CARIMARA: Beneath the forlorn limbs Review
This supernatural mystery from Critical Reflex and Bastinus Rex is a delightful, bite-sized spooky tale.
CARIMARA: Beneath the forlorn limbs. Credit: Bastinus Rex / Critical Reflex
CARIMARA: Beneath the forlorn limbs from Bastinus Rex and publisher Critical Reflex is a short supernatural adventure based on folklore from Normandy. While it's technically a horror game, it plays more like a murder investigation mystery, a cozy detective story with a fantasy flavor. Its atmosphere, visual style, and writing left me wanting more the moment the credits rolled.
CARIMARA: Beneath the forlorn limbs. Credit: Bastinus Rex / Critical Reflex
You're the titular Carimara, a mute goblin who arrives at a secluded cabin in the woods to exorcise a ghost living in the root cellar. The ghost agrees to leave on one condition—you must determine who she was, who killed her, and how. The old woman who lives in the cabin, the dormouse in the walls, and the owl outside will offer only cryptic answers, reluctant to say too much. It's up to you to piece together the solution from fragments and clues scattered throughout the cabin and its surroundings.
As you explore, you create cards from key objects you discover. These cards are how the Carimara communicates, serving as topics of conversation when you interact with characters. Discover new cards, and you can potentially unlock new clues to help deduce the correct answers to the ghost's questions. It's an elegant system that makes your mute protagonist feel less like a limitation and more like a unique approach to adventure game dialogue trees.
CARIMARA: Beneath the forlorn limbs. Credit: Bastinus Rex / Critical Reflex
I found all the cards, although it's not necessary to complete the game; however, it still took me several tries to figure out the solution. Get it wrong and the ghost knocks you out, leaving you to wake up the next day, which sometimes opens up new areas to explore. Failure is built into the progression because you won't find some of the cards you need until you can get out of the cabin. It's a smart design choice that removes the sting from being wrong, gently nudging you toward new discoveries while keeping the mystery challenging.
CARIMARA: Beneath the forlorn limbs. Credit: Bastinus Rex / Critical Reflex
The characters are wonderful. I particularly loved the gruff owl perched outside, though the monstrous dormouse has the most memorable design. All the dialogue is full of personality, elevated by the voice actors who performed the lines in French. The delivery is just incredible. At first, I didn’t even catch that it was actual language, thanks to the vocal style, until after a few lines, it became clear it was real speech and not gibberish.
The game's striking art is rendered in a PS1 style with a limited, heavily desaturated color palette that complements the gloomy mood of the setting. The color choices and design set it apart from the wave of 32-bit styled games we've seen recently; it feels genuinely distinct rather than riding a trend. Despite the low-poly art style, the characters are incredibly expressive with memorable designs that brought me a lot of joy. I loved everything about the art direction.
CARIMARA: Beneath the forlorn limbs. Credit: Bastinus Rex / Critical Reflex
After the credits, Bastinus Rex writes that he'd like to make more episodes if the game is a success. I would absolutely love to spend more time in this world as this character. The setting and atmosphere are great on their own, but the detective gameplay and mystery theme add a compelling layer to the fantasy and horror that makes it stand out. There's real potential here for an episodic series where players solve supernatural mysteries rooted in folklore. As a final note, the name and description of the game ending achievement made me laugh. I won’t spoil it.
Carimara: Beneath the forlorn limbs is available now on Steam.
Overall Score: 9/10
Played on: Steam Deck
