Introduction

Netherworld Covenant by developer MadGoat Game Studio wasn’t known to me honestly till we got a review copy here at SunsetNerdVerse. When I read it was a roguelike my thoughts were…here’s another game slapped with that genre to end 2025. I don’t dislike the genre but I’ve made mention of this in other roguelike reviews that this particular type of game seems to be oversaturating the gaming landscape and that isn’t a good thing. However, I always want to give a developer studio the benefit of the doubt and see if they can change the formula up a bit! Is Netherworld Covenant the new roguelike to take a chance on or will this be the moment you become jaded to all roguelikes? I’m about to find out in my review of Netherworld Covenant for the PC!

Gameplay

Ever play a pretty known game titled Hades? Well folks, Netherworld Covenant is Hades more or less, but I do have to say there are some aspects here that are good ideas and keep Netherworld Covenant from being just a slapped-together Hades clone.

Players take on the role of a soldier who was on death’s doorstep but was given a second chance. Taken to a strange world between life and death, a skull knight—Berserk anyone—tasks you with slaughtering evil soldiers that linger in the world and saving your fallen comrades from a possible doomed fate. In order to do this, you’ll need to arm yourself and equip a ghost power to survive.

First, the gameplay itself is very much like Hades. You have a single attack button that can be held down for amplified damage. There’s a dodge/perfect dodge ability that allows for increased damage or dizzying an enemy if done correctly. You can also use healing items—think the original Dark Souls where you had to stand still to drink a flask—but that’s not what makes Netherworld Covenant interesting. Where Netherworld Covenant shined for me is the ghost abilities. Per your in-game contract, your once-fallen knight can use ghost abilities that give you some incredible powers. The first one is the ability to use a ghost bow to shoot shots that can disrupt an enemy or hit them from afar. You can also create a giant sword that swirls in mid-air but also creates a ghost-like image of yourself that you can teleport back to. There’s even more ghost powers to unlock as you play but these are important as they pair with your chosen class.

Netherworld Covenant offers several classes at the onset and several more that can be unlocked via currency you gain while playing. The knight is your starting class and it’s more or less the simplest and most boring class that I swapped out almost immediately. The other classes range from mages—shoot magic from afar—hunter—shoot arrows from afar—or my favorite, the berserker which is slow but does some damage and tanks. I loved putting ghost powers like the arrow and sword on the berserker just to have ranged abilities in combat and a means of escaping a bad situation.

The brunt of Netherworld Covenant plays like this. You choose a class, start a run, choose a starting perk—they can range from giving you a shield upon hit or stats that could hurt enemies—and then enter into the battlefield. Like Hades, you kill enemies in a room, get some relic—more on those soon—and choose a path to go. The paths range from rooms with possible relic enhancements to gold or health rooms. Again, I don’t want to keep saying another game’s name in my review of Netherworld Covenant but it’s hard not to when there’s an obvious level of reliance on that game’s mechanics.

Bosses themselves are…chaotic in Netherworld Covenant. Some are really cool and offer a fair level of challenge on normal difficulty. However, most can be either overly easy or so annoying you’ll curse your class choice. Take the hunter versus a melee-focused boss. You will have the advantage as you can stay far away despite their powers. Yet, a hunter versus a mage means range versus range. Yes, your ghost powers can come to your aid here but ghost powers can’t be spammed. I often lost runs when I chose any class other than the berserker. I mean in a way this isn’t a bad system but Netherworld Covenant can feel often unbalanced and sometimes downright unfair. Looking at you, enemies that can hit me from across the map and I can’t see you!

The reality is, Netherworld Covenant feels almost too much like Hades, and while I loved Hades and think it’s an incredible game…I don’t want every roguelike to be Hades. Netherworld Covenant tries to have this feeling of Dark Souls with its themes—like how you return to a camp when you die and meet NPCs there and level up as well—but while playing all I could say was…wow this is Hades minus the cool art style and hell theme.

Where Netherworld Covenant isn’t like Hades—and this isn’t a good thing—is the in-game explanations of relics and abilities. There are a lot of various status effects and abilities in Netherworld Covenant but they take a lot of guessing to understand how they work. Stats like DOOM should mean death but instead means an enemy will take a small amount of damage after time passes. Relics too start to add things like ice shields or fire shields and you wonder does that mean they are weaker to the opposing element? Kind of, but never to the point it will make or break a run. Add to this the laundry list of NPCs where you can upgrade skill trees and unlock new armor and you’ll wonder why Netherworld Covenant didn’t spend just a tad more time explaining all that you will do here.

Graphics

I’m honestly mixed with how I feel about the visuals in Netherworld Covenant. The gothic-medieval vibe always strikes my personal fancy but even I have to admit, Netherworld Covenant isn’t much to look at. The visuals often feel copied from location to location. Every time I stepped through a portal I was disappointed that I just ended up in yet another decrepit battlefield or spooky castle-like dungeon. There are some decent visuals like the ghost powers and various classes but rarely does anything change in Netherworld Covenant. The opening too at first glance looked AI and then after some reading I discovered the developers did say it was done with AI. Am I 100% against use of AI? Not for minor things, but an entire opening cinematic is a bit…upsetting.

Sound

Surprisingly, while there’s little voice work in Netherworld Covenant, the music does a good job of getting you into the battle and chaos. I actually pumped my volume up during some of the boss battles as they just made the fight feel more grandiose than it was. I doubt Netherworld Covenant’s OST will ever reach well-known levels but I can say for a small indie title, it does a great job of matching the feel on screen. Mellow when it needs to be, haunting when you’re just walking from section to section, and hardcore when the battles amp up…that is what I want in a game like Netherworld Covenant.

Story

There’s a story here in Netherworld Covenant but honestly, it gets lost in the gameplay. I won’t say it’s a bad story, just I feel personally it was put in the back of the gameplay premise and only ever shows up at critical moments like boss fights and/or when you talk to characters in the base camp. Nothing narrative in Netherworld Covenant pushed me to want to avenge my fallen comrades or even care about saving their souls. I just wanted to grab my next class and dive back into the next run.

Overall Impression

Honestly, Netherworld Covenant isn’t a bad game by any means. I enjoyed the simple action combat and loved the various classes you could utilize. The ghost powers too were fun to experiment with and see how they can almost make hybrid classes ideal for any situation the game throws at you. Still, Netherworld Covenant doesn’t reinvent the wheel here and many of the gameplay mechanics it uses can be seen in games like Hades. Yes, the game works and is fun but I would have liked a bit more attempts at reinventing the genre.

Conclusion

Netherworld Covenant is a fun game, that much I can’t deny. Yes, it is very much like Hades and it has some issues in almost every department but I enjoyed my time playing this roguelike. I think if Netherworld Covenant took some risks in gameplay and didn’t try so hard to be the next Hades…maybe this indie title would have had something going for it. Still, for the low price and for the amount of content, Netherworld Covenant is a decent game that I can recommend to those who really love roguelikes.

—Aaron