This weekend I’m going to spend as much time as possible playing Next Fest demos, and the first one on my list (for no particular reason) is The Spirit Lift, a new deckbuilder with a light horror theme and loads of ’90s inspired nostalgia.
The Spirit Lift is the work of prettysmart games, and in some respects it’s a fairly traditional roguelike deckbuilder, however, after playing the demo a couple of times through, I’ve come away eager to see more of the game when it’s finally time to check it out properly.
The setup for the game is really simple. Three students wander off during an event, and find themselves in a haunted elevator that takes them through a mega weird hotel full of monsters. Meeting said monsters initiates a battle, where you must play cards to take health from your enemies while protecting yourself as best you can.
I think the thing I like the most is the ’90s style and the affection that has been poured into the nostalgic designs. Your deck is made up of the cards held by specific tropey characters. So you can enrol as the football jock, the book nerd, and the sporty girl, for example, and your cards will reflect those characters.
With new characters unlocking as you play, you’re able to evolve your deck between runs. Furthermore, not only can you shape your deck during the prep phase, but you can find new cards and trinkets as you explore the many rooms of the hotel, further expanding your tactical options.
When you discover a hideous monster, it’s time to jump into a card-based battle. Each character brings his or her own advantages to bear, but you only have a shared pool of action points to spend on playing cards. Once you’ve spent your points on actions, then it is your enemy’s turn to have a pop, and any damage comes off a shared health bar.
The card playing is fairly straight forward and I found my feet within minutes. The navigation is also super simple, with WASD controls or by simply clicking on-screen direction buttons. In fact, the square-by-square movement evokes old-school adventuring, which is then reinforced by the retro vibes from the setting. All of which is to say that this is accessible and simple to get into.
All told, I’ve enjoyed the demo and I’ve just stuck The Spirit Lift on my Steam wishlist. I’m not sure when it’s going to release, but I’ll be keeping an eye out for future updates, and given that this is the final iteration of the demo, it can’t be too much longer before we hear something about this strange hotel’s grand opening.
