Blasphemous

Blasphemous is a Metroidvania game developed by The Game Kitchen and published by Team17 for Microsoft Windows, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in September 2019, and later released for Linux and macOS in the following year. It began as a Kickstarter campaign in 2017.

Plot
In Cvstodia, a land of religion highly influenced by Roman Catholicism, its iconography, and Spanish culture –particularly that of the Andalucía region, misery and chaos run amok as a brutal theocracy led by His Holiness Escribar rules over it with an iron fist. However, it all changes when a force known as The Grievous Miracle strikes the land, cursing most of Cvstodia's inhabitants and transforming them into ravenous insane daemonic apostles, horrifically deformed monstrosities and twisted creatures.

With all hell breaking loose, the Penitent One, a silent knight and warrior monk armed with a sword named Mea Culpa who's the sole survivor of the Brotherhood of the Silent Sorrow, wanders Cvstodia in a pilgrimage, encountering various allies along the way as he slaughters the monsters infesting the land and goes on a quest to defeat Escribar.

Why It Rocks

 * 1) Extraordinarily astonishingly stunning, absolutely wonderful and incredibly photorealistic-looking pixelated graphics with magnificently superb visuals, incredible production values, top-notch technical achievements and exceptionally mind-boggling attention to detail. It particularly stands out as despite the 32-bit retro aesthetic of the game, the graphics look even better and are much more detailed than most current-generation games including the likes of Red Dead Redemption 2 and Uncharted 4: A Thief's End, which is massively impressive for an indie game like this and makes for one of the best-looking games ever made, period. In addition, it boasts:
 * 2) * Excellent and vibrant art-style inspired by the iconography of Spain's history that has a impressive amount of colors, making the graphics even better than they already are. It's detailed enough that it makes the player wanna stop playing for hours or look at several playthroughs just to see how marvelous the art-style looks with its rich color palette and godlike scenery.
 * 3) * Extremely detailed landscapes and backgrounds, with Cvstodia being so gorgeously well-made and incredibly visually appealing it resembles something out of the Sagrada Família in Barcelona.
 * 4) * Magnificent animation and phenomenal sprite design that's up right there with Castlevania: Symphony of the Night.
 * 5) Punishingly brutal difficulty that is perfectly balanced, being hard enough to present itself a legitimate challenge, but not overly extreme to the point of being gratuitous and unforgiving.
 * 6) Amazingly gripping plot which delivers an interesting twist on the Metroidvania genre and has a very unique and interesting premise similar to Berserk, being set in a tyrannical theocracy with a martyrdom culture that punishes people daily and is haunted by an ungodly presence. To elaborate how incredibly well-made the whole plot is, it includes:
 * 7) * Excellent storytelling that goes on par with that of Spec Ops: The Line in terms of having all sorts of unexpected twists and turns, relatable characters with understandable motivations, subtle references and conclusions that vary depending on the player's actions.
 * 8) * A surprising plot twist in the middle of the story where it's revealed that the Miracle transformed Escribar into a massive tree. At one point, the tree caught fire, leaving behind a massive pile of ash, atop which stood Escribar's throne. The Miracle drove countless people to attempt to climb the mountain, but all of them failed, swallowed by the ash. As punishment, the Miracle rebirthed them all as monsters. This included Escribar, who was reborn as the Last Son of the Miracle.
 * 9) Many unforgettable and endearing characters that are highly interesting in their own ways, including Escribar, Crisanta, Deogracias, Redento, Candelaria, Viridiana and of course, the Penitent One himself.
 * 10) It tackles heavy themes with insane accuracy and in a really good way, including guilt, grey morality, human nature, religious extremism and zealotry.
 * 11) The game features two interesting endings, each of them being:
 * 12) * Good ending: After defeating Escribar, Deogracias awaits in front of the mountain of ashes that once was the Burnt Tree and tells the Penitent One to climb it and commune with the Miracle. If all the requirements above have been completed, the Penitent One will have proven to be worthy and be able to climb to the top of the mountain. Once on the top, he sits in the Turned Throne, stabs himself with his sword, and his body transforms into a twisted tree, becoming the new Father and Son of the Miracle. After the credits, however, Crisanta reappears and draws the Mea Culpa from the Penitent One's body.
 * 13) * Bad ending: Without having completed all of the Confessor Dungeons, the Penitent One proves to be unworthy and is unable to climb the mountain, ending up swallowed by the ashes. Deogracias takes his helmet and his penitence is over.
 * 14) Intense and visceral gameplay with lots of addictive, fast-paced hack-and-slash combat, lots of brutal finishers reminiscent to the Glory Kills in modern Doom games and truly epic boss battles, essentially combining the best gameplay aspects of the Metroidvania and Soulslike genres into one.
 * 15) Vast open-world with plenty of nightmarish creatures and Lovecraftian horrors to slay alongside lots of multiple secrets to discover.
 * 16) The game perfectly manages to be brutal and gory with being mean-spirited, with its extreme ultraviolence and grimdark tone being amazingly well-balanced and also, it manages to be surprisingly extremely mature and down-to-earth in their portrayal, which heavily enhances the setting's overall intense ambiance.
 * 17) Incredibly fluid and responsive controls that run perfectly smooth and are very tight and solid, allowing for an even better experience.
 * 18) Beautifully grotesque and desolate atmosphere that perfectly captures the game's somber setting and mood extremely well.
 * 19) Tons of replay value that allow for lots of fun and many, many hours of gameplay due to it never feeling boring under any circumstance.
 * 20) Highly costumizable skills and wardrobe akin to games like Grand Theft Auto V, Mortal Kombat 11 and God of War (2018).
 * 21) Excellent voice acting, with the members of the cast delivering absolutely amazing performances. This also applies to the Spanish dub as well.
 * 22) Great special effects and sound design which have a very cinematic feel to them.
 * 23) Ridiculously awesome soundtrack composed by Carlos Viola, which ranges from calm and thoughtful to passionate and powerful. It helps that it's heavily influenced by the folk music of Southern Spain.
 * 24) It very accurately represents Spanish culture in general, which is no surprise given that this game was made by a Spanish developer.
 * 25) Its DLCs, including Stir of Dawn, Strife and Ruin and Wounds of Eventide, are really good as well and do an awesome job in expanding the game's lore, and best of all, they're free.
 * 26) * Speaking of Wounds of Eventide, it's a perfect conclusion to the game itself and manages to leave hope for the events of the upcoming 2023 sequel.

Bad Qualities

 * 1) The level design can be a bit confusing.
 * 2) The pacing, while brisk and smooth most of the time, can sometimes be sluggish.
 * 3) As greatly implemented the difficulty might be, it can be frustrating for some, especially when it comes to some of the enemies and bosses.

Reception
Blasphemous received generally very positive reviews from critics and gamers alike, with praise aimed towards its visual style, combat, boss battles and interconnected world, although the level design, difficulty and pacing received some criticism.

On Metacritic, it holds critical scores of 76/100, 77/100, 78/100 and 82/100 on Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, respectively.

The game won the awards for "Best Spanish Development" and "Indie Game of the Year" at the 2019 Titanium Awards, where it was also nominated for "Best Art".