The Game Kitchen proved themselves with both Blasphemous games; two excellent metroidvanias set in a dark medieval world inspired by Spain’s history. The pixel art and animation were some of the best for the genre and boasted unbelievably creative designs and violent executions.
The Game Kitchen’s next game would deviate from its comfort zone, emphasizing survival-stealth gameplay with RTS elements and illustrative graphics. Hopes were high that the next title would be as impressive as Blasphemous I and II, but something went wrong along the way.
The Stone of Madness should have been a slam dunk, but it’s a middling and tedious slog with graphics that look cheap. There was potential here, but it got bogged down by trying to do too many things at once while not excelling at anything. Where did it go wrong? Find out in The Stone of Madness review!
The Stone of Madness
Developer: The Game Kitchen, Teku Studios
Publisher: Tripwire Presents
Platforms: Windows PC, Nintendo Switch, Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5 (reviewed)
Release Date: January 28, 2025
Price: $29.99
The Stone of Madness combines real-time tactics with stealth action gameplay, but instead of playing as capable ninjas like in Shadow Tactics, players guide a rag-tag team of asylum inmates. The story revolves around five prisoners with unique skills, backstories, and phobias confined within the monastery’s decrepit walls.
Plagued by cruel punishment, madness, and despair, these inmates band together to devise and execute a plan to escape their oppressive prison. Each of the five inmates’ strengths and weaknesses complements the others, and it’s on the player to explore them while also contending with the prison’s night-and-day cycle, guard shifts, and the looming threat of darkness. It’s an unnecessary complication in a game with a lot of pressure.
Mistakes in The Stone of Madness are intensely costly. It’s easy to completely screw yourself while exploring due to the way the sanity meter works and the draining of resources. Typically, survival horror games can drip-feed resources by fostering exploration, but the cast in this game is ill-suited for it.
Every character has a crippling weakness. One lady cannot handle open flames, or a mumbling, crazy guy loses his mind in dark areas. Some characters lose their sanity when committing acts of violence or seeing bodies. Compounded with the limited time of day to operate, players are hamstrung by an agonizing tug-of-war where making progress is unbearable.
Planning an entire day just to get characters into position to acquire some basic items to bypass a gap isn’t enough because there are patrol routes for guards, and ghosts show up at night. It’s not as fun as it should be due to all of the variables and handicaps holding the player back.
The Stone of Madness has made me despise the mentally ill. The utter helplessness of these characters stopped being tragic when the logic became inconsistent. Areas that are supposed to be dark aren’t dark, and only certain flagged flames will trigger a mental breakdown.
The stealth mechanics are akin to classic PlayStation Metal Gear Solid, but with an isometric point of view. Sentries have vision cones and audible range to account for, and players can exploit their AI to bypass. The clincher is having to guild three mental patients with crippling disorders in a massive, open ended Spanish monastary.
Exploring and making shortcuts that lead back to the underground base washes a wave of relief, followed by rising dread of what will come next. This is a challenging game that’s made harder due to not being able to give commands to the party to save time. Night comes quick and dealing with all that spooky shit is too risky in a game where substantial progress is easily lost.
The gameplay is novel and with some fine tuning, it could be excellent. Yet, as it stands, its more frustrating. The night and day cycle pushing players to retreat only serves to artificially pad out the game. This applies to the tacked on skill system which feel like they should have been default actions.
The Stone of Madness flawlessly captures the time and place with its ambiance. The Latin sound bytes and echoing ambiance is excellent and perfect transports the player to the setting. Even the cutscenes look great and feel appropriate.
The in-game graphics are a mixed bag. The beautifully drawn backgrounds are top-notch and are packed with detail. The same can’t be said for the hand-drawn characters, which look flatly drawn, lack detail, and stick out too much from the background. They don’t feel grounded in the setting and have awkward poses and stiff animations.
The supbar character art and animation is surprising since this is the same team that produced the two Blasphemous titles which had amazing animation. If all of the art were done with sprites like in those games, the visuals might have fared better and been more cohesive.
The Stone of Madness is a stressful and obnoxious experience full of setbacks. Playing as a team of mental patients isn’t the rip-roaring fun time you’d hoped it could be. The atmosphere is impressively dense, and the historical aspects were consistently interesting, but playing The Stone of Madness just might put me in a straitjacket.
The Stone of Madness was reviewed on a PlayStation 5 using a code provided by Tripwire Presents. You can find additional information about Niche Gamer’s review/ethics policy here. The Stone of Madness is now available for PC (via Steam), Nintendo Switch, Xbox Series X|S, and PlayStation 5.
