Games Like Blasphemous: Which Part Do You Want Back?
Loved Blasphemous? The grim, punishing soulslike metroidvanias that hit the same notes — brutal bosses, dense maps, heavy atmosphere — plus an upcoming game built on time.
How Long to Beat Blasphemous: the True Ending Problem
The story runs 12–18 hours. The true ending is gated behind an item, a quest chain and a route most players walk straight past — and that is the real fork.
Blasphemous takes most players 12 to 18 hours to finish the main story. Going for the true ending and full completion — all collectibles plus the DLC — pushes that to around 25 to 35 hours.
The reason for the gap is the true ending. The default ending is reachable on a normal run, but the better one is gated behind specific items and routes you can easily miss if you don't know to look.
If the hours are settled and you want the next grim 2D map, games like Blasphemous is the list.
How long to beat Blasphemous
| Goal | Time |
|---|---|
| Main story (default ending) | 12–18 hours |
| True ending | 16–22 hours |
| Full completion + DLC | 25–35 hours |
| Speed run | 1–2 hours |
The main story is the steady part. The true ending and the free DLC chapters are where the extra hours come from.
What affects your playtime
A few things move your number:
- The true ending requirements. Blasphemous doesn't tell you how to get its best ending. It involves a specific item, a side quest chain, and a route that's easy to walk past. Players going in blind often finish the default ending first, then spend extra hours hunting the true one.
- Boss difficulty. The bosses are the time-eaters. The first game has no dodge roll, so you rely on positioning and a backstep, and a wall boss can cost you many attempts before the pattern clicks.
- Exploration and backtracking. This is a Metroidvania, so new abilities open old areas. Completionists revisit the whole map for collectibles, hidden bosses, and the Mea Culpa upgrades.
- The DLC. Blasphemous received several free content updates that added bosses, areas, and the path to the definitive ending. Including all of it stretches the game well past the base story.
The big one is the true ending. Whether you go for it is the main fork between a 15-hour run and a 25-hour one.
Is it worth the time?
Yes, if its tone lands for you. Blasphemous has a distinctive look — heavy religious iconography, brutal pixel-art executions, a grim and specific world — that nothing else quite matches. The combat is methodical and the bosses are memorable.
The honest caveat: the first game's combat is stiffer than modern metroidvanias, and the lack of a dodge roll frustrates players used to faster movement. The cryptic true-ending requirements can also push you toward a guide, which not everyone enjoys. If you want fluid, forgiving action, this isn't it.
How it compares to similar games
If you're sizing Blasphemous against the games it sits next to:
- Hollow Knight is longer — roughly 25 to 30 hours for the main story — with a bigger map and more optional depth, though a similarly grim tone.
- Ori and the Will of the Wisps is shorter and far smoother, around 8 to 12 hours, trading Blasphemous's heavy combat for fast, flowing movement.
- Curse of the Dead Gods is in the same range for a first clear, around 8 to 12 hours, but it's a run-based roguelike rather than a single connected world.
If you've already finished the original, Blasphemous 2 is slightly longer and fixes most of the friction from the first game.
Blasphemous sits in the middle of the Metroidvania length scale, with a tone and difficulty that are more demanding than most. If you want more picks with the same grim, methodical feel, our games like Blasphemous roundup has the full list.
If dark aesthetics and methodical exploration are what pull you through a list like this, one more name belongs here: KUTO: The Lock of Time — our own game, so judge it harder than anything else on this page. The pairing is the one Blasphemous leads with, punishing combat wrapped in grim religious imagery, played at a faster clip where the Warden's Rewind Key buys back mistakes. It enters Steam Early Access in Q1 2027; wishlisting it now means Steam pings you the day it goes live.
Frequently asked questions
- How long does Blasphemous take to beat?
- The main story takes 12–18 hours for most players. The true ending requires additional exploration and adds 3–5 hours. Full completion with all collectibles and DLC takes 25–35 hours.
- What is the total playtime of Blasphemous?
- Blasphemous playtime runs about 12–18 hours for the main story, 16–22 hours if you chase the true ending, and 25–35 hours for full completion with all collectibles and DLC. Your play time depends mostly on whether you go for the true ending.
- How long is Blasphemous 2?
- Blasphemous 2 takes most players 15–20 hours for the main story and 25–35 for full completion — slightly longer than the original.
- Is Blasphemous hard?
- Moderately. Boss fights require pattern recognition and the lack of a dodge roll in the first game makes positioning crucial. It's harder than most modern metroidvanias but not as punishing as Returnal.
- How many bosses are in Blasphemous?
- The base game has around 16 bosses including optional ones. The DLC adds more. Boss fights are the most memorable part of the game — each one has distinct visual design tied to the grotesque religious aesthetic.
- Does Blasphemous have a true ending and what does it require?
- Yes. The true ending requires collecting all Guilt Fragments, completing Gemino's quest with the Golden Thimble, and solving several other side objectives. It's worth doing — the bad ending is deliberately unsatisfying by design.
- How does Blasphemous 2 compare in length to the original?
- Blasphemous 2 is slightly longer — 15–20 hours for the main story vs. 12–18 for the original. The sequel added a dodge roll and expanded the combat system, which some players feel makes it more approachable.
- Is Blasphemous worth playing if you like Dark Souls?
- Yes, but with caveats. Blasphemous shares the punishing death system and cryptic lore-delivery, but it's a 2D platformer, not a 3D action game. The difficulty spikes come from bosses and platform sections, not from enemy aggression.
- Can you backtrack in Blasphemous?
- Yes — it's a metroidvania. You unlock new traversal abilities over time that open previously inaccessible areas. The map is designed for backtracking and most collectibles require revisiting areas with new abilities.
Keep reading
Games Like Blasphemous on Mobile (Android & iOS)
Blasphemous itself plays on your phone through Netflix Games — so if you searched this from a phone, here are the dark soulslikes and metroidvanias actually worth downloading on Android and iOS.
Is Blasphemous a Soulslike? Yes, With Nuance
Blasphemous checks the core soulslike boxes — a death penalty, deliberate combat, bosses you learn by losing. But it reaches them as a 2D metroidvania, not a Dark Souls clone.
Blasphemous Story Explained: the Miracle & Endings
Blasphemous tells its story in fragments, item lore, and imagery. Here's the throughline — the Miracle, the Penitent One, and the true ending that leads into Blasphemous 2 — laid out plainly.
Best Soulslike Metroidvania Games: Blasphemous & More
The games that fuse soulslike difficulty with Metroidvania exploration — Blasphemous, Hollow Knight, Nine Sols and more — and one upcoming pick built around time.