It has been a long time since I listened to Krieg—the most recent one I listened to being The Isolationist from 2010, which I didn't like much. Ruiner is much better to my ears, with the band dropping the weirdness and going back to a sound rooted in '90s black metal, a mix of the Scandinavian and American schools of the time. This is raw stuff and has that addictive repetitiveness to it that was especially common back in the day. There's some melody that kind of prettifies some passages, nothing especially dark or gloomy, but it offers some variety amid the fast and raw black metal on offer. The screechy, raspy vocals sound devilish and a little anguished at times, the kind of sound out of nightmares. If you like old-school raw, mostly barebones black metal with some melody thrown in, this is one well-executed album.
