Silksong's new replacement is about to become the best action game of the year
Overview & Key Takeaways
Chronoscript: The Endless End mixes Hollow Knight combat with an eye-catching hand-drawn art style
What to do when you're a writer incapable of finishing a story? Simple: you kidnap an editor. Optionally, you may use your vampire powers to trap said editor inside your manuscript and have him fight demonic creatures until he's cleared up your work. But should the editor really complain about his fate, when the manuscript looks as gorgeous as it does in Chronoscript: The Endless End? I got the chance to find out during a 20-minute online presentation followed by an exclusive hands-on demo.
In Chronoscript: The Endless End, an exploration-based action-adventure game developed by DeskWorks, you take on the role of Frederick G. Muller, a famous editor who just received a new assignment. All seems well until the job leads him to a creepy, remote mansion, where the resident vampire lady, Viola S. Chambers, teleports him into her unfinished story. As an immortal being (vampire perk), Viola has been working on her story for literal ages, clearly unable to wrap it up without editorial assistance. Poor Frederick is forced to walk his way through Viola's manuscript in the most literal sense — let us hope he's paid by the hour.
Upon seeing Chronoscript: The Endless End for the first time, I was deeply in awe of its visual style. The moody darkness, the hand-drawn charm (yes, everything's hand-drawn), and the abundance of detail in the 2D illustrations create a unique, inky look. On top of that, Chronoscript: The Endless End uses a variety of 3D elements. As you steer a 2D Frederick through the 2D Metroidvania-style chambers, you'll see 3D pens, ink bottles, and feathers on the side of your screen. Zoom out, and you see a 3D Viola hunched over her unfinished draft.
Though I was afraid that the 3D effects would feel redundant or clash with the highly detailed 2D ink drawings, the result felt surprisingly cohesive. The pages themselves are treated as objects, which means you'll experience a slight shift when you move from one page to another — you're literally walking from page to page, a feeling that would not have been possible without the use of 3D. The small golden page numbers, which took me a while to notice, are a lovely detail that'll help you navigate this 2D-inside-3D world.
Image: DeskWorks/Shueisha Games via Polygon
Image: DeskWorks/Shueisha Games via Polygon
Image: DeskWorks/Shueisha Games via Polygon
Image: DeskWorks/Shueisha Games via Polygon
Image: DeskWorks/Shueisha Games via Polygon
Close
Image: DeskWorks/Shueisha Games via Polygon
Image: DeskWorks/Shueisha Games via Polygon
Image: DeskWorks/Shueisha Games via Polygon
Image: DeskWorks/Shueisha Games via Polygon
Image: DeskWorks/Shueisha Games via Polygon
If you inspect the 2D drawings closely, though, you may notice duplicate elements; every bookshelf, chandelier, ladder, pillar, and parchment roll has a few twins in its near vicinity. While this makes sense, as drawing thousands of detailed and unique books would take far too much time (unless you're an immortal vampire), it comes with a risk of repetitiveness if it follows an obvious pattern. In Chronoscript: The Endless End, though, the elements are arranged in a way that feels entirely natural; the same bookshelf may be found at the front, in the back, obscured by shadow, hidden behind other objects, or mirrored. Every page thus becomes a unique collage.
(If I'm allowed to nitpick, I will say that I don't love the wooden ladders, as their broken steps hang on in a rather unnatural way, while the missing parts in the side rails occasionally clash with other elements. In the example below, it looks like the red book is oddly placed in front of the ladder, while it's actually a gap in the ladder's side rail that creates this effect. But hey, I just called this game a visual delight; I should probably excuse this minor flaw.)
Though Chronoscript: The Endless End's art style felt like a new experience, I can't say the same about its gameplay — but I don't mind one bit. While it may sound a bit clichéd to compare a 2D exploration-based action game to Hollow Knight, the similarities are too obvious to ignore. The developers' love for the king of Metroidvanias(which they proudly declared during their presentation) is quite strongly felt in Chronoscript: The Endless End's movement system and combat. As you jump across platforms, avoiding spike pits and falling rocks, you'll have to slay a multitude of unfriendly bugs before you get the chance to rest at a cozy health-replenishing bench. And just when you think "this might not be so hard after all," you'll stumble into a boss arena, whose occupant you must defeat through a series of quick sword slashes, jumps, and dashes.
Image: DeskWorks/Shueisha Games via Polygon
Though Hollow Knight's early bosses may have been more difficult, I could not have defeated Chronoscript: The Endless End's first boss, Obsessive Bookworm, without observing its moveset, dying, and retrying. It strongly reminded me of Hollow Knight: Silksong's Bell Beast. Another, more late-game boss (introduced in a separate demo section) showed a more unique and, frankly, horrifying set of abilities by sucking me into its spiked, casket-shaped body. Good thing I had a new "ink dive" ability that let me dip into ink splotches, thus evade the living torture device.
Of course, as someone who's into drawing, Hollow Knight, games, books, and vampires, I'm inclined to get excited when I see a hand-drawn Hollow Knight-inspired game featuring books and a vampire. But I truly believe, had I been less interested in the combat and aesthetic, the beautiful and dimensions-defying game design would still get me excited about Chronoscript: The Endless End. What remains to be seen when the full game arrives is whether that vampire lady is any good at storytelling.
Chronoscript: The Endless End will be released in fall 2026 for PlayStation 5 and Windows PC.
