Crymelight Review: A Poker Hand Dealt in a Very Dark Wonderland

FuRyu's CRY series has always been a strange pitch: sad anime girls, violent action, and a lot of crying as a game mechanic. Crystar and Crymachina were interesting but padded JRPGs. Crymelight, out November 5 on PS5, Switch 2 and PC (Steam), co-developed with Winning Entertainment Group, finally trims the fat - it's an action roguelite, and that format suits the series far better than I expected.

The setup

Wonderland here is not a children's book. It's a prison for the souls of the dead. You play Alice, a girl with no memories, who teams up with the mysterious Mary to bring down the Queen and earn her freedom. Every soul you beat hands you its sins, and with them, flashes of a painful past. Between runs you sit down for tea parties with the other girls, and that's where the writing does its real work - messy, uncomfortable, sometimes genuinely moving.

How it plays

The hook is the poker system. Skill cards drop during a run, and holding five of them forms a poker hand - a pair, a straight, a flush - which upgrades the effects. It sounds like a gimmick and it's the opposite: I spent more time thinking about whether to chase a flush or bank a safe two-pair than about any dodge timing. Kill enemies and the Wonder Dimension spreads across the arena, buffing you and speeding everything up, so aggression is rewarded.

The Repentance system turns collected sins into power-ups, and upgrade materials carry over, so even failed runs push your weapons and accessories forward. I also like that you can switch between a close side-on camera and a wide overhead view, and hide the UI entirely. Small thing, big quality-of-life win.

Where it falls short

Enemy variety thins out fast, and the middle stretch of the 20-30 hour campaign leans on the same arenas more than it should. Combat feel is good, not Hades-good - hits lack a bit of weight. And the tone is relentless: if you're not in the mood for grief, guilt and trauma, the tea parties become something you skip rather than savour.

Price and availability

The standard edition was announced at $19.99, which is fair for this much content. Note for players in our region: text is only in English, Japanese, Chinese and Korean, with Japanese voices only - no German, no Croatian. If your English is shaky, the story, which is half the reason to play, will be a slog.

Verdict

Crymelight is the best CRY game so far, simply because the roguelite structure keeps the series' worst habits in check. The poker builds are genuinely clever and the writing hits harder than most anime action games bother to. It repeats itself, and it is not a Hades killer, but at this price it's an easy recommendation for fans of dark anime stories and build-crafting roguelites.

Score: 7/10

Image: John Tenniel / Public domain, source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Alice_par_John_Tenniel_25.png