REVIEW : Black Book (PC)
Black Book is an RPG/CCG/detective simulator/visual novel in which you either play the villain or make a feeble attempt to avoid being one.
Clearing Black Book’s campaign should be rewarded academic credit. It’s so deep in Russian mythology that it creates its own CliffsNotes and encyclopaedia to read as you play.
The genre of Black Book is difficult to define. It’s a digital card game with RPG components, but it also features an exploration/conversation component reminiscent of a classic ’90s adventure game. If you wanted to play more Slay the Spire or Roguebook with a 20-hour narrative mode, Black Book is the game for you.
Black Book Review: Witching Hour
Black Book is a terrifying nighttime walking trip through 19th-century Russian countryside, where you’re continuously torn between being a full-on villain protagonist or a slightly regretful anti-hero.
What I like best about this world is that it isn’t your standard Western fantasy setting. With new releases like this and Cris Tales, we finally see more video games that stray beyond the classic Tolkien-via-Gygax imitation.
It’s a lot to process. Black Book suffers from the same problem as certain urban fantasy and stranger RPGs in that it generates terminology so quickly that it’s easy to get lost in the flow. Even though that “terminology” is simply keeping many Russian words intact, such as “koldun” (witch) and “savour” (spell, prayer), I had to take notes as I played.
To Hell and Back
Vasilisa is a young orphan with the potential to become a witch. She intended to ignore it and marry, but then her fiance was found dead.
To reclaim him, Vasilisa returns to her old tutor Egor and assumes his role as a koldun, witchcraft and demonology practitioner, as well as his Black Book. The Book in question includes numerous spells and is protected by seven seals, the first of which has already been broken. According to the traditional narrative, if Vasilisa can figure out how to shatter the other six, she can wish for anything she wants, including the resurrection of her fiance.
While she seeks knowledge, Vasilisa serves as the new witch and “knower” for the local peasants, chasing demons, fighting spirits, and dealing with the occasional curse. Her main goal is always in the background, but most of Black Book revolves around what happens to her while planning other plans.
Upstairs, Downstairs
In general, being a witch in nineteenth-century Russia was hardly a heroic occupation. Vasilisa progressively builds up a state called Sins, reflecting her morals and increasing every time she commits a crime or consorts with evil spirits. It lessens anytime she does something nice for someone.
On the other hand, Vasilisa has a swarm of demons under her command who must be given something to do at all times or else they will punish her instead, incurring huge mechanical penalties. That means you have to send them out to commit minor crimes against the countryside, each of which earns you cash but also a frighteningly large amount of Sins.
It’s not so much a karma balancing act as it is a question of how evil you want Vasilisa to be. She’s not going to walk out of this unscathed, no matter how you play it, but you can invest in strategies to mitigate the harm. As a result, you’ll earn less gold and have fewer skill points to spend on valuable fighting abilities.
It’s a fascinating twist on the standard video game morality scale, which too often divides between sainthood and petty dickishness.
Vasilisa is always on a dark road regardless of how you play – the sequence at the beginning of the game where she obtains her powers involves a short trip to Hell, where she’s greeted like a promising new talent, but you can try not to lean into that.
A Little Bit of Everything
Black Book’s battle takes the shape of a card game, which removes pages from the titular Book. Instead of a finite pool of resources, you’re limited by how many cards you may play in turn. Still, the game distinguishes between regular and “key” cards, which can occasionally restrict your options.
It’s simple enough to get started, but the deeper you go into the Book, the more possibilities you uncover, usually in the form of new spell modifiers. I still don’t feel like I understand how the various systems function, but Black Book’s learning curve is forgiving… for the most part.
A few boss fights constitute an unexpected and unwelcome difficulty bump, one of which nearly forced me to restart the game.
You can also change your loadout nearly at any time from the main menu. You must pay to obtain cards back from the Book, but getting rid of them is free, which helps keep your deck streamlined. As a result, you’re virtually always strapped for cash, which is an odd incentive to keep your pet devils tormenting the countryside for you.
The remainder of Black Book is a strange investigation game in which you can search for clues and unlock encyclopaedia pages to solve the numerous mysteries that Vasilisa confronts. This can range from a peculiar whodunit in a salt mine to determining what kind of demon has possessed a villager, and it’s pretty good at not just feeding you the clues.
It’s a pleasant wine when you figure out the right solution to something from context or study, making one of the better detective-work games I’ve played recently… the 19th-century Russian witch simulator. Huh.
Black Book is all over the place in terms of genre, and it does not attempt to clarify its translation for non-Russian listeners. It’s unmistakably desolate, with more than a few brick-wall clashes that compel you to rethink your deck with severely restricted resources.
It’s difficult for me to assign a numerical value to something like this. However, I’d gladly suggest it to anyone who likes card games; it has a few RPG elements, and if you’re interested in learning about Russian mythology, Black Book is essentially an educational tool.
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