Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew is the latest game from developer Mimimi Games, the studio behind Desperados III and Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shogun. The team’s experience with tactical stealth games brought an unforgettable, charming journey where cursed undead pirates are actually the good guys for once.
The events of the game take place in the Lost Carribean, a mysterious island chain that has everything needed for a great adventure. A hidden treasure, a spooky prophecy, a cast of unlikely heroes with unique supernatural abilities and, of course, a rampaging Inquisition out to get you. Ready to board the ghostly soulship, join forces with other undead pirates and find the cursed treasure of Captain Mordechai? This is our Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew review.
I will be the first person to admit that tactical stealth games are that one genre that I really like but that I am also comically bad at. However, seeing the premise of the game, its charming colorful graphics and quirky humor, I couldn’t help but set my eyes on this unexpected adventure.
Thankfully, Shadow Gambit provides a number of difficulty options that will satisfy you regardless of your level of expertise, whether you are just dipping your toes into the genre or have played it all already and don’t mind the challenge. There are four basic difficulties that you can further customize to create your own and ensure you have the best possible time.
In Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew, you play as Afia Manicato, a cursed undead pirate that seeks to make a name for herself. What better way than to find the lost treasure of Captain Mordechai? Of course, the story has plenty of its own twists and turns, but it is better to experience it all on your own, it’s worth it.
In order to stand a chance, Afia joins the crew of the Red Marley, Mordechai’s soulship, and joins forces with a variety of unique characters that followed his command. Only by sticking together and investigating the clues left behind by the Captain can this quirky bunch oppose the forces of the Inquisition. Needless to say, they are also trying to find the dead man’s chest and will be routinely getting in your way.
Thankfully, the crew possesses a number of helpful abilities that will let you greatly decrease the zealous cultist population in the area or slip by without notice. Afia herself can blink towards her target (or a chosen area) or briefly suspend an enemy in time, while her crewmates have mastered a variety of other tricks.
Distracting enemies with loud noises or a shiny coin? Check. Being able to fire allies at otherwise hard to reach places? In! Mind-control to infiltrate the guarded locations right under the enemy’s very nose? Double check!
Of course, in addition to certain strengths, crew members also have a number of weaknesses. Afia herself cannot swim while someone else might not be able to climb the helpfully placed vines… or both.
This combination of strengths and weaknesses ensures that there are myriads of ways to finish a particular map – and it is a great fun to be figuring out how to proceed with the crew you have chosen to accompany you and to make up for their shortcoming while utilizing their strengths to the full extent.
You will be able to use a party of three cursed pirates at once, so make sure to cover your bases when it comes to the combination of abilities and weaknesses. Still, it is likely that you might run into situations where you wish your brought a different companion along! Worry not, you can always come back the next time with the party you have in mind.
Outside of a few instances, the game does not force you into choosing a particular companion or leaving someone behind. In fact, there is a gentle nudge to try out different combinations. When you haven’t used a companion for a while, they will accumulate a certain amount of experience that will be added to your overall pool when you trot them out.
However, despite their great abilities, the crew still wouldn’t have been able to get anywhere without the help of the Marley – a sentient soulship that possesses special talents of her own. In particular, Marley can snapshot a memory and rewind the time to that point should things go wrong.
Not only is that an important narrative point, but also the explanation as to why you are able to save and restart as you see fit. See, it isn’t that you are bad or got caught unaware, it’s that Marley found a better way forward from that one Memory! At least that’s the theory that I will be using going forward.
Marley can also pause time to give you a chance to carefully consider and time the abilities to be used at precise time. Between the Navigator and the ship, any kind of deed can be carried out without a hitch!
While your crewmates have their special abilities, so do the enemies. The soldiers of the Inquisition come in various shapes and forms and need to be dealt with accordingly. Here are a few examples, but far from all:
- Acolytes – basic enemy units, can be distracted and lured without any drawbacks;
- Commisarius – won’t respond to your attempts to lure them away and will prevent Acolytes from doing so;
- Kindred – a couple of priests connected to each other via magic. They need to be dealt with at the same time lest the surviving one brings the other one back and raises alarm.
- Custodes – killing these can stun Inquisition forces around them and open a Tear back to the Marley. After finishing your tasks, you will have to return to the ship through one of the Tears.
Of course, soldiers of the Inquisition can also raise alarm and swarm you like a hive of angry bees were they to catch a sniff of your mischief. Or find the bodies, so don’t forget to stuff them into the bushes or throw in water.
The locations also provide players with plenty of ways to interact with the surroundings. Blowing out torches and candles to lure unsuspecting Acolytes to reignite them, dropping boxes and barrels on the carefully baited Commisarius – those seemingly little things can still be quite a thrill to pull off.
For those who like to challenge themselves further, the game features a Logbook with a variety of stats, including various badges for completing certain milestones with companions or overall in a certain location. For example, using Afia’s Blink to travel a certain distance, opening all the Tears in the location, participating in a set number of missions or meeting the quota of killing religious zealots with a certain crew-member.
During the time spent on the ship between your various missions of tracking down Mordechai’s treasure, you can get to know the crew. From the depressed skeletons to the fish that wants to be trained in the ways of assassination to the companions themselves, there is a lot of quirky fun to be had.
You might even get to know certain crewmembers from unusual sides. For example, Gaelle le Bris, your cannonness, writes poetry on the side and is surprisingly empathetic to the simple skeletons’ plight. That doesn’t prevent her from being an iron wall of a woman that can shoot bodies – both those of enemies and allies – from her cannon.
The Red Marley herself is also an important character in this story, and her relationship with late Captain Mordechai plays its own role as well. As you clash against the forces of the Inquisition and fearsome inquisitor Ignacia that leads them, you will learn more about the kind of adventures and deeds the two had in the good ol’ days.
The game’s supernatural flair paired with great sense of humor and colorful visual style creates an unforgettable atmosphere of a hilarious, bold and oftentimes silly swashbuckling adventure. And, when you think of it, it is likely not what one would expect from a stealth tactics genre, but that is exactly why Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew shines as brightly as it does.
The game is incredibly welcoming to the newcomers in the genre that is often seemed as difficult and somewhat daunting to approach. It will challenge you, according to your specified level of difficulty, while also rewarding when your elaborate (or not-so-elaborate) schemes come to pass.
If you have always wanted to try your hand at navigating a crew through a set of obstacles, outwitting and outmaneuvering your enemies at every step but were daunted to do so in other games, Shadow Gambit has your back. And if you get noticed or even killed? Well, with The Red Marley on your side there is always another attempt!
Note: the Steam key was provided for the purposes of this review.
