Thank you Playdigious Originals for providing us with a review code!

Fretless - The Wrath of Riffson begins a year ago with a musician winning the battle of the bands and signing away his soul. He is then transformed into a beast and does his part in corrupting the once peaceful world. The game then fast-forwards to present day with the main character Rob wanting to enter the annual Battle of the Bands with the hopes of being signed on by Super Metal Records (SMR). The townsfolk are supportive of Rob’s efforts and wish him the best of luck. Though the shops are not available at the beginning of the game, you are able to buy healing potions and instrument mods soon enough.

Before Rob leaves his hometown he’ll get a quick tutorial of how the battle system works. In the beginning, Rob has an acoustic guitar but will be able to unlock a bass guitar, synthesizer, and an electric guitar. Each instrument can have up to sixteen riffs enabled. Most riffs allow multiple instances, but the more powerful ones do not. The riffs give you the ability to attack, generate a shield to absorb damage, and apply status ailments to your foe(s). Most riffs only target one enemy, but there are some that attack all of them at once.

In battle, you’ll have six riffs to choose from, and they’ll replenish with each round. During your turn you can play up to three riffs. When attacking or blocking, there’s a sweet spot that usually illuminates in yellow that will you allow to block or dish out a stronger attack if you can nail down the timing just right. If you’re not a fan of Quick Time Events, you can disable them in the menu options.

As you build up combos, your base attacks will become more powerful. There’s also a crescendo meter on the bottom, and when that reaches fifty, you can unleash a powerful attack that varies depending on which instrument you have equipped.

The acoustic guitar you start with sounds great. I thought that the electric guitar would be my favorite, but for moral reasons it wasn’t. Sadly, the riffs for the electric guitar typically work on a sacrifice system where you have to subtract health to gain shield or attack points. The electric guitar’s interface has a spinning pentacle/pentagram and has the ability to summon a demon-like monster to fight on your behalf. One of the mini-bosses hails from the dark side and has the ability to summon minions as well. Other moral issues worth noting are fantasy violence and minor language (d*mn).

The music is great in Fretless - The Wrath of Riffson. I love how each instrument changes the battle music. The bass riffs played by Davie504 were by far my favorite. On Steam, you can purchase the 24-track soundtrack for $5.99. Generic bleeps are heard in lieu of voice acting.

While I’m not usually a fan of pixel art, it adds character to this game. Some of the characters look blotchy at times, but the backgrounds are nicely detailed and look great. I honestly preferred the art style of the animated cut-scenes.

Fretless - The Wrath of Riffson is playable on the Steam Deck with the warning that some of the font may be hard to read. I did run into a couple of soft locks that required me to exit the game and go back into it. Thankfully, no progress was lost either time.

This title is highly rated on Steam, and I can see why with its witty humor, charm, and great music. Sadly, the evil undertones prevent me from whole-heartedly recommending it. The asking price is a reasonable $15 for close to ten hours of gameplay. There’s a demo available I you’re curious about it.