Druidstone: The Secret of the Menhir Forest
TL;DR
Druidstone is a story-driven turn-based strategy that feels like a puzzle in disguise. Depending on the playstyle, it can be either entertaining or frustrating. For the former, it is highly recommended to comply with the puzzle nature of the game. Also, there is no traditional RPG here, only some JRPG influences.
Full Review
When I discovered that the authors of the Legend of Grimrock are working on a so-called “turn-based RPG,” I knew I would have to play it. Unfortunately, I cannot say that Druidstone is as good as Legend of Grimrock 2 is. The story is uninspired, dialogues are shallow when they should have been humorous, art style and music are unremarkable. And yet, the game somehow manages to satisfy my love for turn-based games, mainly because of its puzzle nature and hardcore difficulty at the beginning. It reminds me of chess compositions or campaign missions in Heroes of Might and Magic III but with more strategy involved (which is something I appreciate). Similar to roguelite’s gameplay loop, the more you progress in Druidstone, the easier it gets to replay previous missions with permanently stronger heroes. By choosing upgrades and buying items wisely, you can make your squad so powerful it will devastate any opposing force. Enemies are not the main “problem,” though. Every mission has its own twist, and if you do not know what exactly it might be, you better keep your best moves to yourself as long as possible. The game draws a lot from Grimrock’s legacy – you have to solve it in order to beat it; there are even a handful of trials without combat, all of them optional, although they are fairly easy to solve. This kind of gameplay with the lack of possibility to save and retry mid-mission might not be for everyone. If things go south, the only option is to restart the whole mission. The good news is that your heroes cannot die permanently (they just pass out), and you do not have to kill every enemy on the map; completing objectives is enough.
– Real player with 35.4 hrs in game
Read More: Best Adventure Strategy Games.
Video Review:
Druidstone is the first game from the Ctrl Alt Ninja, the new company formed from Almost Human. While the company’s name change, they say it’s mostly the same group of developers, but the result is a very interesting game. Almost Human was the company that produced the Legends of Grimrock series, an interesting call back to Might and Magic style RPGs. This time around Ctrl Alt Ninja looks back to D&D inspired strategy RPGs, does it hit the mark a second time?
– Real player with 32.9 hrs in game
Here Be Dragons
An unexpectedly wonderful game
Although not perfect, this game is wonderful! However, it may not be what you expect. This is not the (satyrical true!) story of how Christopher Columbus reached the New World, but the (indeed satyrical true!) telling of the events which led to his protagonism. While the former make us think this is a traditional RPG, with exploration, battles and a progression system consisting of evolving one or few characters until the end, the latter gives room to what it really is: a combat-only game with many characters, each of which protagonist in their own short campaigns, and where character progression starts after the first battle of the campaign and ends just before the last. What really progresses throughout all the game is combat complexity and the greater scheme which ties all campaigns together. So let’s dive deeper into both aspects.
– Real player with 20.2 hrs in game
Read More: Best Adventure Strategy Games.
There were two good things in this game that made me complete the game: battle mechanics and solid visual style during battles. But other elements of the game must be rewritten from the scratch:
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dialogs - thay are boooring; guys, please don’t try to do all the pieces of the game by yourselves, find good writer. Alternatively make an option “skip dialogs” to save time
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technically I don’t understand why 2D game had been made using Unity. It’s huge overkill, there’re many crossplatform libraries and frameworks for 2D games that can be run anywhere. Because of your poor decision the game doesn’t run on Linux
– Real player with 12.9 hrs in game
Korvux - Chapter 1
This game is quite amusing and fun to play. The story is easy to understand and the quests are not too simple or too difficult. Unfortunately the story is a bit short, so I’m even more excited about the sequel in the second chapter. The fighting system is well chosen and the opponents aren’t too easy or too difficult either. I also like the humor and the insiders in this game, which make it quite entertaining. Even the music is well adapted to the game and is not annoying.
In summary, the story was too short for me, but it was still a lot of fun to play. As already said, I’m looking forward to a sequel and I hope that I’ll find myself there as well :^) .
– Real player with 87.1 hrs in game
Read More: Best Adventure RPG Games.
Awesome game with a neat story and funny easter eggs. Would definitely buy again!
– Real player with 27.1 hrs in game
Lara Croft GO
A great Puzzle game with a lot of cool mechanics and awesome graphics.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1504132845
There is nothing connected with Lara Craft series except Lara Croft. I played some games earlier, they were made in action/RPG setting with a lot of dialogues and story. There is no story, there is no action and RPG elements. There are just Lara and a lot of puzzles :D
The game is turn-based puzzle game. There is no hurry, so you have a lot of time to think. Levels are small, so even if you die, you don’t need to make a lot of same actions again.
– Real player with 35.6 hrs in game
After the excellent Hitman GO, it would have been trivial to follow up with another game in a similar gameboard based world, just putting in the certainly much more attracrive Lara in place of 47. However, Square Enix Montreal took the high road, and ended up with something much more, and also much less… at least it looked like that for quite a while. Bear with me, this review is going to be of the long-a**ed persuasion.
