It's a competent Metroidvania with decent level design and some secrets to discover. It's bog standard, though with nothing unique that stand out from the crowd.

Combat is simple and satisfying. Subweapons are actually nice and pretty much essential part of combat even during bosses.

Bosses are bit on easy side but pretty fun and fair. There's also a good amount of them!

Healing is quite restricted, they don't refill flasks on respawns until much later and you lose a tiny amount of money on dying but you keep all progress.

Easy / normal difficulty, I'd recommend Easy difficulty because Normal is considered by many to be hard mode of most games.

Color palette is ok, I didn't like it. Visual acuity is not good in some areas.
Map design is good, even clearly marked secret areas, too. You can place markers.

There's a nice spread of biomes and enemy variety is pretty good but their attack patterns / animations feel bit same-y.

NPCs with your usual quests and vendors. the world building is good and story is easy to follow.

Exploration is decent. Just wish rewards weren't just mostly gold from chests and your majority of power-ups tend to come from NPCs/quests. There's plenty of cool secrets to discover and some mini-puzzles to solve.

Dev is super responsive and have been good on fixing / updating the game regularly so mad props to that.

update 1: level design get much better later, it almost feels like Blasphemous.

update 2: further in now, it's evident that there wasn't adequate playtesting as some sections are poorly tuned and a certain area is excessively long without a save point or shortcut. So buyer beware, maybe wait few more patches. The game is good but lack polish. Or just play on easy difficulty.

update 3: basically done with the game, it's pretty good MV with few issues

In general, I'd say it's 7 or 8/10 Metroidvania depending on what you like / dislike.

I really liked what I've played so far! A very 90s feeling Metroidvania, which also feels refreshing at the same time. The game has a strong atmosphere and interesting mechanics, this one is a proper Metroidvania too with ability gating and backtracking. It also controls great and is decently balanced. The things I liked less were that it's sometimes hard to see what are platforms and what is background elements and the pits which do damage are also hard to spot. I also did not like some of the boss attacks of the two last bosses I fought, they felt slightly unfair and hard to read/dodge. But this was still pretty minor. I think this game is entirely or largely made by one person and that is incredible, overall a very interesting and fun game!
Looking forward towards playing more!

Updated 14OCT2023

Well i can't say my opinion has changed. I slogged my way to the final area, more out of spite than any real enjoyment. My original review remains my opinion after 14 hours of play. I will give compliments though on the puzzles as i enjoyed getting notes and working out codes to access certain areas. Overall though i did not enjoy this game enough to complete it.


Original
I always hate to leave a negative review on a small publisher, but i'm not really loving this game. I'm about 3 hours in and find it more frustrating than fun. Combat seems to be an afterthought. Reminds me of the original Castlevania games where mobs were put in the most annoying places almost guaranteeing you'll get hit. I find myself just dodging past most mobs as there's really no point to kill them. They drop one or two coins and you risk getting hit. Chests easily drop 10-25 and seem to be everywhere. The Lurker fight is terrible. Hit boxes very unclear and the only way i was able to beat it was through sheer luck of RNG. Mobs are sometimes difficult to see with darker backgrounds. For the love of all that is holy, stop putting design elements in the foreground that block your char view. (Chains in the gnome caves i'm looking at you.) I'll take a break for a bit and try to come back to it in a few days.

The game's large maps encourage you to roam around and acquire new abilities, but they're still solid enough to keep you curious about new things to explore.

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Disclaimer
I am in the credits of this game! However, this is not a sponsored review or anything like that. I just helped out with some localization stuff.
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Really excellent metroidvania. Simple but enjoyable combat, great enemy and location variety, lush, memorable pixel art throughout the game's multiple biomes, a neat and concise backstory with some additional lore to uncover...there's just a lot on offer here. Shoutout to the excellent soundtrack as well, SamDee nailed the vibe on every track and really elevates each location.

Kingdom Shell is a great choice for standard metroidvania play - I went through on the normal difficulty and while several of the bosses offered a strong challenge, for the most part it's a fairly breezy experience. If you're not feeling the movement/traversal early on, don't worry - in typical genre fashion, you'll get some upgrades later on that will have you zipping across the screen and dancing around enemies.

I'd say my biggest critique of the game is the death mechanic. The penalty for dying is that you drop a percentage of your gold, the primary currency you use to purchase passive buffs and upgrades. The problem here is obvious: if you reach a challenging boss, and take several attempts to beat it while slowly learning its moveset, you're just losing gold the entire time. This discourages the very enjoyable process of gradually mastering a boss fight over the course of death after death, because you'll come out the other end significantly poorer. The simple solution is to save-scum whenever you reach a new boss or challenging area (which I eventually ended up doing), but this is an inelegant workaround. I have thoughts on how to address this problem, but I won't burden this review with them.

