the game has to offer without really having to always be at the top of my game.

@bigsocrates: hey, we didn't hear from you for a while, i hope everything is going well

@donutello: I'm sorry this is a week late. I'm fine personally but a close personal friend of mine had his life basically explode the week before last and he had to move in with me and I've spent a good amount of time visiting his mom in the hospital (She's going to be okay) and dealing with stuff to try and help him. Getting a totally unexpected roommate and additional responsibilities, along with just having all my patterns disrupted, has made me pull back from online spaces and I've wanted to do UUGPGC updates but each time I've been pulled into something more pressing. I will try to be more reliable moving forward as I find a rhythm to life again.

@bigsocrates: Don't worry abou UUGPGC, that can wait. I'm glad you and your friend's mom are (going to be) ok!

So despite my issues the last couple weeks I did finish Infernax before my friend's crisis. I only got the basic good ending and not any of the other endings.

My overall impression of the game was mixed. I liked it at first and I definitely had a good time with parts of it, and I appreciated the various updates to the old formula in terms of save points and clearer direction, but the game play was (intentionally) stiff and I found the only way I could progress was through memorization. Because of that it took me far longer than the 7 hours projected (I also did some side quests) and I kind of had to push myself through to finish. Weirdly the bosses tended to be pretty easy while the dungeons were kind of brutal and I did many of them in stages, unlocking doors or getting power ups and then backtracking to save. Also I found healing to be the only magic that really mattered to me, though by the end I had a lot of potions and was almost fully upgraded.

The story was fine for what it was and made sense, but I was irritated that it wasn't always obvious what the "good" or"bad" action was because you are incentivized to play in one style but there were times I thought I was doing the good thing but wasn't. I think this was intentional and it's fine (it incentivizes replayability) but it irritated me.

This is a game I probably would have skipped if not for the club and I did have a decent amount of fun with it so I guess I'm glad it was selected but I'm wondering if others played and what their experiences were.

@bigsocrates: I had the same experience, bosses mostly taken out in a single try, but level platforming was what became diffiuclt later on. I still loved my time with the game.

Yeah from seeing others responses here, I'm glad that I used the Konami Code. I still had plenty of hangups, especially during some platforming sections in the dungeons, but overall it made it so that I never had to do a combat sequence more than twice. I don't think I would have finished it if I had lost all my dungeon progress because I couldn't time a jump near the boss.

The code also changes the power up/move unlocks to make sense with your different weapons, so overall I'm mostly impressed with how much effort they seemingly put into a weird cheat that most people won't even see.

I did get extremely stuck once though. It was when you had to cast a spell to make the 2nd or 3rd dungeon appear. I walked around the map 3 full times before I looked up what to do.

@noboners said:

Was this at the water town? I completed the first two dungeons and was having a good time, then ended up overleveling as I searched all over the map looking for the 3rd dungeon. I spent a long time doing quests, talking to every NPC, and backtracking into the dungeons thinking I missed the double jump ability -- since the one of the earliest quests is about the sick guy who came from the north. I eventually got sick of all the backtracking and uninstalled.

@superjoe: yeah that was it. There's a guy in a bar kinda behind the water town that says something akin to seeing a tower during a storm. That's the clue to tell you to use the storm magic at the edge of town to make it appear. At least I think that's what I ended up doing...

As someone that never plans to play Simon's Quest again, I'm still surprised how much I loved this one. To me, this was to Castlevania 2 what Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon waa to CV 3. A nice modern update to a specific game. I've heard it compared to Zelda II but it's been too long since I touched that one.

Soooo I've been meaning to join in on this whole UUGPGC game club thingy, and I sort of accidentally just played through Infernax without knowing it's the game y'all picked. And I gotta say...I freaking loved it. I had a total playthrough time of around 9 hours but I think that's mostly due to one thing - I think I did the 2nd dungeon FIRST and was thus slightly underleveled for it. I died so many times. Also - curse that storm castle with the spinning wheels. It took me a little while to figure out how to even unlock it (I did figure it out eventually without any guides though). And then once I was in there. Holy hell. Those damn frogs and spinny wheels killed me a BUNCH of times.

Also, I will never take for granted how spoiled we are with modern save mechanics again!!

Either way, I am surprised just how much I enjoyed this one. What a great little surprise on game pass :)

I was pleasantly surprised by Infernax. I don't have a lot of fondness beyond general nostalgia for Castlevania, but I do love games of the era. I also didn't expect much given it was from Berserk. I remember playing their flash games a long time ago in a browser far, far away, and I expected to quickly move on.

It was more difficult than I expected, but I had zero shame dropping the difficulty once I realized how the checkpointing worked.

The satisfaction of overcoming the challenge only applies to truly special games when there are so many new experiences at my fingertips these days.

I was also a bit annoyed by the morality system being opaque, but it seemed like perhaps not every decision impacted it. I thought I had chosen poorly on a couple of occasions, but I still recieved the best "good" ending.

Despite some flaws that others might find to be features, it will be one of my favorite games this year I'm sure.