Noir Lords

Given the amount of positive reviews, maybe it's just me. The game is fun and I did enjoy it. However, it gets boring very quickly. You can see how many hours I have on the game and I completed the game and even leveled several cards to 3. Here are the things I didn't like about the game. 1) It is extremely easy, On my first playthrough I made it to stage three, the only reason I lost three times on stage 3 was because I started a game not realizing my team was incomplete because I either had some people in the ward that I forgot to revive or I leveled up a character. For some reason whenever you level up a character it automatically removed that character from your team, so you need to re-add them. Adding a card to your team is a bit tedious when you have many cards since there is no way to search or filter and the cards aren't sorted in any particular way. When you start a match, the game makes it difficult to quickly verify if your team is complete because rather than just showing the cards that are in the selected deck, it show all of the available cards with the cards in the deck highlighted. Plus, the highlighted cards are not at the top of the list, they are randomly scattered across the list, so you need to scroll across all of your cards to confirm. Because of this, I generally just confirm and trust my team is complete. 2) The gameplay loop is very repetitive. There is no variation in between runs. 3) All cards are very similar. The cards don't have enough interesting mechanics and interactions. 4) The enemies are all very similar. It would have been great if every fight in the story mode felt like a unique interaction, but they are literally all just a random mix of the same few enemies. Even the text at the start of each match is just randomly generated.

I had a blast playing this game. It offers a solid amount of strategic depth, with plenty of different approaches to experiment with. Some Agents do feel a bit overpowered, but honestly, I think that actually adds to the fun. In single-player games, having a few OP abilities or characters can make the experience even more enjoyable. The Sabotage mode was also a great addition. I ended up spending a surprising amount of time playing it. The boss fights, in particular, were engaging and very well designed. Compared to them, though, some of the regular encounters felt a little too simple and ordinary at times. Also, as a cat person, I loved the use of cats throughout the game. Overall, I’d give it a 7.5/10.

Look, do you like cats? If the answer is yes, then honestly, for the price, rest of this review shouldn't matter much. But for those who are lukewarm about cats (I refuse to believe there are people who simply don't like them), I'll still write a more detailed review. The noir aesthetic is the first thing that hooks you. The art style is moody and stylized in a way that gives the whole thing a real personality. It doesn't look like a AAA game obviously, but it has a vibe, and that vibe is consistent throughout. Rainy city streets, shadowy characters, the whole thing. Reminds me a bit of an old pulp detective paperback but turned into a card game, which is not a comparison I thought I'd be making but here we are. Gameplay-wise it's snappy. Like, genuinely fast. Matches can wrap up in under 5 minutes which sounds almost too short but it actually works really well? You're never really sitting there waiting for things to happen. The card mechanics themselves — attacking, blocking, poisoning, fortifying — aren't overly complex but there's enough there to make you feel like your decisions matter. I've definitely had moments where I played something stupid and immediately regretted it, which means the game has actual stakes. The campaign has a story running through it and it sets the tone well even if it's not the most elaborate narrative you've ever seen. Doesn't need to be. It gives you enough reason to care about where you're going. Now look, it IS Early Access. Content is a bit thin right now and you'll probably see most of what the game has to offer relatively quickly. There are clearly things still being built out — more cards, more game modes, more story. So if you need a complete 40-hour experience right now, this is not that nor should it be considering the price. But if you enjoy watching something grow and want to get in early on something that has a clear identity and a developer who seems genuinely engaged with the community, it's worth it. This is a passion project and it shows, in the good way. Looking forward to seeing where it goes. Also, did I mention cats?