In the end, Kingdom Shell is a high-quality title, an impressive solo-dev project, and a really enjoyable way to spend a dozen or so hours. Easy recommend for anyone who enjoys this style of game.

---see where this game landed on my Metroidvania tier list beneath this review!---


The game is competent enough in most areas and is fairly enjoyable for an indie title. It plays a bit like Timespinner or a less compacted Momodora: Reverie under the Moonlight. It's pretty slow and challenging in places and it was a good 6 hours before I found a 'movement' type upgrade to alleviate some of this.

My initial impressions of this game were not very high. There was a little bit of jankiness with the Lurker fight, and by that point the repetitive music tracks of the first 2 biomes had been grating on me. There was also a long wait before acquiring movement upgrades, and the MV exploration had been pretty contained. While paths were branching, all roads really led one way.

These first impressions put me off a bit. Over time however, everything that I mentioned above was to varying degrees alleviated. The game opened up more, and it started to win me over. It was a slow burn.

While things did improve as I got deeper into the game, it never quite reached the heights of my favourite games, but it was a solid and enjoyable experience overall for me in the end. So much so that I went as far as to get 100% of the achievements (None of which were obnoxious ..er. Well, I farmed some gold for an hour toward the endgame).

The map: You have to mark anything on your map that you may wish to return to. It's not ideal, most games do this for you, but I can work with that. Save points and Merchants are however marked for you, and you can see where rooms interconnect. Different biomes are in different colors which is good.

The music: At first I thought this was alright, but after 15 minutes in either of the first 2 biomes, the tracks actually get very annoyingly repetitive because they repeat the same short pattern, just in different ways. The tracks don't go anywhere. This works in short segments, like the boss fights, or on a menu screen, but not so much in a biome that you will spend a lot of time in. Other tracks weren't an issue to me, it's mainly those first 3 hours.

Gameplay: The game is pretty metroidvania, with a number of different ways to go and will have you backtracking to find things later in the game. Some of the paths loop back as a result of pressing switches, similar to Blasphemous 2.

You don't lose any progress when you die, but you do drop some coins.

Your character mostly fights with a short range melee attack (Almost like the baseball bat in Phoenotopia: Awakening).

The game is both a little challenging and punishing at times, in that you might find yourself methodically clearing the same 12 screens and dying a few times until you are successful. It is very easy to die as your hp is quite low, and some things will kill you in a couple of hits. The difficulty is something I appreciated though, I did my playthrough on Normal (hardest) mode, and it felt akin to Cathedral or Environmental Station Alpha difficulty-wise.

The boss fights were one of my favourite aspects of the game. They always gave a bit of trouble at first, but I'd memorise the patterns and gradually overcome. Challenging but fair and quite interesting and distinctive from one another.

There are charms that you can collect and equip which provide small bonuses to combat.

You will learn a small few spells that mostly just act as secondary ranged attacks (Secondary due to their mana cost), but they are also used to hit switches that you otherwise couldn't reach.

Verdict: Kingdom Shell is very indie and easier to recommend to diehard metroidvania fans that have already played all the good stuff. It's slow, a bit raw and rather unexceptional, but fun enough if some of its drawbacks don't bother you too much. If you liked Momodora: RutM and Timespinner then you are likely going to have a lot of fun with Kingdom Shell if you can handle the difficulty. For me it's actually the better game of that bunch.

EDIT: I initially left a negative review pretty much solely down to the "Lurker" boss fight. I perceived the fight to be unfair, and it really isn't. That was hubris on my part, for which I apologise. I went back with a different approach which completely trivialised it.

If you do hit that fight and struggle, I've uploaded a video of me going through it on normal mode: https://youtu.be/poNI-2iQEeo

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My Metroidvania Tier List (PC) (excluding Metroid & Castlevania titles)
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-Not an objective list, purely how much I enjoyed the games-

S+ Aeterna Noctis |
S Tier (Truly Special) Astalon: Tears of the Earth | Monster Boy and the Cursed Kingdom | Hollow Knight |
S- Blasphemous 2 | Cathedral |

A+ Afterimage | The Last Faith |
A Tier (Amazing) Elderand | Ori and the Will of the Wisps | Doomblade^ |
A- Ender Lilies: Quietus of the Knights | Depths of Sanity | Environmental Station Alpha |

B+ Blast Brigade | Haak | Biomorph | Turbo Kid |
B Tier (Really Enjoyed) Alwa’s Legacy | Steamworld Dig 2 | Islets | Blasphemous | After Death | Pronty^ | Mortal Manor* | Escape From Tethys | Outbuddies DX* | Monster Sanctuary | Elliot Quest | Rebel Transmute |
B- Haiku, the Robot | The Mobius Machine | Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown | Ultros |

