Despair. Despair everywhere. Despair among us. No hope. Death. Desolation.
Well this is pretty much how it is going in DD's world. But does this dark theme (use dark reader to preserve your sight wink wink) also applies to gameplay? That's actually a good question.
I would have answered a straight forward "yes" if you had asked me this several weeks ago. But a friend of mine brought his Switch for the new year party (don't judge us) and made me play this. I was very pleasantly surprised by how "accessible" it was. I put "accessible" between quote marks because we must remember it is a rogue lite marketed as hardcore. That means it isn't accessible for 99% of videogame players. But it isn't as hardcore as I thought.
And basically that's why I liked it. It's actually cool. It takes his time to correctly explain what's important and then... The game vanishes behind its gameplay. Which is actually the best thing it could have ever do. And I'm very happy with it.
Gameplay is "aux petits oignons" as we say in french. Literally, "as sweet as onions". It's the infamous "everything matters" rule. The game's based on squads composed of 4 characters. The position of your squad members is utterly important : knights should be in front to tank and reach the enemy while mages must be backward to safely cast AOE spells. On top of this you add a little bit of randomness and a system of double health gauge (actual health & stress health) and you obtain a very addictive game loop. Of course, because XCOM exists, all the things you loot must be reinvested in your base to upgrade your buildings, which allows you to upgrade your characters, which allows you to beat greater challenges with greater rewards. And that's basically it.
I quit with no regret once the game became a little hard, just before it became "unfair" in my opinion (How are you supposed to have enough healing power in your team without a vestal?). I played... Holy moly 10 hours! I thought it was only 6h! If that's not the sign it's a good game, I don't know what it is!
It's a cheap game that supports an indie studio, go buy it and play it ;)
Well this is pretty much how it is going in DD's world. But does this dark theme (use dark reader to preserve your sight wink wink) also applies to gameplay? That's actually a good question.
I would have answered a straight forward "yes" if you had asked me this several weeks ago. But a friend of mine brought his Switch for the new year party (don't judge us) and made me play this. I was very pleasantly surprised by how "accessible" it was. I put "accessible" between quote marks because we must remember it is a rogue lite marketed as hardcore. That means it isn't accessible for 99% of videogame players. But it isn't as hardcore as I thought.
And basically that's why I liked it. It's actually cool. It takes his time to correctly explain what's important and then... The game vanishes behind its gameplay. Which is actually the best thing it could have ever do. And I'm very happy with it.
Gameplay is "aux petits oignons" as we say in french. Literally, "as sweet as onions". It's the infamous "everything matters" rule. The game's based on squads composed of 4 characters. The position of your squad members is utterly important : knights should be in front to tank and reach the enemy while mages must be backward to safely cast AOE spells. On top of this you add a little bit of randomness and a system of double health gauge (actual health & stress health) and you obtain a very addictive game loop. Of course, because XCOM exists, all the things you loot must be reinvested in your base to upgrade your buildings, which allows you to upgrade your characters, which allows you to beat greater challenges with greater rewards. And that's basically it.
I quit with no regret once the game became a little hard, just before it became "unfair" in my opinion (How are you supposed to have enough healing power in your team without a vestal?). I played... Holy moly 10 hours! I thought it was only 6h! If that's not the sign it's a good game, I don't know what it is!
It's a cheap game that supports an indie studio, go buy it and play it ;)