Earlier this year, I spent a good amount of time thoroughly enjoying BURGGEIST, developed by a solo developer, “which weaves together so many mechanics so beautifully that I struggled to put it into words. BURGGEIST isn’t a game for everyone, of course, especially given how obscure and haunting it is and given how it speaks – quite literally – in its own invented language… but I thoroughly wish that more people would give it a try and experience this bizarre and wonderful game for themselves.
Honestly, there is something quite daring about this game. It straddles genres with audacity and makes you feel small amid its brooding world and monstrous foes. It’s not a perfect game, of course, but even with its rough edges, it is one of those rare indie titles that stays in my mind, living rent-free, long after I stopped playing.
Developer: GHRIAN STUDIO
Publisher: Kodansha
Genre: Indie, Real-Time Strategy, Tower Defence, Open World, Exploration
Release Date: October 14th, 2024
Reviewed on: PC
Available on: PC
Copy was purchased. [Review Policy]
BURRGEIST casts you as Ignace, a mathematician whose wife Lucile has been rendered motionless by a mysterious condition. After years of study and hope have failed to yield a cure, Ignace’s stepdaughter, Étoile, begins to receive cryptic messages. Ignace must build a tower that reaches the heavens to free Lucile. And with that… our strange quest spread across the desolate lands of Aliscans begins where we have to erect towers, defend them from hordes, and piece together fragments of lore about a world abandoned by time.
BURGGEIST is hard to describe.
Inspired by ICO and Shadow of the Colossus in terms of its world, storytelling and vibe, the game has a lot to offer if you’re into PSX-style graphics and strange tales. Gameplay-wise, though, it’s a tower defence & real-time strategy action game, with a big focus on exploring the world and using different abilities creatively, utilising the environment for various effects.
You’re just thrown into this world, and while your main mission is simple – build a tower to the heavens -, how you reach that, how you explore the game, and how you tackle the tower defence segments is completely up to you because of how the spell system works.
Note: I've uploaded a bunch of videos of the game a while ago over here. In case you wanna see my very first impressions of the game! Also, Iron Pineapple also did a great video on it over here. Highly recommend checking that out!
The core mechanic of this game revolves around elevation and using the environment to your advantage. Many of your gyromantia (magical abilities) get upgraded the longer they stay in the air, meaning more damage or better effects. On top of that, though, you can also chain the various gyromantia you find together to reach a lot of height or to traverse terrains more easily. Scattered across the landscape are these book-like towers and other spires that reward you with upgrades and items… if you can reach their heights through clever use of your abilities. It’s a really cool idea, honestly.
Both the traversal of the map and the combat mechanics during the tower defence portions make magnificent use of this ability to chain together spells. On top of that, your success in building up your towers depends greatly on how you scout out the area, how familiar you get with the various landmarks and the general structure of the locale.
There are plenty of spots where you can start constructing your tower, and the higher you go, the faster the difficulty scales up. The Abhorrers will start marching towards your tower to prevent your progress, which is why you need to defend it with all your might – and with the help of the titular Burggeist, a white creature carrying a stone slab on its back that has cannons attached to it.
The Burggeist is a creature you can control freely using movement and attack commands. You can ride if you want to. It’s a really cool companion of sorts that poses as this large white creature carrying a slab with cannons attached to it, and as you explore the world and solve armament puzzles (that require you to deal high bursts of damage to unlock new weapons), you can really customize the weapons platform to provide high bursts of damage or sustained fire or perhaps even other bonuses that you benefit from as Ignace.
Having the Burggeist stationed near the tower to bombard incoming enemy units is quite necessary because BURGGEIST doesn’t want you to just sit back and let the cannons do the talking. Much rather, it incentivises you to get involved directly because of special enemies like the Trumpeteers that dramatically raise the difficulty level of the current tower as long as they play their song, which is why you have to take care of them as quickly as possible.
I mentioned customisation earlier with the weapons platform, but you’re not just limited to that when it comes to customising the player experience. The game features a skill tree for the tower, for instance, as well as upgrades for your turrets that allow you to place more of them or up their range and damage.
Futhermore, you may find items in the world that improve your stats or change how you approach battles. Similarly, you can acquire a ton of different movement and damage spells in the game, of which you may only equip a limited amount, each with its own upgrades.
In terms of build- and theory-crafting, the core gameplay mechanics, the player customisation options, and the cryptic lore of the world really offer just so, so, so much. I’m deeply in love with this game.
On top of that, building up your tower unlocks strange interactions with the denizens of this world, people plagued by various kinds of problems, who then task you with various quests, which in turn yield really great rewards.
More than anything, though, the game really made me feel as if I was in this world that I should know about but just don’t. I got fully immersed in the strange tales of characters like a knight who can’t take off his armour, a person who lost their face while rolling down a hill, and a witch dual-riding brooms with her feet looking for revenge. It’s very bizarre, almost Lynchian at times, and if you’re familiar with Japanese folklore, you’ll probably know that a lot of the stories don’t end happily, necessarily.
Now, as I mentioned, the game isn’t perfect. It’s very rough around the edges with janky controls that take time getting used to in the beginning and a movement system that doesn’t allow for a lot of freedom early on… but once you get used to the initial jank and once you acquire a few movement abilities, there is no game, I dare say, that is as cool in terms of movement and map traversal as BURGGEIST because of the degree of freedom you have with chaining your abilities together. It’s incredibly satisfying.
On another note, the game isn’t the most accessible, both in its exploration and its storytelling. Some people might have a hard time with the themes of the game or with the cryptic and eerie nature of a lot of the happenings. Similarly, the map you have is hand-drawn and doesn’t have any markers on it that you could utilise to mark things for later. This might put some people off… but I find that this actually adds a lot to the charm of the game as it really adds to the vibe of you being out here on the frontier, making sense of the world on your own. It’s a fantasy of sorts that I enjoyed a lot.
Beyond that, the pacing is a bit abrupt near the end, I found. The game really ramps up in difficulty as you keep going, which I found rather rough to deal with. There are also some writing quirks with unclear and odd lines that might confuse folks, but I don’t think it’s that big of a deal in the grand scheme of things.
BURGGEIST isn’t just about building towers or chaining spells. Rather, it’s about discovery, melancholy, and the strange satisfaction of mastering something truly unique. It’s not for everyone, but for those willing to embrace its weirdness, it’s unforgettable. I only wish more people would embark on this world and dare to climb its towers.
BURGGEIST is rough, cryptic, and strange. And yet beneath its surface lies one of the most creative and atmospheric indie gems that I've played in years. It's janky and rough around the edges but once you get used to it, it becomes one of the most satisfying and awesome things in the world. It's a crime that it isn't more known.
This post was originally written by Dan Dicere from Indiecator.
If you see this article anywhere other than Indiecator.org then this article has been scraped. Please let me know about this via E-Mail.
Indiecator 
I had never heard of this game except from you, and it looks really intriguing! Will have to add it to “Baby Steps” on my list of games with innovative mechanics that doesn’t lead you by the hand.
LikeLiked by 1 person