Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus is a metroidvania that centers on a newborn celestial fox looking for his purpose. Read our review to see what it did well, what it didn't do well, and if it's worth buying.
Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus Review Overview
What is Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus?
Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus unfolds in a mystical realm inspired by Japanese folklore, where players assume the role of Bō, a celestial blossom fox descended from the heavens. Tasked with a crucial role in an ancient and enigmatic ritual, Bo embarks on a journey filled with mystery and intrigue.
Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus features:
⚫︎ Upgradeable gear
⚫︎ Collectible equipment
⚫︎ Hidden areas to discover
⚫︎ Various side quests
⚫︎ Mini-bosses and monster rooms
⚫︎ Fast travel and unlockable navigation tools
For more gameplay details, read everything we know about Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus's gameplay and story.
 Steam |
$19.99 |
 Nintendo eShop |
$19.99 |
Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus Pros & Cons
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
 Excellent Platforming Gameplay Fantastic Character Designs Creative Boss Fights |
No Map Markers Lack of Combat Hints |
Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus Overall Score - 74/100
Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus is a game that is hard-carried by its immediately-rewarding experience. You can derive a lot of enjoyment navigating its treacherous terrains and defeating its enigmatic monsters. However, after you put the game down, it’s quite difficult to justify picking it up again over other titles you might still have left unfinished. This is mainly due to its relatively cut-and-dry gameplay design and lack of a gripping tale. Still, the game is quite good, and is undoubtedly something any metroidvania enthusiast would like.
Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus Story - 6/10
While the game does have a story, it takes a seat so far back that you won’t even notice its existence until it throws you a large amount of exposition deep into your run. Weirdly enough, it even seems rushed at the beginning, only to fade in obscurity a bit later on. It also doesn’t have much pull against all the side quests and irrelevant dialogue you’ll encounter.
Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus Gameplay - 8/10
Smooth, fast-paced and action-packed, Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus’ combat is every battle junkie’s dream. More importantly, it has very creative boss fights that combine pattern recognition and platforming to create unique battlefields to play with (or die in). Exploration is also crazy fun with lots of challenging puzzles to test your metroidvania skills on.
Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus Visuals - 9/10
The hand-drawn artworks and thoughtful character designs showcase the game’s themes beautifully. It’s hard to find anything to criticize when every moment is a visual feast of mysticism and wonder. There aren't even any issues with visual clutter, as the game makes full use of the entire screen space efficiently. It kind of falls apart with the menus and interfaces, though, since it does look quite drab and uninspired.
Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus Audio - 7/10
Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus comes with most of the bells and whistles you’d expect from an action game. Well, aside from voice acting, at least. However, none of its sound effects or background tracks are particularly memorable aside from a very select few of the latter. If anything, they are often drowned by all the visual spectacles the game has to offer.
Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus Value for Money - 7/10
As it is now, for a cent short of $20, you’ll likely find the game suitable enough to justify the purchase. There's quite a lot of content to play with, and its gameplay and visuals will engage you for long stretches of time. Do note, though, that the game’s story doesn’t pick up until late into your playthrough, and its replayability is only marginally appealing due to the limits that you can modify your experience.
Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus Review: On The Path To Greatness
By this point in time, it’s quite hard to imagine something that hasn’t been used to base a game on. Even the most twisted of themes have been used to great effect somewhere out there in a genre of game that somehow just fits.
I mean, look at the Ronald Mcdonalds (the horror game). That was quite good in various ways.
Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus is also quite good. However, I don’t mean that with the same kind of satire as a McDonald’s horror game. It may not sport any shiny new appendage or a wildly original story, but the game itself is polished well enough to be a noteworthy contender among its peers
The game uses Japanese occult and mythology as its main theme. Its character design, art style, and even choice of colors are all meant to deliver its narrative visually in a way that favors the latter more than the former.
Imagine this; you’re a lone soul in the middle of a still forest with a view of a magnificent city in the distance. As you walk down the path, admiring the background, thunder suddenly strikes the city’s tallest pagoda, blinding you for a moment. Rubbing your eyes free of the pain, you open them to the sight of a massive skeletal monster, a gashadokuro, lumbering with thunderous footsteps away from the city.
That is literally how Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus opens up after it relinquishes controls over to you. As a big fan of the occult, you can imagine just how captivating that sight was to me. It was something a lot of modern shows such as In/Spectre lacked (although Mysterious Disappearances has plenty). The fact that this was a game also made it seem like foreshadowing—you’re gonna be fighting that thing later on, right?
Visual spectacles aren’t the only thing this game is good at, though. Since we’re talking about a game, then the gameplay is also just as important to take note of (unless we’re dealing with a visual novel, of course).
Let’s quickly get that over, though. Yes, Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus’s gameplay is very good. It’s polished enough that if it was a mirror, you’d probably see every pore on your face in fine detail. Thankfully, it’s also quite challenging… which is a strange thing to say considering that metroidvanias should always be stimulating. At least, that’s what I think.
Either way, Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus certainly didn’t prioritize accessibility, that’s for sure. Is that good? Depends on who you ask, but I think the relatively difficult but fair platformer sections are a nice change of pace.