By taking the high road, I mean that SqEM invented a completely different environment for the turn-based puzzles of Lara Croft GO. They chose to look like an old-school platform game set in 3D, surreptitiously inserting visual extras like dynamic lighting and smoothed edges into the decidedly low-poly environment. As a result, the game’s more closed-in spaces look simply very good, and then they open to beautiful vistas, sometimes containing not-yet-seen (or already seen) parts of the environments. The jungle / cave complex is rather static, so it’s all the more intense when some action like unfriendly animals or giant boulders happen. Massively adding to the atmosphere are the excellent sounds like gates crashing down behind, underlining the impossibility of going back, or the restrained soundtrack that’s maybe more a soundscape. In short, the game provides one of the best “being there” feeling I’ve ever encountered, and it’s pure joy to walk through the game’s levels, basically uninterrupted…
– Real player with 16.0 hrs in game
Please The Gods
IN A WORD: MAYBE
IN A NUTSHELL:
WHAT TO EXPECT: Indie made. Norse inspired setting. Simple rogue-like/adventure gameplay. Played on an evolving world map. Rogue-like quest structure. Numerous encounter types. Turn-based, synchronous, skill manipulated, dice combat. Twenty-six attack and defence skills. Buff, nerf and combat affecting mechanics. Influenced by Finnish mythology. Face a selection of enemies and their variants. Difficult boss battles. Singleplayer only.
– Real player with 19.4 hrs in game
I wanted to like this game, and there are some promising concepts here, but ultimately it’s all just too rough around the edges in all respects. It also commits the cardinal sin of making it so you can’t skip the tutorial. No excuse for that in the year of lord 2019 no matter how indie a game is.
The game is a dice game and as one might expect, luck plays a huge factor. There are skills one can collect with talent points that help tilt luck in your favor, but at the end of the day there’s no fix for poor dice rolls. As such death should be expected unless you play on easy difficulty and get default +2 bonuses to your attack and defense rolls, and even then, don’t expect to be impervious. Now death isn’t always such a bad thing in video games. In rogue-likes for example? Death is a feature. However in a rogue-like, if you die, at least the next time you go through the dungeon it’s been randomized a bit to keep that sense of “freshness” in your replay.
– Real player with 5.1 hrs in game
Squids Odyssey
Expected it to be a simple game to play between “serious games”- turned out to be a fun alternative to complicated titles.
– Real player with 52.8 hrs in game
Game good but it’s sad it’s experience is altered by various glitches and bugs
There are quite a lot of levels, around 20 hours of gameplay i would say?, add another 15 for completing
! pro mode .
The squids are cute
There are quite a lot of squids (around 10)
The levels look great
Can be very dynamic, especially with scout class squids
Can crash for multiple reaons, here’s a list (also some bugs)
-Clicking pause just before losing a game (like, your character fall and you want to restart to get 1 sec faster because of the losing screen)
– Real player with 37.2 hrs in game
The Labyrinth
The Labyrinth in a Game where you go in and create a team in which you would go into a dungeon and attempt to make it to the bottom. Its fairly easy (I have played it on hard mode) and there are many different possibilities for the room to be. Overall its a fun game and I’ll be putting more Hours into this and There can be so much more in Future updates.
– Real player with 101.5 hrs in game
I recommend the game.
This game has potential and places to grow and branch out, from different monster types to abilities. I was always a fan of these minimalistic game designs that just let you pass the time without having to stress over it.
At first the game seemed like a handful, lots of information but it turned out more simple and fluent in its controls than it seems. Sure its clunky and has some bugs, but is it worth its price? Sure it is! And if you still doubt if you want to buy it check it out on one of the many websites that its on for free!
– Real player with 52.6 hrs in game
Beasts Battle
Fun, worth playing, not that challenging.
This game reminds me of past days playing HOMM III.
Tips:
1, Always play careful, try to avoid losing troops, or you’ll have to spend much more time looting to win the last 2 battles on hard difficulty.
2, For Overlord mode, just go through easy mode first and get 60 mp, then it’s a piece of cake to get all 3 stars.
3, Remember to go back to compaign mode after complete a hotseat game, or the related achivement won’t unlock.
– Real player with 10.7 hrs in game
It is mildly entertaining, though its ‘features’ seem pointless. The perks system is irrelevent, the career ‘paths’ are nearly identical, the land obstacles serve no purpose other than visual and the strategy is always the same; focus on ranged attacks. It is too shallow to recommend.. perhaps the sequel will be an improvement.
– Real player with 8.6 hrs in game
Divinity: Original Sin - Enhanced Edition
This game fires on all cylinders. Combat is fun, Exploration is rewarding, Story is interesting, Humor is amusing. If you like rpgs and using your brain I can’t understand how you haven’t already played this game.
– Real player with 203.1 hrs in game
A really great game if you love RPG. It is really complex and challenging. It also provide you with flexibility to finish the game, be it flexibility to develop characters, freedom to completing quests and puzzles through various ways, and also variety of combos to kill your opponents in battles.
Storytelling is good. The best part is the quest design, especially the early main quest in Act 1. Several mid-end game side quest will be boring but the main quest overall is still fascinating. I also love the humor in the dialogues and character interactions.
– Real player with 171.1 hrs in game
Knights of Pen and Paper 2
This is a review of the paid PC version of the game. The free version may be slightly different.
Basically a cool party-oriented fantasy game. I find it disappointing only for the opportunities missed to make it better. But it is still worth playing. I spent $9.99 on the “Dragon Bundle”, which includes the base game plus the “Here be Dragons” expansion, and consider it definitely worth the money. This game is all about planning and party-building, the actual combat is rather dull and repetitive.
– Real player with 156.9 hrs in game
A very fun turn-based RPG. Here are some thoughts I had while playing this:
Pros:
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Lots of variety in character building. From different races, to different player-types, classes, skills, and equipment, there are almost endless ways to customize your heroes and build them however you want.
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Old School. Feels a lot like D&D, albeit simplified. There are a lot of d20 rolls and classic RPG mechanics.
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Replayability. With all the different kinds of characters you can build, and the fact that dungeons are mostly randomized, this game can pretty much be replayed an endless amount of times. There is also a good amount of base content even without replaying it. I currently finished the first story arc, and it took me about 10 hours, however there are at least 2 more story arcs if not more. So there is plenty to play.
– Real player with 42.1 hrs in game