I am the terror that stabs in the night! I am the hero that puts the action in your RPGs! I... am Scarlet Stranger!... well, okay, not me, really. But that's the hero of this stylish little title from Armor Games and Antony Lavalle, and I figure if you ever miss out on a chance to make even a passing reference to Darkwing Duck, you're doing society a disservice. Take up your sword and shield and dashing ensemble to strut boldly into Castle Chameleon, a sinister place own by the sinister-er (IS TOO A WORD) Count Thrashwoode, and dare to combat not just the monsters within but the ever-changing walls of the castle itself.
Use the [arrow] keys to move and the [X] and [Z] buttons to use your sword and shield respectively. Your goal, ultimately, is to rescue the mandatory princess and not die, but when the castle changes shape around you periodically, that's easier said than done. Your health is kept track of in the upper-right corner, Zelda-style, with a series of hearts. As you adventure, you'll discover treasure that you can sell for new equipment, or even crafting supplies to make your own. Just keep your eye on the timer at the bottom.
While the movement might take some getting used to, Scarlet Stranger really is an absolutely gorgeous little storybook adventure of a game, with the design by Super Flash Bros shining particularly bright here. Character and monster artwork is top-notch, lending to the surreal fairytale set-up, and is just plain adorable besides. Additionally, if you're old and decrepit like me and were weaned on the very first few Zelda games, you'll appreciate the way the gameplay is simplified in that traditional top-down action manner, complete with hidden items, magic switches, and... lumber gathering. The downside is that it does feel perhaps a little too simplistic, especially considering the grinding that comes into play later on. Still, with its flamboyant style and classic gameplay, Scarlet Stranger is definitely work picking up and paying a visit to Castle Chameleon with. After all, when's the last time you can say you saved a princess while battling octo-giraffes? (Thanks a lot, nightmare fuel.)
I played this game. It was buggy. It kept crashing.
I did manage to save her, but then the game crashed!
[I'm sorry you had that problem. I didn't have any issues with bugs OR crashes. - Dora]
Posting here, since your website doesn't seem to have a contact/support link:
Are you aware of the extra-annoying Playfirst popup which obscures the website proper with a "we don't accept more affiliates" nonsense?
It has become more and more frequent, to the point that the only way to see the JayIsGames homepage is stopping it mid-loading. Help me spell "untolerable"!!!
Don't worry about SOPA... Playfirst is killing your visits well enough by itself.
This website is one of my favourite and I hate having to move elsewhere for my casual gaming... but you are really forcing me to.
[Hi Tracian! I'm sorry to hear about your problem. It's not one I've encountered myself, so I'm wondering if it's some sort of weird targeted advertisement? I'll make sure Jay has a look at this... we hate those ads too. PS: In the future, if you need to get a hold of us, out contact page is here: https://jayisgames.com/support/contact/ By the way, if you register for a free account with us, you do see a drastically reduced number of ads. (Plus, you don't have to wait for your comments to be approved.) Maybe that will help? -Dora]
[I will contact my ad provider to have that particular ad banned. I apologize if it's intolerable for you. Please do consider creating an account, and make sure you have at least 1 favorite saved. Those things can help reduce the number of ads you see on the site. I'm also working on a solution for JIG community members to enjoy an ad-free experience in return for your continued support of what we do here. -Jay]
On the downside, the jumping puzzles and mechanic in general were quite annoying.
On the upside, as shown in the screenshot there is a Giraffe crossed with an Octopus (or is it a tentacled pony?). Monstrous!
Really easy, but fun and cute game.
Not so cute that the game screen blacked out and the timer kept rolling when I tried to leave the final room after. And even when the timer ran out, the screen just flashed white and showed 00:00 at the bottom. And restarting started me at a new dungeon.
I beat the game with the cursed ring but nothing happens...
i guess i shouldnt have
sold the cursed ring
i beat the prince guy and now its froze
Hrm... okay, so I beat the boss and the princess followed me out of the throne room, but I still got the ending that she's trapped forever?...
Hrm. Great concept. Peppy music.
I'm quite excited to sink my teeth into this title.
Bug:
Apparently, if you can jump on top of a locked door, you can get past it into the next room...
But you can't then get back out. Moving into the previous room spawns you inside of the locked door.
And the cloud saves your exact position in the dungeon (instead of spawning you at the entrance as some... entries of a dungeon/puzzle genre building franchise had previously made convention).
So should you jump past a locked door, you're stuck there until the next layout change, or perhaps longer.
