The Initial
Skip · RPG · 2017
Steam Deck PlayableThe verdict
SKIP IT.
It scores 41, under the fair line, at $9.99.
- Length
- 2.3h
- Value
- $4.34/hr
- Reviews
- 76% positive
Watch this gameOne alert when it is worth buying.
Minimum on the Steam store: 2 GB of memory, GTX 740 or better, 3 GB of storage. Runs on Windows, macOS.
THE INITIAL is a hyper action game about pretty schoolgirls battling against evil. It's developed by a small team of five developers. We hope you will love this game as much as we do.
What drives the score
How to read this
Grades run S to D, read from the buyer's side. ▲ marks a lift, ▼ a drag or a dock, ? an input we do not have, • a fact this genre's score does not use. How the grades work
The value story
It has never been cheaper than $3.99. That was April 2020. Its cuts run 50 percent off as a rule. There have been 24 in the 9 years tracked, about 6 weeks apart.
Against its own genre it lands in the top 31 percent on value. It is better reviewed than 63 percent of its genre. Among the games that feel like it, 嗜血印 Bloody Spell ($24.99, scores 74) beats it on value, while it beats Book of Yog Idle RPG (free, scores 15).
Steam's global achievement data puts about 19 percent of players at this game's ending achievement. On a 2.3-hour game, the hours short of it still count in its price per hour. Inside the two-hour refund window, 70 percent of the 857 reviews written there were positive, against 76 percent overall, and those are 49 percent of everything written about it.
The drop-off
98% start to 19% finishA normal fall-off for a game this long. Steam global achievements
What players say
This would have been a decent free student project. Unfortunately, this isn't a free student project. The Initial is a spectacle fighter with somewhat clunky controls, somewhat frustrating combat, and bosses that have way too much health. At first it feels okay, if rather low budget. But elements of the game gradually start to annoy, and the simple truth is that there are many other better action games available for...
Steam reviews, mixed to match its Steam ratio and rotated daily. Opinions are theirs.
No data upstream: critic score (Metacritic).
Cite this score
The Initial scores 41/100 on the BANG Score (a skip) as of Oct 2, 2026. The BANG Score rates what a game is worth for the money. Via Steam BANGERS. https://steambangers.com/game/665090/the-initialReviews set the ceiling, and price against real length moves the BANG Score inside it. How it works, and where it is weak → Steam reviews as of Sep 26, price as of Oct 1.
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