Recent reviews by Whiskeyjoel

A perfect middle ground between Path of Exile's unrelenting complexity, and Diablo 4's...well, everything. I've been playing this game on and off for the last 4 years while it's been in development, and even early on it was obvious that game had tremendous potential. It's wild to think back on some of the early concepts vs what we have now in the finished product. The studio and dev team have done a fantastic job, as this is very clearly an ARPG made by ARPG fans.

Yes, the launch has been a bit choppy, yes it's frustrating to be locked out or have disconnects etc when all you want to do is play the game. But I see these server issues as a testament to the game's success. If no one wanted to play this game, the servers wouldn't be buckling under the load. EHG, keep doing what you're doing.

Superior to Vampire Survivors in every single way. Steamlined gameplay removes the superfluous story elements of VS, because lets face it, no one played VS for the "story". Overall, the tone and presentation is much better here, and doesn't look like a cheap arcade game, ability choices feel more impactful, and for $3...you really can't go wrong.

Some neat ideas, but the pace of the game is very slow (even considering that 4x games tend to be slower paced in general). Also, while interesting from a flavour perspective, the near-constant AI pontifications and incoming calls from "Houston" quickly become incredibly annoying and intrusive.

I like it, it's a fun game so far. I don't LOVE it, but I do like it. The battle system is fun and intuitive, they did a good job with that. The skills system is also well done, and if you're into lore and backstory, there's a whole "library" system you can delve into if you're into that. Things that aren't so great, well, the main story is a little weak so far. It's pretty basic, not a lot of complexity. Similarly, the characters are also pretty 1D, and the dialogue is weak, to say the least. Hopefully these things improve later in the game, but I'm about 5 hrs in so far, and it's not looking promising. In my playthrough so far, I'm also noticing that the game is just very EASY. Most maps my guys are a good 4 levels higher than enemies, which really trivializes a lot of the fight mechanics.

I think this game had a lot of potential that wasn't fully realized, which is a shame, because the bones of the game are solid. It's just missing that wow factor. I also think the game is a bit overpriced for what it is. I paid $80CAD, and realistically, I'd say this should be closer to the $60-65 range.

I'd give this about a 7/10, and while I DO find the game enjoyable for the most part, I would recommend waiting for a sale.

Game is quite good and I'm enjoying it a lot. I played the first Hard West game, and while also enjoyable with some interesting ideas, it was a bit rough around the edges. This game takes a lot of those original ideas and fleshes them out, while keeping the same "Supernatural Wild West" theme.

I'm not sure what all the moaning about the game not having true tactical combat is about, or that's it's "puzzle combat" and forces you to play a certain way. That's idiotic and also completely false. The game is very tactical, and will punish stupid decisions while rewarding good ones. This is not like X-COM where you can just rush in guns blazing. You need to plan out your moves in advance for optimal efficacy, pay attention to each character's unique abilities, and use cover and obstacles to your advantage. As far as battles having puzzles, each battle has at least one optional objective that you can fulfil for bonus rewards. Sometimes meeting the conditions can be tricky and require careful planning or trial and error, but that just means you have to actually use your brain. And if you don't feel like it and think that's too hard, at the end of the day those bonus objectives are OPTIONAL.

Moving on, two really interesting mechanics are Bravado and Trick Shot. Bravado gives a character a full AP reset when they land a killing blow. With careful planning and party management, you can abuse this mechanic to chain kill several enemy units before they can even act. Trick Shot allows you to use things like metal barrels to ricochet bullets to hit otherwise untargetable enemies, even allowing you to chain ricochet shots in some cases, although each "bounce" lowers the chance of hitting your end target. A third mechanic, Luck, plays a more passive but powerful role. Luck increases your chance to hit, and any time you miss you get a nice chunk added to your Luck meter for future use. When your luck meter is full, you can essentially cheese your hit chance by burning your Luck to guarantee a hit. This can come in very handy when used in conjunction with Trick Shot.

Recommended for people who enjoy turn-based tactical battles, and like having to use their brain. If you enjoy this game, I also recommend checking out Weird West. If you have Xbox Game Pass for PC, you can play the game without buying it.