Hooray.
Bug warnings ought to be non-spoilered tagged... I jumped on a locked block and got stuck too...
I can't disable the music, I'm trying to play this while listening to a movie but when I click on off, the volume goes down for a second and comes right back. Very annoying.
This game is a bug-ridden piece of junk.
Very cute game, but a lot of bugs.
When you move to a new castle, symbols on the old maps (the keys and questions marks) don't always disappear, so you get a new map with both new (correct) and old (incorrect) symbols.
It's quite possible to put yourself in an unfinishable situation, where you don't have the key needed to get the next key. This may be an intended consequence of random (and re-generatable) castles, but it's annoying.
When I finally beat the game with the necessary item, the Princess gave me the "my cage dissolves, get us out of here!" speech... and then when I left the room, I got the "You left the princess behind" ending.
Using Chrome on a Mac, there is no way to turn off the audio - when you click the 'off' button on the Pause screen, it just fades for a second, then comes back. I generally prefer to have other music in the background, so this is pretty annoying - particularly as I was enjoying it until I realised! I tried it in Firefox and the same thing happened.
I'm using safari on a mac, and I can't even play it. It gets to the title screen, and just stays there. No play button or anything. I would try another browser, but unfortunately I'm using a school computer and am forced to just use safari. I'm sure it's a great game though.
Good game, but agree with the bugs.
Some of the ? marks in the room do not go away even if you get the chest.
Also there was one random chest on the outer wall that I could not get to. I still was able to complete the game, but was not able to enter all the rooms.
If you are standing on a spot where a chest spawns after you kill the enemies in a room, you will get stuck outside of the room.
Lastly, the ending blackout. With the cursed ring I can release the princess, but when I leave the room, the screen turns black and the timer runs downs.
Bahh got to the prince, died, blacked out and reset on me - is this intended ?
I really enjoyed this game but have experienced similar bugs to the above - mine just went to a black screen when I left the princess to find the ring. It had a countdown to resetting the dungeon, but nothing happened on hitting 0.
Sad really as I was looking forward to doing a bit more, though the puzzles etc could do with being more interesting and difficult. The entrance area had the hardest puzzle...
I want to like this game. I really do. It's actually pretty rare to have such a fun dungeon crawler that feels so much like the original Legend of Zelda. But, bugs. BUGS! SO MANY BUGS! The buuugssssssss...
Right. One I noticed, if a chest spawns under you (I know it sounds like it wouldn't happen often, but it's happened to me several times already) or if you accidentally jump onto one from above, you can either get stuck on top of it, unable to jump off, or suddenly teleported to the bottom edge of the screen, PAST the wall, unable to cross back over. Oddly enough, when this happened to me, there was leather sitting around down there that I picked up. (0_o)
how do you defeat the boss if he cannot be harmed by weapons?
Actually, i didn't find ANY bugs completely perfect game :)
Got into the final boss fight with a few rooms left unexplored. Couldn't beat the boss, figured I needed something from one of the unexplored rooms, but then couldn't leave the final battle room to re-enter the castle. Not sure if this is a bug or an intended consequence, but it was frustrating. Otherwise, a fun if simple game with cool artwork.
Played through game, got cursed ring, left with princess, and...
black screen with timer counting down to zero. Very disappointing.
anonymous: to defeat the boss, you have to
harm him with his own weapon. That is,
deflect his energy ball with your shield and hit it back to him with your sword. Repeat until he croaks.
Great review Dora, and your Zelda comparison is more apt than I first thought! Not only there is a Zelda sound effect hidden in the game, but it's also possible to unlock several unused Zelda-like dungeon items normally not available in the game, like a map and compass.
Originally the game was supposed to start the player without the map, and the chests/keys were also not supposed to be visible, hence these two items. There was also an inventory limit, which would've been extended by an item pouch upgrade.
The map bug reported above can be fixed by a cheat that freezes the timer (so the map will stay the same). I've also made an item conversion hack, along with infinite money/hp cheats, all of which are available here.
I must concur, a great game broken by SOOO MANY BUGS.
The first time I played,
I had crafted the cursed ring, but forgot to equip it...
so I got the bad ending.
I played through again to get the good ending, and after beating the boss
the princess' cage opened, and the countdown began. We headed to the exit, and the screen faded to black... then nothing. The countdown kept going, but when it hit 00:00 nothing happened.
I want to see the good ending, but it's not worth it at this point.
Update