Ship of Fools

by Aethyna Dec 25, 2022 | 1 Votes | 70 Played | 0 Reviews

9 rate

Genres:

Action

Graphics:

Labels:

Co-op , Dark Fantasy , Roguelike/roguelite

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Team 17 Ship of Fools is a hectic co-op roguelite set in a world shrouded in a perpetual, mysterious, and very much dangerous storm. In this game, you, along with your buddy, will navigate the seas on a ship, battling various sea creatures along the way, in hopes of finally discovering the source of the storm and banishing it! Play Now Similar Games

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Summary Plotline Gameplay Community Graphics/ Sound Conclusion

Summary

Ship of Fools is a hectic co-op roguelite set in a world shrouded in a perpetual, mysterious, and very much dangerous storm. In this game, you, along with your buddy, will navigate the seas on a ship, battling various sea creatures along the way, in hopes of finally discovering the source of the storm and banishing it!

Plotline

Ages ago, a light entity was captured by sea warriors and placed it atop the Great Lighthouse to illuminate the waters of the Archipelago, banishing the surrounding darkness and the monstrous sea creatures that come with it, making safe sea travel possible again. However, over time, the strength of the light waned and the darkness reared its ugly head again!

Shipwrecked at the lighthouse with no memory of who you are or why you are there (and therefore, dubbed as a “fool” by the locals), this burden of pushing back the darkness now falls upon you. With help from the locals, will you be able to save yourself and the people of the Archipelago?

Gameplay

To start playing, you’ll need to choose a character first and go through the game’s tutorial where you’ll learn the game’s basics, including how to “bounce” a projectile back at the enemy, how to fix your ship, and how to use the cannon to defend your ship. In the beginning, you’ll only have access to two characters, namely Hink and Todd, but as you progress, you’ll eventually be able to unlock other characters.

Each character comes with a unique perk via their respective Heirloom item. For instance, Todd has the “Humble Hood” which grants him a greater and swifter paddle attack combo, making him a more formidable melee attacker, while Hink has the “Scar of Past Glory” instead, which allows her to deal splash damage and effects on every critical hit. Due to this, each character fits a specific playstyle so you’d do well to choose the one that’s best for you.

As the game is a roguelite, you’ll be expected to embark on multiple journeys across the sea in an attempt to reach the final boss of the map, defeat it, and move on to the next one until you reach the very end – the eye of the storm. The map you’ll be navigating on here is designed to look like a hex-grid board game and you can move your ship to the three adjacent grids forwards or diagonally sideways, and not backward.

Some of the hex grids on the map are also marked to clue you in as to what it may contain. For instance, a Harpoon sign would guarantee a bunch of Harpoons as loot while a Wind icon indicates that your ship will be blown past that tile to a random neighboring tile. There’s no legend to tell you what the icons meant and it’s all about trial and error here, though, for some, the icons shown are pretty self-explanatory. There are also events that you’ll encounter, as well as other NPCs along the way, such as vendors.

The map itself will gradually be covered by the storm as it moves slowly toward the left. Make sure you only head into the storm – try to avoid it as much as possible - once you’re confident that you are ready or have nowhere else to go that’s not covered by the storm.

As you might have expected, a large part of the gameplay in Ship of Fools involves fighting off a variety of enemies, mostly sea creatures, that will swarm your ship. Combat in this game is as hectic as any other co-op game. You and your shipmate are expected to work together to man the guns, reload their ammo, and manually fight off any creatures that may have latched onto the side of your ship or have landed on the decks. As pointed out before, you can even bounce enemies’ projectiles back at them. Sometimes, there are “traps” that you’ll have to dodge too, such as the totems that will shoot out lasers periodically that will stun your character if he/she’s in the way.

Depending on which map grid you’re on during the fight, you may or may not get a reward chest. Only grids with a reward as indicated by its icon will give you a reward chest containing the said reward, whether it is more sand dollars (in-game currency), harpoons (or reeling distant items in), shields (up to eight of them), and planks (for fixing any broken patches on the ship’s decks; essentially these are health potions for your ship).

One of the more coveted rewards, however, is the Tendrils. These are crucial upgrade materials that you’ll need to make any sort of overall progression – note again that the game’s a roguelite. You see, as you play, you’ll encounter various NPCs whom you can rescue, such as Rust the Blacksmith. They will then set up shop, so to speak, on the lighthouse island you’ll always return to if your ship sinks (game over).

These NPCs offer plenty of vital upgrades, from weaponry to ship, to even your starting resources for a run, like sand dollars, in exchange for Tendrils. Thankfully, you can also get them if you die as a run reward. The amount depends on factors like how many items you got and how many enemies you’ve defeated. Ultimately, the goal here is to restore the Lighthouse back to its former glory. This means rescuing all the inhabitants and repopulating the island.

Besides tendrils, the artifacts and trinkets are important rewards that grant useful bonuses for either your ship or your character for that particular run. For artifacts, it is an item that you can place on a circular pedestal in the middle of your ship to get the bonus it grants, such as more ship HP. Removing the artifact from the pedestal would mean that you’ll lose whatever benefits it provides.

Trinkets, on the other hand, are items that you can equip on a character, which wouldn’t be much of an issue if you’re laying solo. Playing the game with a friend, however, will mean that both of you will have to decide and collectively agree who the trinket should go to. Of course, if you ask me, I’d say it all depends on the role of the player on the ship. After all, you’d want the player who is, for the most part, manning the guns, to get a trinket that can boost projectile damage like the Old Pirate Hook or add a Fire effect to projectiles like the Fire Chili, just so he/she could play their role better.

Now, despite being mainly a co-op game, Ship of Fools can be played entirely in single-player, thanks to the game’s auto-turret, which replaces the “player number 2” on your ship. The auto-turret isn’t better than having an actual, somewhat competent player by your side since its fire rate is incredibly slow and you’ll still have to reload its ammo periodically yourself, but it’s definitely better than nothing.

However, as fun as the game is, many players have noted that the game is surprisingly short and for some, very easy. Someone took just three solo runs to defeat the game. Currently, the game doesn’t offer much replayablity as it doesn’t have an endless mode or an End Game+ difficulty mode to challenge players to play the game some more. Unlocking additional characters and items isn’t alluring enough for players who have already defeated the final boss to come back to the game and play. This is definitely something the developers would want to look into, especially considering how well other co-op games are doing when it comes to replayablity.

Community

As a co-op game, Ship of Fools is designed to be played by two players, although, as aforementioned, you can play the game entirely in solo mode if you want to. The game supports both Steam Remote Play and local co-op so you can actually rope in your friends who don’t own the game to play it with you.

Graphics/ Sound

The game features some amazingly dreary graphics that use the kind of art style which may bring to mind games like Don’t Starve. In terms of sound, the game has music that fits really well with its theme. The sound effects are really well-done too, helping to clearly indicate important events that are going on on-screen that you may have missed because you’re busy chasing after slugs on your ship or reloading your cannon.

Conclusion

All in all, Ship of Fools is a fun and hectic co-op roguelite that offers a challenging, teamwork-oriented gameplay with a host of interesting characters to play as and many upgrades to pursue. However, as entertaining as the game is, it simply lacks the kind of longevity that defines iconic co-op roguelites like Children of Morta or popular co-op games in general, like Overcooked. So, we can definitely recommend checking out the game if you’re a huge fan of co-op roguelites, but know that as you might just get a couple of hours of playtime out of it, you might want to wait a bit for a steeper discount for the game to justify the cost.