When Hades came along in 2020, it quickly built a reputation as one of the best roguelike games around. Naturally, such a successful game has inspired many others, but how can other developers improve on perfection? With co-op, of course! That’s the clever approach that games like TMNT: Splintered Fate from Super Evil Megacorp and SWORN from Team17 and Windwalk Games have taken. SWORN doesn’t outshine Hades in length and depth, but it certainly makes for a great cooperative experience.
Whereas Hades told a story based on Greek myths, SWORN draws from the stories of King Arthur and his knights. The twist here is that Arthur and most of the knights of the round table have gone bad, with some taking on monstrous forms. Merlin revives a handful of fallen warriors and sends them to stop Arthur and recover the Holy Grail. Along the way, a few familiar characters like Gwenevere and Nimue will join the cause as well. Despite the fantastic premise, however, SWORN has precious few story scenes. If you scoffed at the abundance of cinematics in Hades, then this game’s minimalistic story should be more to your liking.
The game begins with a 5–10-minute single-player tutorial. Initially, players control the Knight, a general-purpose character. He starts with a sword but can unlock a bow and two other weapons before long. As players participate in more runs (and collect the in-game Fairy Ember currency), they will unlock the female Monk, the tank-like Rook, and the magic-wielding Specter. Each character will eventually gain a choice of four weapons and four spells to wield. The lineup of characters, weapons, and spells is more varied than Hades, though the usefulness of some weapons and spells is questionable.
Runs are structured similarly to Hades, with players progressing through a series of rooms in four main realms (plus a hidden fifth one!). After clearing the enemies from a room, the team will choose from one or two exits, each promising a specific type of reward. Various random events can occur and provide benefits to players. However, some random events (like taking a small reward for a major health penalty, and Morgana’s “blessings” that bestow both a positive and negative consequence) are practically useless. Each of the first three realms features a miniboss fight at the midpoint and a proper boss fight against a corrupted Arthurian character at the end. There are two possible minibosses and two possible bosses per realm, adding a bit of variety to runs. The bosses are fun and challenging, but they always begin with an annoyingly unskippable cinematic.
Fae blessings are the main way that players can increase their offensive and defensive powers during a run. Whereas the original Hades features 9 gods who offer about 15 standard boons and 8 Duo and Legendary boons each, SWORN‘s 8 Fae offer a whopping 36-43 blessings apiece! One Fae’s powers bestow cold damage, one offers poison, one increases crit chance, and so on. Oberon, the Fury Fae, seems to be the worst of them, but maybe I need to give him more of a chance. The downside to each Fae having so many blessings is that it can be hard to get the ones you actually want. Instead of a 1/15 chance to get a choice blessing (ignoring prerequisite blessings), you have a 1/28-to-1/35 chance here. SWORN’s dashing powers seem to be less useful than in other games of this style, but each Fae does have the chance to bestow a unique companion who fights alongside the player, and an Ultimate attack. Ultimates work like the Call in Hades. After the Ultimate meter fills up, the player can briefly transform into the Fae and deliver one or more powerful attacks.
Long-term goals include clearing the first four realms with all four characters and each of their weapons, clearing the super tough fifth realm, clearing a four-realm run on each of the five difficulty levels, and (after the Version 1.2 update) completing the Boss Rush with all four characters. The fifth realm inexplicably lacks the random events and item-filled breakable barrels found in the other realms. This makes it harder and less enjoyable than the rest of the game, but at least players don’t have to clear it multiple times for Achievements or anything.
Replaying on multiple difficulties is more feasible and rewarding. Each higher difficulty level ramps the challenge by adding randomized modifiers to every room. The heroes will have to fight with blessings disabled, dodge constant meteor showers, and much more. The challenge of these higher difficulties is mostly welcome, but players will max out their long-term upgrades well before reaching the final difficulty levels. It would be more fair (and fun) to offer additional late-game upgrades. As for the Boss Rush, the portal to access the challenge appears in the fourth realm, Camelot. Requiring players to basically complete a run every time they want to access the Boss Rush is a bit much.
SWORN is quite fun to play solo (despite the minimal narrative), but it’s especially fun in multiplayer. The game supports 4-player online co-op on everything but Switch, where it only supports 2-player co-op. There is no cross-play, sadly. The “Join Game” option lets players browse open games, whereas choosing to host will send the host to wait for others in their home base. Players can’t join mid-run, annoyingly, which makes for a boring wait when hosting and limits the number of open games at any time. Finding games would be easier if Windwalk Games adopted TMNT: Splintered Fate’s approach of letting players join midgame or even the Earth Defense Force series’ approach of letting people join but wait until the next level before they can actually participate.
Everyone’s individual upgrades carry over from single-player (including Moonstone shop unlocks), so an experienced player can help newer players get farther than they would on their own. Items and stage rewards are shared amongst the group. The gold shop, however, will only sell one of each item it contains, so two players can’t buy the same upgrade. A rudimentary communication system allows players to select from four simple text messages (Greetings, Goodbye, No, and …..) to display on screen. The messages can eventually be customized by purchasing an upgrade from the Moonstone shop. Any communication system is better than none, but the voice bubbles here are awfully tiny.
When a player dies during a co-op game, he or she becomes a floating orb. Disembodied players can attack enemies to deal small amounts of damage, but they are tethered to living players, so their range of movement is rather limiting. Reviving a dead player incurs one of three costs: gold, a single player’s health, or a max health reduction curse for the whole team. Those health penalties mean that the run gets harder and harder for everyone if someone keeps dying, much like in Heroes of Hammerwatch II.
One persistent multiplayer issue that has so far gone unaddressed is the lack of host migration. If the host disconnects or quits the game, everyone gets kicked out to the main menu. There are two clear solutions: either assign a new host or allow the non-host players to continue the run in single-player (as with Heroes of Hammerwatch II). When playing with friends, this usually won’t be an issue, but I’ve found that hosts quit from public games all the time. The only reason this problem doesn’t make me furious is that players don’t lose the Crystal Shards and Moonstones (upgrade currencies) they’ve collected if the host leaves. Thank goodness for that!
Although SWORN fails to take advantage of the narrative possibilities of its dark Arthurian premise, the gameplay is strong enough to hold its own. Whether playing alone or in co-op, I always find myself craving one more run. Fighting gruesome foes in oppressive medieval realms is highly engaging, even though the dated visuals don’t impress. SWORN has received a steady stream of updates since it launched in September, so hopefully the developers will continue to polish and balance the gameplay. The potential is there for this game to take the crown as the best co-op Hades clone… May it accomplish that goal without falling like poor King Arthur!
SWORN costs $29.99 on Xbox Series and PlayStation 5, and $24.99 on Switch and Steam. Physical editions can be preordered at Amazon for $34.99 for PlayStation 5 and Switch. The Steam version is fully Steam Deck-compatible. The Xbox version is currently available on Game Pass Premium and Ultimate.
Xbox download codes were provided by the publisher for this review.