Seduction: A Monk's Fate

For as much as I like the big, showpiece horror games like Resident Evil and Dead Space, I’ve always had a soft-spot for the types of scary stories you can tell in just an hour or two. That’s why I was so excited to play Seduction: A Monk’s Fate, which first hit computers last year, but just recently got ported to modern consoles, thanks to EastAsiaSoft. It’s the story of a monk’s journey through a nightmarish world filled with ghostly spirits and unresolved memories. Get those chants ready, because this is my review of Seduction: A Monk’s Fate.

Deep in the mountains lies Nanyi Temple, a peaceful refuge for those in need. That best describes this young father, a desperate man who has made the long journey in hopes of escaping his past and giving his newborn son a better life. Fast-forward a couple decades and that young boy, Lee, has grown into a faithful monk who is learning the way of Buddha. However, when he mysterious switches rooms in the temple, Lee starts seeing visions of a young woman and remembering other people’s memories from a long time ago.

If that wasn’t freaky enough, the young monk enters a nightmare world filled with ghosts, spirits and demonic creatures living at the bottom of a well. It’s a trippy and often surreal adventure that sees our monk solve puzzles in an attempt to piece the mysteries together and make sense of all these weird memories.

Seduction is a side-scrolling horror game that takes heavy influence from the point and click adventures of the past. No matter where the nightmare world takes you, the goal is always to pick up the important items and then use them to solve puzzles that will open up new parts of the game. Thankfully, you won’t need to combine any items and the puzzle solutions aren’t as obtuse as many point and clickers, but you end up spending most of the time exploring the small levels for items you can add to the inventory.

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When you’re not hunting down things to pick up, you’ll be avoiding the ghoulish characters in this nightmare world. With no weapons or combat training, the monk will either need to avoid the spirits by correctly nailing a quick-time event, or he’ll let the power of prayer take over. You might be surprised how effective that is to banishing evil spirits, along with solving some of the other puzzles. I also really like how the prayer button does different things depending on where you are or what you’re doing.

As a short horror game goes, Seduction has plenty of gore and a number of welcome surprises. I’ll say this about the game, it takes you places. Every time you get bored exploring a tiny chunk of land, the game will whisk you away to something completely different, such as swimming through the murky (and definitely haunted) lake. Interspersed among the different locations and puzzles are short glimpses of other people’s memories, slowly piecing together the story and leading towards a surprisingly satisfying conclusion.

Running no more than ninety minutes, Seduction: A Monk’s Fate somehow manages to go by too quickly, while simultaneously being leisurely-paced. With the exception of one key moment, Lee is slowly walking around, almost as if there’s no urgency to the adventure. This can make exploring some of the bigger stages, such as a haunted temple, feel like a real slog, especially when there’s so much backtracking.

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It doesn’t help that the checkpointing system is a little buggy. Seduction has this problem where it gets confused if you don’t save frequently. I ran into this problem early on where even though I would trigger the checkpoint, I would end up starting over from the beginning for some reason. The good news is that this only happened with the first few checkpoints, but there were other times when it felt like some of my progress wasn’t being saved correctly. On the other hand, considering how short the game is, it won’t take long to replay those moments and catch back up.

Visually, there’s a lot to like about Seduction. I like the wonderfully-haunting hand-drawn locations and appreciate the way they frame the cinemas and story elements. There are a lot of moments where we’re seeing everything through silhouettes, while other times the cut scenes will resemble something out of a classic film noir. You can tell that this is a small game made on a budget, but I appreciate the unique look and the large variety of hellish locations.

I just wish the story was as compelling as the art design. Don’t get me wrong, Seduction has a solid set-up and the final act is definitely satisfying, but everything in the middle meanders and is mostly predictable. It’s also clunkily translated, giving us lengthy conversations that never sound natural. I found myself caring a lot more about the horror-themed world and monsters than the memories and mystery. And even though the ending is handled extremely well, there’s a good chance that you’ll guess what’s going on within the first few minutes. On the other hand, as far as games about monks traveling to nightmarish worlds and defeating evil spirits through prayer go, Seduction: A Monk’s Fate is one of the best.