Castle of Secrets Review
Castle of Secrets is a gothic melodrama and horror point-and-click adventure from SQ Studios.
Castle of Secrets. Serene Questworks Studios / Wandering Wizard
I find gothic horror compelling, and Castle of Secrets, Serene Questworks Studios' debut title published by Wandering Wizard, taps into that atmosphere in a rare way: it’s also a gothic melodrama. It’s a point-and-click adventure steeped in spooky mystery, with some inventive design choices and puzzles. However, rough edges remain that dull what could have been a great game.
The story follows Susan Tranton, a young woman whose beloved father suffers an untimely death, leaving her mother Agatha with inconsolable grief. Agatha soon remarries a rich man who turns out to be cruel. Susan’s mother soon dies under mysterious circumstances. Susan enters the world of the dead to find her dead parents, guided by a cat and raven who have placed a bet on Susan’s ultimate fate. Susan’s choices in her interactions with the spirits of the dead she meets—whether she chooses to punish or redeem them—will guide her to different endings.
Castle of Secrets. Serene Questworks Studios / Wandering Wizard
The game’s clunky localization and awkward voice performances of dialogue severely hurt it. The dialogue is too literal or sometimes comes off almost like nonsense, depending on a particular line’s translation, making the story feel shallow.
I found the puzzles in Castle of Secrets to be a bit of a mixed bag. Some were well crafted and excellent, while others were simplistic or amounted to just hunting for hidden objects in a scene. I found the latter particularly frustrating because of the game’s inconsistent interface. Items didn’t always highlight when hovering over them, and the pointer wouldn’t change to indicate interactivity. The hint feature that’s supposed to mark objects of interest in the screen temporarily seemed to often exclude some of them. “Pixel hunting” should be a thing of the past at this point.
Castle of Secrets. Serene Questworks Studios / Wandering Wizard
While some of the game’s rooms are conventionally simple 3D spaces, some introduce a neat movement mechanic: If you click an arrow, the scene rotates, and Susan’s axis of movement changes. It creates rooms with a lot more depth since you can explore them from different angles to reach new places. It makes some rooms feel like puzzle boxes as you expose new layers.
Visually, the game combines painterly 2D character sprites with 3D environments. I wish everything was executed in that 2D style, because it shows a lot more personality than the 3D graphics, which are forgettable, at best, despite some inventively designed spaces. I feel like the game’s concept art must have been much more impressive than what ended up in the game.
Castle of Secrets. Serene Questworks Studios / Wandering Wizard
On Steam Deck, the game crashed immediately after the opening cutscene—thankfully, switching to Proton Experimental fixed it. After that, it played smoothly at the Deck’s default resolution with medium graphics settings.
Castle of Secrets is an atmospheric adventure with some great elements: a compelling setting, clever traversal mechanics, and some thoughtful puzzle design. But poor localization, weak voice acting, some lackluster puzzles, and an inconsistent interface seriously hamper the experience. It’s unfortunate that gaps in the game’s quality undercut what could have been an excellent gothic melodrama.
Castle of Secrets is available now on Steam.
Score: 6/10
Played on: Steam Deck