Weirdly enough, though, after putting down the game to get a meal, I didn’t get an overwhelming urge to continue playing it afterwards. Usually, being interrupted by something as trivial as lunch would make me extremely antsy to get back to playing, especially if the game is good. But that wasn’t the case for Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus.
That left me with a lot of mixed feelings. It was only until after I had a short nap that I realized what was wrong; while the game design is certainly solid and its visuals are stunning and mystical, its story-driven nature sorely lacked a gripping narrative. The game didn’t give you a reason to feel impatient over not going back as soon as possible, outside of the desire to just play a good metroidvania.
In fact, the game’s story feels weirdly rushed during the first part of the game, only to grind to a practical halt a bit later on. Worse, still, during the parts where the story should continue, the quests you take in order to progress are rarely used to build upon the world further.
The narrative is Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus’ weakest point. It goes to show that a game designed around a robust narrative is essential to make a truly great, balanced title.
Well, at least you can pet dogs. That immediately makes the game worth every dollar.
Pros of Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus
| Things Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus Got Right |
|---|
|
Excellent Platforming Gameplay Fantastic Character Designs Creative Boss Fights |
Excellent Platforming Gameplay
Despite having massive skill issues when it comes to platformers, I thoroughly enjoyed every single platforming section of Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus. While they’re quite challenging, their level of difficulty isn’t at the point where you need to make frame-perfect dodges and dashes in order to succeed. There’s enough allowance to make minor mistakes and still recover from it.
In other words, it feels really fair and any big mistakes can be blamed on the player rather than on the game.
Fantastic Character Designs
It’s hard to understate how much of an impact Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus’ opening scenes can have for those with a healthy interest in Japanese mythology. The sight of a gashadokuro (a giant skeleton monster) rising from a burning pagoda alone was captivating enough. Its gradual march, complete with thunderous steps, instilled the silent forest with the kind of dread you can only really find in suspense movies. Pretty cool for a relatively cartoonish game!
Of course, that’s not all. Many of the characters have excellent designs based on the myths surrounding them. There are a few exceptions, sure, like the kitsune being relatively tame in design. However, a lot of them had a lot of charm thanks to the gratuitous use of shadows and accessories.
Creative Boss Fights
Metroidvanias that make full use of its platforming in boss battles have an incredible amount of freedom to creatively design the fight. Since mobility is rarely an issue, the game can make use of the entire stage to support your fight. Such is the case with Path of the Teal Lotus’ gratuitous use of space by scattering features to get around with. Similarly, this allows bosses to do widespread attacks that not only look pretty, but also serve as a way to telegraph their attacks.
Cons of Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus
| Things That Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus Can Improve |
|---|
|
No Map Markers Lack of Combat Hints |
No Map Markers
This is a very minor complaint, but considering that fast travel is unlocked relatively deep into the game and that there are items you can collect at previously-explored locations, it would help a lot if the game implemented custom map markers. This would allow you to pin areas of interest, which would help immensely with the otherwise annoying task of backtracking for missed collectibles.
Lack of Combat Hints
While Path of the Teal Lotus’ bosses aren’t that difficult once you realize where to hit them, the path to getting to that point itself can be rife with a lot of trial and error. The game itself doesn’t make much of an effort to clue you in on where they are vulnerable.
For example, since a kitsune’s defining feature is their nine tails, you may be led to believe that that’s their weak point. It’ll be like reducing their tail count until they’re down to one, right? Unfortunately for you, the answer is much simpler than that.
Some of the game’s normal enemies also suffer from this problem. It creates the impression that the obvious and intuitive is often wrong, leading you down a path of self-doubt and excessive caution. While being careful is a virtue, the fact that the game holds you back at every new encounter really puts a damper on the kind of pace that it can easily maintain.
Is Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus Worth It?
It’s a platformer enthusiast’s paradise.
For some reason, a lot of metroidvanias that have been released recently have very basic platforming sections. Games that challenge both one’s patience and reflexes such as Hollow Knight are becoming rare in favor of more accessible games. While Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus’ platforming sections certainly isn’t that difficult, at least it does present a good challenge to shake up the scene. Hence, it’s a great buy for anybody looking for something worthwhile to test their skills.
| Platform | Price |
|---|---|
| Steam |
$19.99 |
| Nintendo eShop |
$19.99 |
Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus FAQ
Is Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus a roguelike?
Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus has no roguelike elements. It’s just a metroidvania with a lot more platforming than usual.
Is Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus similar to Hollow Knight?
Yes, the game draws heavy inspiration from Hollow Knight in many aspects, such as its platforming sections and combat mechanics.
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Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus Product Information
 |
|
| Title | BO: PATH OF THE TEAL LOTUS |
|---|---|
| Release Date | July 18, 2024 |
| Developer | Squid Shock Studios, Christopher Stair, Trevor Youngquist |
| Publisher | Humble Games |
| Supported Platforms | PC, Nintendo Switch |
| Genre | Metroidvania, Platformer, Adventure |
| Number of Players | 1 |
| ESRB Rating | Everyone |
| Official Website | Bō: Path of the Teal Lotus Website |
