The Haunted Hoard: The Count Lucanor (PC)
It’s hard to blame Hansel for running away from home on his tenth birthday. A life of poverty where the food is running short, a father who went to fight in a war and never returned home, and no prospects beyond subsistence, his childish storming off might be his only hope, or at least serve as a lesson about how rough his medieval world might be to a brazen and naive young boy. However, while this may sound like the start of a fairy tale about a youth being humbled or honed by the dangers of the world, this tale takes a dark turn as the castle of Count Lucanor promises him the shift in fortune he seeks while exposing him to horrors the likes of which he’s never seen before.
The Count Lucanor is a puzzle heavy survival horror game, but your trip to Tenebre Castle first sows some interesting seeds. Hansel’s mother sends him off with what little resources can be scrounged up, and much like in a fable, his morality is tested as he comes across a few people along the road who all need the very things meant to help him thrive in the world. These encounters are not so simple as doing the right thing, Hansel needing a good eye for who should be helped, and when you arrive at the castle later, you’ll see your choices pay off in interesting ways. The castle of Count Lucanor has a certain gravity to it that pulls in the people you met along the road, the story of the count looking to find a successor to inherit his riches drawing in the greedy and the doubtful alike. You don’t get to meet the count immediately though, instead his blue kobold servant introducing the trial you must overcome to meet the count. You must learn the kobold’s name, rooms around the castle containing letter clues while also being filled with traps and the dangerous servants of Lucanor who will impede your efforts. Depending on who you assisted before you might be helped or hindered by a merchant, a shepherd, or an old lady and her strange son who acts like a pig, but whatever route you take will also have a wannabe treasure hunter Giulia there with more trustworthy advice and tips to help you survive the castle of horrors.
The Count Lucanor probably won’t take you more than four hours to complete so even the minor members of the cast become familiar, especially since many hang around the fountain in the courtyard where you save your progress. However, it is the only place of safety in the castle, the dark halls soon stalked by masked servants. Hansel is a bit of a slow walker and has no means of self defense, often needing to instead hide behind curtains or under tables to avoid detection. The servants aren’t overly dangerous, you can run away if they spot you, but they do have a nasty trick where their magic pulls you in closer before they can reveal their gnarly enormous tongue they try to lash you with. The pull lets them remain a potent threat no matter where they’re encountered without being overbearing, and Hansel has a health bar that can survive a hit and even be refilled with food you find as you explore.
However, the Red Camerlengo is a more potent variation that carries with him a greater aura of fear. Not only will he instantly kill you should he get his hands on you, but he patrols areas you need to go more intelligently and takes great delight in taunting you as he does so. The Count Lucanor’s pixel art mostly keeps what you see around the castle limited in how terrifying it can appear, but text boxes with character portraits or rare moments of very detailed cutscenes can help bridge the gap a bit, the Camerlengo in particular looking unhinged to bring home his intimidating upgrades to the standard servants.
While you can’t fight back against the servants or rare other monsters you encounter, Hansel does have a tool to help avoid them: candles. Candlesticks are a fairly common treasure and you can place one on the ground almost whenever you wish, lighting up the usually dark halls and rooms of the castle so you can see danger coming. The candles won’t fade and can be picked back up if you like, but it gives a bit of player control to how you explore, the candles wise to use cautiously but being too careful might mean you run into trouble, especially if more than one servant spots you at a time. It’s technically a simple bit of interaction but one where you do try to be careful and clever to avoid wasting the resource, and since Hansel can carry one in hand as a mobile light source, you can press on through darkness and try your luck if you feel that the wiser approach.
The different rooms of the castle containing letter clues to the kobold’s name are fairly varied and often have some puzzle or navigation challenge to overcome. The concepts can range a fair bit in complexity, one room having you have to time your running so you can pass over fire traps without being scorched while another is a pretty simple puzzle of pushing boxes to the right spots so you can slip by. Rooms that get more creative or throw in some patrolling servants are usually the more interesting ones. Some optional treasures or elements used to see the alternate endings do require exploring rooms a bit more deeply and using items in more effective ways, but most puzzles aren’t too complicated because you’re either only able to do so many things in a room or given more apparent clues on what to try. The variety still makes the process of learning the kobold’s name engaging as you don’t know what danger will be behind a door and sometimes need to mix figuring out a little trick with avoiding something dangerous.
Near the end survival does get more difficult and it does take more cleverness to avoid danger, but you’re never pushed to think too hard or forced to face a fiend in something closer to a scuffle. Some secrets do require a sharper eye to uncover and the various endings can all provide an appropriate payoff to how you approach them, The Count Lucanor able to have some tense or cryptic elements but still remain fairly easy to play while not denying you much for not noticing alternate paths or special interactions.
THE VERDICT: A simple horror fairy tale but a well-executed one, The Count Lucanor mixes up its puzzle solving activities well despite few being all that complicated and adds a dash of danger with the servants and Red Camerlengo. Placing candles is a simple but genius way of having the player manage the danger levels themselves, The Count Lucanor not particularly difficult but there is a tangible bit of terror when trying to sneak around the dark and manage your resources. Alternate paths and endings give the game a little more substance, but The Count Lucanor crafts an effective little horror puzzler despite not reaching for the stars with its gameplay.
And so, I give The Count Lucanor for PC…
A GOOD rating. While you do have to be fairly good at timing your movement and the servants are sometimes a bit stubborn in hanging around areas where you need to go, The Count Lucanor is a fairly accessible horror fairy tale despite some intimidating elements. The gold coins used for saving aren’t so rare that they need to be hoarded preciously, and the candles are abundant enough you can place them around often but still need to be strategic if you truly want to light the way so no horrors sneak up on you. You’re given room to think when it’s necessary but a dose of danger when your tasks are simpler to enhance things. While it may sound like enemies that supernaturally pull you towards them might be frustrating in a game that notably has a slow walk speed as well, the castle’s size and the shape of the rooms makes The Count Lucanor playable without much irritation because it is careful how things are built. It still only does so much with the space it has, one of the rooms being a pretty simple maze an example of where The Count Lucanor needed to stretch its creative legs some more for example, but there are enough with a bit more imagination to make exploring more enticing. The fairy tale feel might be why it was kept a bit brief and didn’t dive too deep into more overt or grotesque horrors, although the game isn’t above something bloody or uncomfortable either so it’s not just a mildly frightening fable either.
Developer Baroque Decay’s next game Yuppie Psycho improves on a lot of what was done here despite shifting to a modern corporate setting, but The Count Lucanor still has the charm of a more twisted fable and its smart ideas about how to handle its horror elements to make it worth checking out. Hansel’s search for fortune is nice and concise, making it easy to appreciate its charms and restrained difficulty, likely in one enjoyably eerie evening of play.