You’ve probably seen the screenshots. A young girl in a red sari, standing against the backdrop of massive, sandstone arches that look like they were plucked straight out of a Rajasthani dreamscape. That’s Raji: An Ancient Epic. It’s gorgeous. But if you think this is just another platformer with a coat of "exotic" paint, you’re missing the point entirely. Most people look at the visuals and stop there. Honestly, the real story is how a tiny team in Pune, India, managed to build a game that feels more alive than most AAA titles coming out of Montreal or Los Angeles.
It’s personal. It’s gritty. And it’s deeply rooted in a mythology that most Western gamers only know through Wikipedia snippets.
Nodding Heads Games, the developers, basically risked everything for this. They sold their houses. They went months without pay. When you play Raji, you aren't just jumping over pits; you’re playing through the literal blood, sweat, and tears of creators who refused to let their culture be distilled into a caricature. The game follows Raji, a circus performer chosen by the gods to save her brother, Golu, from a demonic invasion led by the lord Mahabalasura.
It's a simple premise. But the execution? That’s where things get complicated.
What Most People Get Wrong About the Combat in Raji: An Ancient Epic
If you go into Raji: An Ancient Epic expecting the fluid, button-mashing chaos of God of War, you’re going to have a bad time. You'll die. A lot.
The combat is rhythmic. It’s almost like a dance, which makes sense given Raji’s background as a circus performer. She doesn’t just swing a sword. She uses the environment. You see a pillar? You can run up it, spin around, and launch a devastating area-of-effect attack. You see a wall? You can wall-run and dive into a crowd of demons with the Trishul (Lord Shiva’s trident).
A lot of reviewers early on called the combat "clunky." I’d argue it’s just deliberate.
The Trishul is your first weapon, and it’s arguably the most versatile. It feels heavy. When it strikes a demon, there’s a distinct "thud" that vibrates through the controller. Later, you get the Bow of Vishnu and the Sword and Shield of Durga. Each weapon changes the tempo. The bow turns the game into a tactical shooter where you’re constantly back-pedaling to find space. The sword and shield make you a tank.
But here’s the kicker: the elemental upgrades. You can infuse your weapons with lightning, fire, or ice. Lighting is objectively the meta choice for crowd control, as it chains between enemies, stunning them and giving you a second to breathe. If you aren't using the environment—the walls, the pillars, the acrobatic leaps—the demons will overwhelm you. It’s not a flaw in the game design; it’s the game telling you to stop playing like it’s Devil May Cry.
The Pahari Art Style Isn't Just for Show
The visuals in Raji: An Ancient Epic are inspired by Pahari painting and the architecture of Rajasthan. This isn't just a "style choice" to look pretty on a Steam store page.
Pahari painting is a Himalayan art form known for its intricate detail and use of color. You see it in the way the characters are outlined and the specific palette of oranges, deep reds, and earthy browns. The developers actually visited ancient forts in Rajasthan, like the Mehrangarh Fort, to capture the exact scale of the arches and the way light hits the stone at sunset.
It feels authentic because it is authentic.
There’s this one sequence in the game where you walk past giant murals that tell the story of the gods. As you move, the murals come to life. The narration is done in a way that feels like a grandmother telling a bedtime story, but one with high stakes and terrifying monsters. This is a far cry from the sanitized, Disney-fied versions of mythology we usually see. It’s respectful, but it’s also raw.
The shadow puppet theater cutscenes are another highlight. Instead of expensive CGI, the team used the traditional Tholu Bommalata style. It’s flat, 2D, and uses silhouettes to convey emotion. It’s a brilliant way to handle a limited budget while actually enhancing the atmosphere. It makes the world feel ancient. It makes the threat of the demons feel like a timeless struggle rather than a localized event.
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Why This Game Was a Miracle for Indian Game Dev
To understand why Raji: An Ancient Epic matters, you have to look at the context of the Indian gaming industry. For decades, India was primarily an outsourcing hub. Big studios would send their boring asset work—modeling crates or rendering grass—to Indian firms.
Nobody was making original, high-end PC or console games about Indian stories.
Shruti Ghosh and Avichal Singh, the founders of Nodding Heads, wanted to change that. They didn't have a publisher for a long time. They failed their initial Kickstarter campaign in 2017. Most teams would have quit. Instead, they kept polishing the demo. They kept pushing. Eventually, Microsoft and Nintendo took notice.