C+ (Fun) Lone Fungus | Ghost Song | Death’s Gambit: Afterlife | Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night | Kunai | Kingdom Shell | Axiom Verge | Rabi-Ribi | TEVI | Treasure Adventure Game |
C Tier (More or Less Enjoyed) Flipwitch | Infernax | Plague of Yamorn* | Column on the Sea | Jrago* | MF-01 Aerostrike^ | Laika: Aged through Blood | Xanthiom Zero | Carrion^ | Chasm | Wuppo | The Mummy Demastered | Momodora 4 | Momodora 5 | Catmaze | Castle In The Clouds | Omega Strike | HunterX | HunterX: code name T | Aggelos | Midnight Castle Succubus | Sheepo |
C- (Meh) Ato | EldritchVania | Cookie Cutter | Elephantasy | Rusted Moss^ | Grime | Moonscars | The Messenger | Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth | Iconoclasts | MindSeize | Ebenezer and the Invisible World | Luna’s Light* |

D Tier (Didn’t enjoy enough to play through) Castle In The Darkness | Alwa’s Awakening | RIN: The Last Child* | Pharaoh Rebirth | Yoku’s Island Express | Guacamelee! 2 | Shantae and the Pirate’s Curse | Beholgar* | Phoenotopia: Awakening | Insect Adventure* | Clunky Hero* | Headlander | Strider | Minoria* | Souldiers | Bone Appetit | The Witch & the 66 Mushrooms | Transiruby | Destroy Space Aliens | La-Mulana | Rex Rocket | Guacamelee! | 8Doors | Gato Roboto | Super Panda Adventures |

E-Tier (Didn't like) Sheba: A New Dawn | Ex Vitro | Wonder Boy: The Dragon’s Trap | The Weird Dream | Ginsha | Dandara | Vernal Edge | Blaster Master Zero | Medusa* | Lost Ruins | Sundered | Salt & Sanctuary | Valdis Story | Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet | Touhou Luna Nights | Chronicles of Teddy | B.I.O.T.A. | Shadow Complex | Timespinner | Aquaria | Nyaruru Fishy Fight | Apotheon | Future Fragments | Gungirl 2 | Bad Pad* | Chakana* | Lootbox Lyfe | Slavania* | Angel’s Gear* | Fearmonium | Magicians & Looters* | Tres-Bashers* | Dust: An Elysian Tale |
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^ = Mouse & Keyboard are STRONGLY advised.
* = Very raw indie or contains some jank or lack of polish.
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This is an incredibly solid and fun metroidvania. It doesn't do anything groundbreaking or insanely innovative. But I don't see that as an insult. Sometimes you just want a good, well made game in a genre you enjoy. And thats what this is, a solid 8/10 fun metroidvania made by someone you can tell really loves the genre. I'd say if you like the genre its worth the buy.

I played a little, killed the first boss, and the first impressions are good, nice music, good controls, good level design, there are a couple of disadvantages, such as the platforms are hard to see in the background, the animations are not very good, but I immediately realized that this is not a high-budget metroidvania and gave the game a chance, the game is good.

Please give this a go without reading the negative reviews. This game is not perfect but it plays fine and the dev is listening and working on updates constantly. LOVE, LOVE, LOVE this game!! I have only played just over two hours so far and for sure still have a long way to go. The controls are great, the confusion is fantastic. In my opinion this is a Metroidvania in it's best form. I am super excited to keep going and find, enjoy heaps of secrets and answers that I am sure will follow. The price is totally fair, there is so much content. I have read that this is a solo dev, what an achievement, WELL DONE.

I'm getting close to the finish line with this one and no not at 100% by any means but I've never been a completionist. I see a lot of negative reviews here that seem a bit petty. In all honesty this is absolutely a good metroidvania, especially during a time when they seem to be abundant. You can tell the developer (solo) put a lot of time into crafting the world, everything connects pretty seamlessly, and you can interact with different characters/races that come with some lore. The visuals are great, and you have animations in both the background and foreground, plus, every area isn't just a blocky color swap, they all feel and play differently. Overall, the atmosphere and soundtrack of this game is great.

The combat and gameplay aren't anything too intricate, but it does the job. You have plenty of challenging platforming sections and combat can be difficult if you do not play cautiously and instead rush your way around. As you progress, you'll realize you need to do some exploration if you haven't to increase your weapon damage, health, magic, inspiration (charms), etc. I feel like I've played a lot of metroidvania's lately that have been more linear, and this one will have you backtracking for the right reasons, so it was never an issue for me. I think the main con here is the combat, you don't get a lot of range with your main weapon, but you have alternate magic abilities to use, and the hit boxes on enemies can at times be unpredictable.

The bosses in my opinion are a lot of fun. They start off pretty easy but they're all unique from one another in both gameplay and design. The later bosses get MUCH more challenging so there is definitely a difficult curve for you to be prepared for.

All in all, I recommend this to anyone who enjoys Metroidvania's. This one doesn't just focus on one aspect such as platforming or the souls-like combat, but it instead puts everything together to create an enjoyable experience.