Who are these mouth breathers giving this game half a star an hour after it came out, I see you bro. This game is ducking awesome. Man it was a blast to go through and it's not the type of game or genre that I'm too familiar with, but decided to give it a go anyways and I'm glad that I did.
Now this is definitely a niche product I feel like you either gonna love it or ask for a refund after the tutorial. Game is focused on squad dispositions, tactical combat and planning somewhat similar to my beloved Heroes of Might and Magic games except you don't directly control your units during battle. I feel like this will be the main hurdle for people trying this game out. Essentially you assign characters to different units, you can customize their positioning, active and passive skill use and in what order they use them and you can give them equipment/accessories that increase stats or give additional abilities or action points to use during battle. Now of course you have different class units that perform better against certain classes and have better synchronicity with others the game encourages you to mix and match, it's good stuff. So far what I've been describing is the combat section but we also get an overworld map again similar to Heroes of Might and Magic were we control our main character running around in the overworld map collecting resources, rebuilding towns, buying provisions, equipment, exploring and completing different side quests. This ain't a user manual you'll figure it out.
Speaking of characters and classes there are so many to choose from almost too many if you ask me and in true Vanillaware fashion they're all gorgeous to look at. Really vibed with this game and that clean medieval fantasy aesthetic. In general the visual artstyle is top notch. Actually got surprised by how solid and professional the voice acting was really helps to bring the life out from all of these characters. Now the game's story is quite a standard affair, not gonna be winning any awards but it never got annoying or in the way or made my eyes roll it was just solid throughout.
Anything negative I have to say is just so minor it's hardly worth mentioning. Overall I did find the game a bit too easy on normal, luckily there are 3 more difficulty options after that so it's an easy fix. The menu navigation with a controller can be a little annoying especially when it comes to switching character skills and equipment if you're a horder. The game has what it felt like a slow and steady start and ramping up process which didn't bother me too much but was noticeable also unit size clearly indicates 6 potential slots but we only ever use 5, now it's obviously for positioning but this asymmetry looks kinda strange I was waiting until we get to 6v6 battles but alas it never came. I also experienced some minor frame rate drops on PS4 Pro version particularly in a couple of endgame larger battles.
To sum it all up, solid tactical gameplay, great deal of customization for your units, fun characters and their interactions with one another, professional voice acting, beautiful visual style, decent musical score, feel good fantasy story with a happy ending and a lack of any real negatives. Certified banger in my eyes.
Now this is definitely a niche product I feel like you either gonna love it or ask for a refund after the tutorial. Game is focused on squad dispositions, tactical combat and planning somewhat similar to my beloved Heroes of Might and Magic games except you don't directly control your units during battle. I feel like this will be the main hurdle for people trying this game out. Essentially you assign characters to different units, you can customize their positioning, active and passive skill use and in what order they use them and you can give them equipment/accessories that increase stats or give additional abilities or action points to use during battle. Now of course you have different class units that perform better against certain classes and have better synchronicity with others the game encourages you to mix and match, it's good stuff. So far what I've been describing is the combat section but we also get an overworld map again similar to Heroes of Might and Magic were we control our main character running around in the overworld map collecting resources, rebuilding towns, buying provisions, equipment, exploring and completing different side quests. This ain't a user manual you'll figure it out.
Speaking of characters and classes there are so many to choose from almost too many if you ask me and in true Vanillaware fashion they're all gorgeous to look at. Really vibed with this game and that clean medieval fantasy aesthetic. In general the visual artstyle is top notch. Actually got surprised by how solid and professional the voice acting was really helps to bring the life out from all of these characters. Now the game's story is quite a standard affair, not gonna be winning any awards but it never got annoying or in the way or made my eyes roll it was just solid throughout.
Anything negative I have to say is just so minor it's hardly worth mentioning. Overall I did find the game a bit too easy on normal, luckily there are 3 more difficulty options after that so it's an easy fix. The menu navigation with a controller can be a little annoying especially when it comes to switching character skills and equipment if you're a horder. The game has what it felt like a slow and steady start and ramping up process which didn't bother me too much but was noticeable also unit size clearly indicates 6 potential slots but we only ever use 5, now it's obviously for positioning but this asymmetry looks kinda strange I was waiting until we get to 6v6 battles but alas it never came. I also experienced some minor frame rate drops on PS4 Pro version particularly in a couple of endgame larger battles.
To sum it all up, solid tactical gameplay, great deal of customization for your units, fun characters and their interactions with one another, professional voice acting, beautiful visual style, decent musical score, feel good fantasy story with a happy ending and a lack of any real negatives. Certified banger in my eyes.