Sin Slayers: Reign of The 8th

Introduction

Sin Slayers: Reign of The 8th sends a party of three wicked adventurers through tile-based dungeons in turn-based battles, hub-based between runs at a church where the party is equipped, crafted for and quested from before setting out across a world map of selectable dungeons. Its central hook is the Sinometer, a running tally of morally compromising choices made along the way that unlocks greater rewards at the cost of tougher, more twisted enemies. Goonswarm Games developed and self-published it, relaunching on Steam on 25 November 2024 — this is a relisting of the original 2020 Sin Slayers, which had been pulled from the Steam store, with the developer offering free replacement keys to owners of the original. Reading all 9 available English-language negative reviews alongside the top positives, out of a Mostly Positive corpus (roughly 72.7% across 33 reviews), finds a game whose most interesting story may be the relaunch itself.

A relaunch that earns real goodwill

The single most-upvoted review in this entire sample, sitting well above every other review by vote count, isn't really about the game at all — it's about how Goonswarm Games handled bringing it back. "This game was deleted off steam some time ago," the reviewer explains. "It was then re-released in this version. The developers opened a claim forum to all affected owners of the original so they could get a replacement key to this version at no cost. Game mechanics and personal preferences aside, that's a solid integrity move in this age of scams and greed." Another reviewer echoes the same context more bluntly from the negative side, calling it "a remake of a game that was banned from the steam store" without explaining why — Steam and the store page itself are silent on the original removal's cause, so this review can't independently verify the reason, only that multiple reviewers on both sides of the recommendation split independently corroborate that the original was pulled and this version is its replacement. Whatever prompted the original delisting, offering free keys to existing owners rather than requiring a repurchase is a genuinely good-faith move, and it's clearly the detail that has stuck with players who bothered to review the relaunch.

Combat that both sides agree is thin

Set against that goodwill, the most consistent substantive complaint in this review's sample — voiced by critics and by reviewers who still recommend the game — is that combat doesn't offer much real decision-making. One detailed negative review put it starkly: "the fights have few options, which is a fatal error in a purely 'gameplay' based game with little to no story... fights are not interesting tactical matches but mindless slogfests." A separate reviewer scoring the game 3.5 out of 10 went further, arguing the lack of real choice in combat means "it may as well be an auto battler," and detailing specific frustrations: healers who can't act at all when the party is at full health, no basic attack option even at level 5, and status effects that lock characters out of turns for extended stretches. That last point recurs independently — another reviewer described "2-3 grave keeper normal enemies with 100% stun on normal attacks" able to stun-lock an entire party to death, adding pointedly that the relaunch felt "somehow more unbalanced and buggy than the 'original.'" These are specific, mechanically detailed complaints rather than vague genre grumbling, and they appear on both sides of the recommendation split — even one of the game's defenders, giving it a positive review, called it "painfully mediocre" and warned it "won't scratch either itch" for fans of the Dark Quest or Darkest Dungeon games it visibly draws from.

Grind, presentation, and rough edges in the rebuild

Progression draws its own specific frustration. One reviewer tracked roughly 1.4 hours of play for a single character level, which yielded only a handful of automatically-allocated stat points and nothing that felt like a meaningful build choice. Several other reviewers, both positive and negative, independently describe the game as grindy — one summed up a run in four words: "Grind, xp, grind, loot, grind, craft." Presentation issues specific to this rebuilt version also surface: one reviewer reported damage numbers failing to display entirely during combat, alongside fonts and art assets that looked inconsistently blurry next to sharp backgrounds and UI elements. None of these individually sink the game, but together with the balance complaints above, they paint this relaunch as a straightforward relisting of the original rather than a meaningfully polished remaster — the store page's own changelog claims "numerous optimizations and improvements," but several returning players report the opposite experience.

Final Verdict

Sin Slayers: Reign of The 8th is a middling tile-based dungeon crawler whose most compelling chapter is off the battlefield entirely — a developer choosing to make good on a delisted game's existing owners rather than starting over and asking for money again. That's worth genuine credit, and it's clearly resonated with the small audience that has reviewed the relaunch. But the underlying game itself draws the same complaints from critics and defenders alike: thin tactical choice in combat, real balance problems including stun-lock enemies and a healer who struggles to contribute, and slow, grindy progression that doesn't reward the time it demands. For fans of tile-based crawlers like Dark Quest 2 who can tolerate those rough edges, or anyone who owned the original and simply wants closure, this is a reasonable pickup on sale. For everyone else, the goodwill story is more interesting than the game it's attached to.