“Towa and the Guardians Of the Sacred Tree” Review

Imitation, they say, is the sincerest form of flattery. I love Hades. I sadly didn’t get around to playing it until a couple of years ago when I received my Xbox Series S as a Christmas gift. Talk about a…

Imitation, they say, is the sincerest form of flattery.

I love Hades. I sadly didn’t get around to playing it until a couple of years ago when I received my Xbox Series S as a Christmas gift. Talk about a game that rewards both success and failure: true, you’ll die a lot, but you’ll also wake up in a fully fleshed out hub area with several incredibly likable characters and sidequests to take part in. Then there’s the combat, kinetic and heart-stopping in its sheer speed; easy to learn, hard to master.

So when people started seeing previews of Towa and the Guardians of the Sacred Tree, many immediately noticed the number of things it directly cribbed from Supergiant’s roguelike phenomenon… so much so that some would even call it plagiarism (we’ll get to that). But they also noted a number of different systems that were put into play, from having two character per run that share a life bar, to a larger and more expansive hub world (with a bigger cast of characters).

Now that we can enjoy the game in full–does it measure up to Hades? Well, kind of.

It’s complicated.

What Is It?

Towa And the Guardians Of the Sacred Tree (henceforth referred to as Towa) is a roguelite action game developed by Brownies Inc., most famous as the developers of the Egglia series of JRPGs (and was in turn founded by Shinichi Kameoka, one of the luminaries of the Mana series). In this, their first all-platform title, they take heavy inspiration from Supergiant’s bestselling series of Greek mythology-inspired roguelite Hades, while at the same time throwing in a handful of unique features that sets it apart from its inspiration.

Towa‘s story takes place in a fantastical feudal Japan analogue, largely centered around an area called Shinju Village. In this village lives the eponymous Towa, a semi-divine woman who has lived amongst the regular people of this village for centuries, witnessing many births and deaths along the way. As it often the case with divine or semi-divine beings, Towa gains the ire of a demonic god by the name of Magatsu, who seeks to spread his influence across the land, hoping to swallow up Shinju Village with it. Towa is strong, but she can’t do this alone, so she seeks the aid of eight individauls (called ‘Prayer Children’) to aid her in this struggle… but there’s a problem: Magatsu’s influence not only pollutes the land it infests, but also jumbles up the flow of time. So in order to fix this issue, Magatsu’s offspring (demonic boss monsters) have to be killed one at a time so as to slowly fix the timeline.

How one actually does this, and the effects it has on Towa and her friends, is where the meat of the story is.

Why Should I Care?

If you’ve played Hades, you already kind of know how this game works. You start a run, going through a sequence of constantly shuffling dungeons and rooms. Every time you clear a room, you get a reward of some kind (either currency, or power-ups relating to a certain element), and are then given a choice of different rooms to then travel to, each of which are signified by symbols that explain what comes next. You have only one life bar and no continues (unless you get the power-up that lets you resurrect with half your health), so when you die that’s it; you go back to the start to upgrade and modify your equipment with your gains and try again. During runs, you’ll occasionally come across store fronts where you can buy food (which will have power-up effects for a number of future rooms), or items (including power-ups you’d typically only find as rewards in the dungeons). You also have a hub area (which in this case in Shinju Village) where you’ll meet several reoccurring characters who have their own personal story arcs and their own relationships with you and the other townsfolk. These same townsfolk will also help you upgrade your equipment or craft new ones, while also offering new attacks and other add-ons (for a price, of course).

That’s pretty much where the similarities end, however. Outside of the differences involving the story and universe, there are also some different features. Unlike in Hades where you are a solitary adventurer who chooses a weapon and then goes, this game has every run happen in pairs: you choose one character among the eponymous Guardians (eight in total) to act as your primary attacker (the Tsurugi), and then another to act as your mage (or the Kagura, named after the staff they carry). Any character can take either of these roles, but they all come with their own strengths and attacks (they also only have two weapons–two swords and a staff). While the mage has to deal with recharging their spells by gathering mana gained from successful attacks, the attacker has to deal with their two swords, which have to be shuffled through after a certain number of hits due to the edge of the swords dulling with every attack (once depleted, the swords are only deal half damage). Furthermore, both swords have different attack styles: your primary long sword can do combo attacks, but the other typically does singular, area-wide hits.

Also unlike Hades, there is no one singular sequence of worlds that you traverse, but instead they change depending on the mission (again, you’re fighting different bosses depending on your mission, so it changes after every successful run). Later, Towa herself gets in on the action when Mugatsu’s influence attempts resurrect itself in places where it was already purified, but that gets into spoiler territory so I’ll stop there.

What Makes It Worth My Time And Money?

Look, I’ll be direct: the parts of the game that use Hades as a template? They’re incredibly solid because it’s still Hades. The game not only cribs the basic formula, it copies everything from destructible vases to find items, to the sequence of the giant raft on a river, and others… and it all still works like a dream. That gameplay cycle is as solid and addictive here as it is there. I’m not going to go so far and call this plagiarism (because that would be rude), but its obvious where they’re taking notes from.

But then you get to the original stuff, and that’s where it falters. Let’s start with a glaring one: the game sells itself as a ‘co-op’ experience, but this isn’t really true. The other player stuck with the Kagura Staff essentially only acts as a semi-mobile turret, who can only use their spells when supplied with enough mana, and since gaining mana is specifically dependent on the Tsurugi successfully attacking, they are essentially limited by how effective the Tsurugi is. This is made even harder because the Kagura bearer is tethered to the Tsurugi, so mobility is extremely limited.

Another major issue? That weapon degradation mechanic. As said previously, every attack degrades the swords, and once completely degraded, the weapon is only half effective unless you shuffle to your other sword (and vice versa). This can be extremely frustrating since, as both swords have their own attacking styles, one is essentially forced to shuffle between weapons at the most inopportune time. There are power-ups that can temporarily strengthen a weapon’s durability, but it’s only temporary to that particular run. Yes, you can also craft stronger weapons and even customize their looks… but its more of a chore than anything due to its multi-staged series of QTEs (so much so that the game basically includes an option to skip it entirely).

(That’s not even getting into late game issues with the difficultly being artificially ramped up through cheaper and cheaper enemies, but I think I’ve made my point.)

And then there’s the world of the game itself: it’s bright and pretty, don’t get me wrong, but the characters simply do not have the personality of its inspiration. They’re likable enough, and the universe is nice to look at, but they just aren’t nearly as engaging. There is the time element that’s unique to this game, but even that is a gimmick at best.

Sadly, although a technically accomplished game, Towa just cannot get out of its inspiration’s shadow. It’s enjoyable to a degree, but even when I was enjoying it I was thinking of Hades.

Let this game stand as a cautionary tale about wearing your influences on your sleeve a little too closely; There’s nothing wrong with taking inspiration from other games, but unless the original stuff can measure up, you’re really just a hollow copy at best.