When Raji finally launched, it wasn't just a win for the studio; it was a proof of concept for an entire country. It proved that you could take "regional" stories and make them globally relevant. You don't need to westernize your characters to make them relatable. The bond between a sister and her brother is universal. The desire to stand up against overwhelming odds is something anyone can understand, whether they live in Mumbai or Munich.
The Mechanics of Faith and Favor
One of the cooler systems in the game is the "Favor of the Gods." As you progress, you find orbs that you can slot into a skill tree. It’s not a massive, Path of Exile style tree that requires a spreadsheet to navigate. It’s simple, but impactful.
- Lightning: Great for stun-locking.
- Fire: Best for raw damage over time (DoT).
- Ice: Good for freezing enemies in place, though it feels a bit weaker than lightning in the late game.
You can’t max out everything in a single playthrough. You have to choose. Do you want your Trishul to strike with lightning every third hit, or do you want your bow to fire flaming arrows? This customization adds a layer of strategy to the encounters.
The boss fights also lean heavily into Hindu lore. Fighting a demon like Mahabalasura or the corrupted chieftain Rangda isn’t just about lowering a health bar. These fights have phases that require you to use specific movement sets you’ve learned. Rangda, for instance, requires a lot of verticality. If you stay on the ground, you're dead.
It’s worth noting that the game is short. You can beat it in about 6 to 8 hours. Some people hate that. Honestly? I love it. It doesn't overstay its welcome. It doesn't pad the runtime with "fetch 10 herbs" quests. Every minute you spend in the game is focused on the narrative or the combat. It’s a tight, focused experience.
Navigating the Critics: Is Raji Too Linear?
A common critique of Raji: An Ancient Epic is that it’s "on rails."
There isn't much room for exploration. You follow a path, you fight, you solve a puzzle, you move on. And yeah, if you're looking for an open world like Elden Ring, you're going to be disappointed. But linearity isn't a sin. In Raji, the linearity allows the developers to control the framing of every shot. Since the camera is fixed at a specific isometric angle, the team can ensure that every time you walk into a new area, you’re seeing exactly what they want you to see—the scale of a statue, the shimmer of a pool of water, or the looming shadow of a demon.
The puzzles are also fairly simple. They usually involve rotating rings to form a picture or matching symbols. They act more as "palate cleansers" between high-intensity combat sections than actual brain-teasers. If you’re a hardcore puzzle fan, you’ll breeze through them. But within the context of the journey, they provide a necessary moment of reflection.
Final Practical Insights for New Players
If you’re picking up the game for the first time, keep these things in mind to avoid frustration.
First, remap your dodge button. On a controller, the default layout is fine, but some people find it more intuitive to have it on a shoulder button so they can keep their thumb on the right stick for camera adjustments (though the camera is mostly fixed).
Second, don't ignore the murals. Not only do they provide the lore, but standing near them often triggers dialogue between the gods (Durga and Vishnu) that gives you hints about upcoming mechanics or enemy types.
Third, master the wall-bounce. It is the single most powerful move in your arsenal. It allows you to escape being cornered and transitions into a heavy attack that can break enemy shields.
Raji: An Ancient Epic isn't just a game; it's a cultural landmark. It has its flaws—the platforming can occasionally feel floaty and the ending comes abruptly—but the sheer ambition on display is staggering. It’s a game that demands to be played with the sound up, the lights down, and an open mind.
What to do next
- Check the Enhanced Edition: If you're playing on PC or modern consoles, make sure you have the Enhanced Edition. It adds Hindi voiceovers, which honestly makes the experience feel much more grounded and authentic than the English dub.
- Explore the Bestiary: Spend some time in the menus reading the descriptions of the demons. The game draws from real Vedic texts, and the descriptions of creatures like the Giras provide a lot of context that isn't explicitly stated in the cutscenes.
- Support Indie Devs: If you enjoy the art style, look into the "Making of Raji" videos on YouTube. Seeing the original concept art compared to the final 3D renders gives you a massive appreciation for the technical hurdles the team overcame.
The game is a reminder that we don't need another generic fantasy world with elves and orcs. There's a whole world of mythology out there that's just waiting to be explored, and Raji is the perfect gateway.