I Returned to Realm of Ink and It’s Still Amazing

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• DEVELOPER: Leap Studio
• PUBLISHER: 4Divinity
• PLATFORMS: PC 
• GENRE: Roguelite
• RELEASE DATE: December 15, 2025  
• STARTING PRICE: 16,49€ 
• REVIEWED VERSION: PC

The last time I played Realm of Ink was back in March this year, shortly after its second major content update. Since then, I hadn’t touched it even though the game received several updates. Now, in December, it has finally received the last biggest update yet, which brought me back to see what’s new. It has a very interesting backstory. Despite being pulled from Steam because of its publisher, the game returned to the store in March and resumed development without missing a beat, even appearing at Gamescom.

The game still offers that familiar Hades-like roguelite gameplay, sometimes a bit too close for comfort, but it’s set in ancient China with strong fantasy elements. Because the game has changed a lot since my initial Early Access review, I won’t be revisiting that perspective here. Instead, I’ll focus on what stood out to me this time around.

Mastering Every Hero and Pet Combination

Let’s start with the biggest negative: the language and localization. The text looks genuinely awful. Translation is all over the place, filled with strange dashes, awkward spacing, and errors that make it hard not only to read but to understand. As a result, the story often makes very little sense, and conversations between characters feel confusing and easily skippable.

Another notable issue is how clunky the game can feel at times, especially when it comes to controls. This might not apply to every character, but with some of them, dashing feels unreliable once you start chaining abilities. Even when I wasn’t pressing anything else, the game sometimes refused to dash, seemingly forcing you to wait for certain animations to finish before you can move again.

That’s pretty much it when it comes to major negatives. What really stood out positively is the sheer number of playable characters, each offering unique playstyles, weapons, and abilities. Many characters have distinct light and heavy attacks, exclusive perks, and unique skills, giving you a lot of room to experiment. Unlocking them also isn’t difficult. Compared to Hades II, which I personally found a bit too grindy and repetitive at times, Realm of Ink feels noticeably more forgiving. It also offers multiple difficulty options, which you unlock progressively after beating the previous one.

I also really liked the depth of builds and unlockables. Between perks, gems, elixirs, and pets, there’s an impressive amount of variety, and it’s easy to lose yourself experimenting, but in a good way. You might focus on poison builds in one run, fire damage in another, or go all-in on critical hits. These builds are further enhanced by active and passive bonuses that improve damage modifiers, crit damage, light attack power, and more. Pets deserve special mention as well. You unlock them by combining gems, and each pet comes with a unique ultimate ability that can either deal damage or assist you during combat.

Boss Battles are the Heart of Realm of Ink

The gem system is quite unique, giving you two active abilities that go on cooldown once used. Realm of Ink is largely built around these abilities, as they form the core of your build and provide multiple bonuses at once. How you combine them with everything else is extremely important.

For example, one gem can spawn a protective shield around you, while another increases the percentage chance of finding epic and legendary perks and bonuses, among many other effects. The game is very stat-heavy, and once you understand what to prioritize and upgrade, you can become nearly unkillable and easily destroy everything in your path.

Enemy variety can feel repetitive at times, but each chapter introduces new areas, enemies and mini-bosses. The real standout, however, is the boss design. Each boss feels unique, complete with short bits of dialogue and distinct attack patterns you need to learn in order to defeat them efficiently. There are multiple bosses per chapter, and they become progressively tougher. There’s also a final boss encounter, which I won’t spoil, but it’s genuinely challenging and will put your skills to the test.

Even when you die, getting back into the action is quick, and progression feels fast and rewarding. The main hub offers plenty to do: upgrading your character, strengthening your pet, unlocking new heroes, or testing your damage against a training dummy. Overall, Realm of Ink feels like a very well-rounded game that doesn’t suffer from any major bugs or technical issues.

Must-Play for Roguelite Fans

At its core, this is a classic roguelite wrapped in beautiful visuals and fluid animations. While the sound effects and audio occasionally stuttered, it didn’t have a noticeable impact on gameplay. Visually, the game shines, using variety of inked colors that complement its ancient Chinese-inspired world, paired nicely with fitting music.

If you’re a fan of Hades or similar games, you’ll feel right at home with Realm of Ink. There’s a substantial amount of content here – expect around 10 to 15 hours before unlocking most things. While repetition is inevitable in roguelites, the variety of builds, characters, and challenges makes this a game worth returning to from time to time.

Review copy provided by the publisher