Edit: I will say, the one issue I do have is the long loading times anytime you enter a battle. It's more of an annoyance than anything else, but it seems excessively long considering how smooth everything else is.

Meh. Janky and mediocre gameplay. Extremely limited character ability choices create artificial difficulty. Call me jaded, but in a world with so many other games out there, I'm pretty quick with my refund trigger finger, and this game didn't make the cut

While clearly a labour of love, the state of the game is...pretty rough. It's got potential, but I'd wait on this one until the EA is over

I'm really enjoying this game! I love Slavic mythology, it's so dark. The game is also very pretty and definitely has a unique visual style. There are a few idiosyncrasies, such as how you're a witch and summon demons, but are always saying things like "God bless!", but maybe that's just cultural affectations I'm not really understanding. The translation at times can also be a bit "off" and slightly confusing, but nothing I can't figure out, and it kind of adds to the charm. Combat is smooth and fun, I really like the way you can chain together spells to create different effects. With card-battle games, you never know if the implementation is going to be smooth, or needlessly gimmicky. I'm glad that this game got it right. Lastly, although this game has spoken English set as the default, I would highly recommend you set it to the native Russian. For one, it adds additional flavour and depth, and second, the English voiceovers are terrible.

As far as a bare-bones, cookie cutter Japanese tactical RPG goes, it checks all the boxes, but doesn't try to do anything new or original. You could make the argument that "if it's not broke, don't fix it" or that a tactical JRPG doesn't NEED to reinvent the wheel to be interesting. That's fair. But this game also lacks a lot of the complexity and polish of both modern tactical RPG's and the older classics. All in all, I found this game entirely forgettable, as it lacks any kind of defining traits that you can't get from a plethora of other games.

As a huge fan of both FFT and Tactics Ogre, I honestly found this game to be extremely disappointing. There's a big difference between paying homage to genre classics, and just being straight up derivative and unimaginative.

Refunded

So I've taken a few days to really digest and think about what I wanted to write about this game, at least in its current state.I played the prologue and really enjoyed it. The setting and the lore was very engaging, and I enjoyed the characters. Eager for more, I bought the full game, skipped the tutorial, went into the overland map, and landed face-first in...post-apocalyptic caravan simulator? Where did the storytelling go? Where is the risk vs. reward balance? Where are the engaging characters that actually make a game memorable? Yes, the locales are gorgeous in a blasted wasteland kind of way, and the lore is very interesting, but everything is drowned out in a sea of minutiae and tedium. I think that this game has potential, but in it's current state, that potential is not being realized. Not even close. Combat is ridiculously difficult, and not in a play smart to win way, more of a this game hates you and sets you up to fail, and there's nothing you can do about it kind of way. And if you do manage to win, it doesn't feel at all rewarding or satisfying. Likewise, successful caravan trips from one city to another quickly become tedious, as all you're doing is trying to stay ahead of the money and supplies burn. I get that the game wants to portray a harsh and unforgiving world, but there needs to be a balance between "this is hard but the payoff is worth it" vs. "this game is difficult for completely arbitrary reasons, and there's little to no reward factor". The result is a deeply unsatisfying experience mired in tedious detail and artificial difficulty. I wish there was a third option besides just YES or NO for recommendations, because I would say NOT NOW. Maybe this game will realize it's potential (it IS there), and maybe it won't. Time will tell. For now, I would not readily recommend this to anyone unless you're happy just playing a caravan sim with a thin coat of fantasy paint. If you want something more engaging, well, it's not there yet.

PROS:
-Gorgeous locations, even the map is super pretty
-Very detailed body of lore
-Unique concept and take on the whole post-apocalypse idea
-Great artistic style

CONS:
-Story-telling elements dry up significantly after the prologue is completed
-Companion characters are forgettable and feel like standard fantasy tropes, with almost indistinguishable personalities
-Constantly trying to prevent starvation and/or bankruptcy while just travelling from one city to another becomes very tedious very quickly
-Game is difficult for arbitrary reasons, with little to no reward to compensate
-Combat is a joke. Like seriously, it's so bad that the game would probably be improved by just removing it altogether