Skelethrone: The Chronicles of Ericona - Switch Review

Steve Whiting -

Skelethrone: The Chronicles of Ericona is an action RPG/metroidvania from the solo-developer studio 70’Strike. We love an underdog here at Switchaboo, and I’m always keen to put a lesser known title under the magnifying glass in the hope we can spread the word!

Gothic and pixely in its presentation, it certainly doesn’t strike me as an original concept, but as long as the gameplay holds up, that shouldn’t matter. Let's take a look!

The Good

In Skelethrone: The Chronicles of Ericona, you control the titular Derek Ericona, who has taken the form of an eerie skeleton. The story is sparse but ol’ Derek has been punished for treachery in a previous life and has reincarnated as the skeletal figure to pay for his sins. He begins a journey to exact revenge against the mighty Queen Aurora, who has massacred most of the beings in the world of K'ar Kaaros, and replaced them with ‘Mourners’, a swarm of undead and dangerous creatures. The bleak story is told in the opening gameplay screens and some early cutscenes, which, despite being 2D, really convey the sense of dread and bring the characters to life. It was great to see and hear the cinematics with a spooky voiceover from the offset, and certainly elevates Skelethrone: The Chronicles of Ericona over similar titles with similar team sizes.

As with any action RPG/metroidvania you have the ability to level up across health, stamina, magic and dexterity categories that allow you to use more elaborate and effective weapons. The levelling up system in Skelethrone: The Chronicles of Ericona was relatively easy to follow and was accessible even if you’re not used to these kinds of games. The currency you gain (Essence) from defeating enemies, which can also be used to level up, will be dropped by your character when you die. You then have one shot to go back to where you died to collect the Essence you dropped, but if you die before collecting it, then you’ll lose it forever. This is of course a very well trodden trope in soulslike games and is very popular amongst metroidvanias, but in Skelethrone: The Chronicles of Ericona the checkpoints (camp fires) and mini checkpoints (lanterns) are fairly distributed without making it TOO easy. This all makes for a challenging but pragmatic adventure.

While there were some bugs in the version of Skelethrone: The Chronicles of Ericona that I played, the game in general ran pretty smoothly. It was originally slated for an early May 2024 release date, but this quietly got deferred until August 2024. Whether that was to avoid a clash with Animal Well, which was released the same week in May, or it was to add some final polish and tighten up performance, it certainly seems like a wise idea because it has seemingly paid off!

TL;DR

  • Simple but impressive opening cinematics and voiceover
  • Checkpoints are sensibly distributed
  • It runs well on Nintendo Switch

The Bad

The boss fights in Skelethrone: The Chronicles of Ericona are, as you’d expect, pretty damn hard. This makes for a welcome challenge because many of the general fodder enemies have such basic AI that it makes them pretty easy to evade. I’m torn as to whether this is a bad thing or not because overly difficult enemies can become obtuse in a game like this, but the dodge roll you can do in Skelethrone: The Chronicles of Ericona is pretty easy to execute, and even at the start of the game you’ll have enough stamina to execute it 3 or 4 times in a row. This basically means you can generally roll/dodge your way from A to B without having too much difficulty from the fairly predictable enemies.

Another negative in Skelethrone: The Chronicles of Ericona which could be viewed positively on one hand but negatively on the other; the load times are pleasingly short, wahey! But as with many games, there are combat tips on the loadscreens, leading to some farcical and slightly comical scenes where the tips flash up for a second and you’re like, ‘Hey, what, was that important??’. I actually chuckle to myself when it happens, but it’s slightly clumsy.

There are some other presentation issues in Skelethrone: The Chronicles of Ericona are easily fixed; there are no map markers (the map otherwise is great), there’s no way to track side quests (argghh) and it’s far too easy to crouch by accidentally nudging down on the Joy-Con, which is incredibly frustrating during intense combat. Like I say, these are merely presentation issues, but ones I feel should be resolved!

TL;DR

  • Basic AI makes for easy-ish fodder enemies
  • Loading screen tips unreadable
  • No map markers nor a way to track side quests

Final Score: 8/10

Skelethrone: The Chronicles of Ericona is a truly great effort. Expansive, fun exploration and hard as nails boss fights will please most metroidvania fans.

Sure there are some presentation issues which make it a little rough around the edges, and this means it’s not in the same echelons as other gothic metroidvanias such as Blasphemous or The Last Faith, but it’s priced at less than 15 quid which represents great value for what’s on offer!

Thank you for checking out our Skelethrone: The Chronicles of Ericona Switch review, thank you to Valkyrie Initiative for providing the review code and thank you to our Patreon Backers for their ongoing support: