It would be fair to say that there’s certainly no shortage of roguelites, especially in the indie space, meaning that it’s increasingly difficult to make a game in the genre that stands out from the crowd. However, it seems that the development team behind Forestrike – a 2D tactical martial arts roguelite – has managed it. The big innovation is the supernatural ‘foresight’ mechanic, which allows you to visualise and practise each level as many times as you like before committing to the actual fight. This allows you to work out the moves of the enemies – and there are a lot of different enemies in the game, each with unique movesets – in order to meticulously plan and choreograph the upcoming fight. But be warned, even with foresight, this is a tough old game.
The overarching roguelike structure in the game is familiar. There are four areas to fight your way through, starting in the countryside and ending in the palace of the Emperor. Each of the four regions offers different pathways, some of which are harder than others but offer more rewards. For instance, some levels withhold the foresight ability or have more challenging enemies. The currency you earn along the way allows you to buy health and upgrades. There is also metaprogression. Most notably, you unlock different ‘schools’ of martial arts (for instance, the School of the Leaf grants you one dodge per fight), meaning that each run is potentially very different, depending on which ‘school’ you choose.
The story is simple. You play as Yu, who is sent out from his monastery by the head monk to save the Emperor from the machinations of a wicked interloper. Like Hades, albeit on a much smaller scale, the story is wrapped around the roguelite form. Depending on your progress, there’s often new dialogue when you return to the hub area (the monastery) after a failed run, and there’s also dialogue (plenty of trash talk) during the runs themselves. New characters are also gradually introduced through the new ‘schools’ mentioned above.
The world of the monastery is a decidedly conservative one – with lots of talk of the divinity of the Emperor – and yet there is also some social criticism around the sad plight of the starving and mistreated peasants and farmers in the area. Unfortunately, the unoriginal story did not engage me, and I often found myself rushing through the mediocre dialogue, and the cinematic storytelling generally fell rather flat. This game is all about the innovative two-part structure of combat encounters.
This combat is essentially split into two distinct parts: the ‘foresight’ planning part and the actual execution of the fight. The former portion of each fight is a kind of puzzle: a working out and memorisation of the deadly set of dance moves that will win you the fight. And it’s a highly complex dance, with lots of inputs and mechanics to absorb, especially in later runs. Every move has to be carefully thought out; there’s very little room for error. It is a hard game!
This is where the second main element of the gameplay comes in. These fights are not only puzzles to be solved; they also require lightning-quick reflexes when you are putting your painstaking plan into action. Precise parries, perfectly timed dodges and pinpoint execution of kicks and punches are required. And there are no jumps to help you get out of trouble – at least, not at first (I believe that a limited jump can eventually be unlocked as an upgrade once you’ve unlocked one of the ‘schools’). This is especially daunting when faced with projectiles and other assorted weapons.
The combat feels tight, even rather constrictive at times, but this seems to be by design. It certainly does not have the kind of expansive movement of an old-style arcade beat ’em up. It’s much more cerebral than that. Button mashing will be no help here. Quite the opposite. It’s crucial that you keep a cool head and stick to your script. Unfortunately, this is where I often lost my nerve and failed in spectacular fashion.
The single-screen arenas that the fights take place in remind me of theatre stages, and the ‘foresight’ sections are like rehearsals for a play. I often got my lines down perfectly when rehearsing only to fluff them when it came time to fight for real. I fell victim to stage fright way too many times. And this is a big problem in such an unforgiving game.
As mentioned, there’s little wiggle room for mistakes in the fights, and defeat means the unceremonious end of your run. The metaprogression (new schools and moves to unlock) does provide variety and the chance to experiment with a fight style that might suit you better, and the upgrades within runs also help, but health remains very limited, meaning that even a small misstep in the execution of your plan can end in disaster.
Unlike the excellent turn-based Shogun Showdown (2024), another dance-like combat game which requires careful planning, Forestrike operates in real time, meaning that quick reflexes are key. As is good muscle memory. While the foresight certainly does help – the complex fights in Forestrike would be very difficult for most players without it – it does have the effect of piling on the pressure and nerves for the ‘opening night’ of your combat-based performance. I did not excel under this pressure, and I here confess that I have yet to complete my first full run. However, you should see how awesome my fights look during rehearsals!
This brings me to one of my favourite things in the game: there’s a replay function! Watching back fights is so much fun. It’s highly gratifying to marvel at yourself dodging, parrying and kicking your way to victory. (And also, as was more often the case for me, watching carefully to see where you went wrong). In short, these replays make you look like a cool martial arts badass, especially in slow motion.
The pixel art is wonderfully detailed too, and the animations pleasingly idiosyncratic (I love how the protagonist runs). This will come as no surprise to fans of Skeleton Crew’s/Thomas Olsson’s first game, the action platformer Olija (2021). Like their previous game, Forestrike has a muted colour palette, featuring lots of browns and greys. The combat animations are smooth and characterful, while some of the backgrounds later in the game, especially the bustling street scenes, put me in mind of those in Street Fighter II. The highly polished comic-book-style character portraits, which appear during dialogue sections, contrast beautifully with the pixel art, a bit like those in Celeste. It’s a mix of art styles that I find particularly appealing. The art and general presentation are immaculate.
