Ironclad Tactics
I’ve been playing Ironclad Tactics off and on for over a year. Only now, after earning every card, I realize that I forgot to write a review. It’s sort of a Plants VS Zombies game except that it’s Zombies VS Zombies, and the zombies are steampunk mechs.
The pace is realtime, but it moves slow enough to allow some thinking time for your next moves. Most of the challenge comes from building specialized decks to solve the puzzle that each level presents. Your AI opponent will have the upper hand with some new attack or defense and you’ll have to come up with a counter. Most of the time this results in a tense battle of planning, wits, and fortune. When you tweak a deck combo into working just right it feels great! Each new card opens up lots of tactical options and completing challenges for cards feels rewarding.
– Real player with 46.5 hrs in game
Read More: Best Card Battler Strategy Games.
I got this game in a bundle and I was so happy that I decided to give it a try - I would easily purchase it individually.
If you enjoy deck-building card game, laning-style gameplay, and the steampunk theme, then you will love this game.
The aesthetics are great - the detail put into the cartoon-style graphics are very nice. The cutscenes are delivered in a comic-book style format, and the art is well done. The music is sounds are also good and add to the atmosphere of the industrial-age setting.
– Real player with 22.4 hrs in game
Insane Robots
I am half way through this game and I am loving it! So many different robots and maps, so I must think of different ways to defeat them every time. I had so many close shaves but tries something new and beat the enemy robot. It’s fun to play with friends too, though not so many players in the online.
I wanted to post a quick review now, but will add more when it is all finished.
– Real player with 96.7 hrs in game
It deliver a 15 hour campaign as promised in the description of the game, and although it having a few cons overall its enjoyable.
Lets start at the pro’s
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Fun multiplayer
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Extra difficult levels, providing replayabilty value
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Easy to get into
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Appealing card battling
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Updates promised
And the cons
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Small multiplayer community (at the time of writeing this review)
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May feel grindy at times
– Real player with 17.5 hrs in game
Solaris Rift
BEST TEN MINUTES OF MY LIFE!!
– Real player with 0.7 hrs in game
Read More: Best Card Battler Strategy Games.
A fun little project of a game you can beat in an hour if you try. The devs did a really good job with making the strategy feel complex and worth thinking through with only a handful of main concepts. I definitely recommend checking Solaris Rift out and getting all the achievements!
– Real player with 0.5 hrs in game
Gremlins, Inc. – Card Game
This original digital card game offers intense sessions for 2 to 6 players. At the core of gameplay lie two key mechanics: “hand management” and “take that”.
SET IN THE WORLD OF GREMLINS, INC.
The game is set in the world of corrupt capitalist gremlins of the future, the setting that’s already familiar to the tabletop community from the digital board game Gremlins, Inc. .
This card game is a standalone game with its own original set of rules and mechanics, and does not require ownership or previous experience with the previously released digital board game.
BUILD PROJECTS WHILE ATTACKING OTHERS AND DEFENDING YOUR OWN ACHIEVEMENTS
The sessions are played for score and for rounds. The player with the highest score at the end of the session wins. Build temporary and permanent projects, play instant action cards and camouflage your plans from the opponents while preparing your attacks.
SINGLE-PLAYER AND MULTIPLAYER MODES
The sessions typically last between 20 and 60 minutes. The game supports single-player and multiplayer modes, including peer to peer sessions as well as games played on the official servers, and allows to play with different decks.
PROVEN BY REAL-LIFE SESSIONS
Before we set to make it into a digital game, this project existed as a real-life card game enjoyed around the world in 6 languages.
A VIBRANT COMMUNITY AND A PUBLIC ROADMAP
We release this card game under the Early Access program as we’ll be expanding and modifying it based on the community feedback. The roadmap includes such features as team mode, ranked sessions and the support of Steam Workshop.
Rise of Humanity: Prologue
I recommend this to fans of turn based games who are cool with card based attacks. This is basically a free demo of the full version of Rise of Humanity, and it accomplished its goal of getting me interested in the full game which I have now wishlisted.
Here is what you need to know:
+High quality graphics detail, great antialiasing, as well as decent music and sound effects, but as for graphic performance…
-Ultra graphics setting @ 1440p on my RTX 3080 maxes out the GPU with an average of ~90 FPS? Its not like I can zoom out wide, so I was hoping for something a bit closer to my 165 Hz refresh rate.
– Real player with 1.4 hrs in game
Changed the audio settings aaaand… it’s gone. Completely. Reinstall did not help. I’ll probably try it later, with version 1.x. Unplayable atm.
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upd.: the bug was fixed fast enough, devs are surprisingly interested in feedbacks, and gameplay, nevertheless still being buggy, is promising.
I’d like to see less pointless actions in battles, like move to the shoot distance - use card - click on the single enemy instead of use the card on the enemy on click. Or drag card on yourself if this is the only option to use it - on yourself. Also planing a chain would be better imho then use cards one by one.
– Real player with 1.2 hrs in game
SteamWorld Quest: Hand of Gilgamech
Makings of a Hero
SteamWorld is a franchise of vaguely connected games, each starring a friendly cast of robots. The latest entry – Hand of Gilgamech introduces a stark departure from the usual futuristic setting, venturing instead into the land of fantasy. Meet Armilly, an adventurer aspiring to at last become a member of the local heroes’ guild. Good heavens! The village has been invaded by an evil army and all of the heroes have been kidnapped. Such a tragedy, if only there was someone desperately longing for a worthy quest to finally prove themselves. It’s high time to gather your trusty companions and make this one count.
– Real player with 41.6 hrs in game
On my first playthrough I went with the Legend difficulty and I was not disappointed… Mostly. Also, quick note, I got the game half off so my thoughts are based around what I got for that price.
Starting with things I liked/loved:
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The Art is beautiful.
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The Characters are simple but lovable.
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The Music I find to be very pleasant to listen to.
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I love the opening and ending sequences, I wish there were more of these.
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The Ending Song, while short, made me smile. I love it.
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The card game mechanic is pretty solid. Deck-Building is fast and easy, chaining cards together for combos or allowing for an additional helpful card to be played is really fun, and while I didn’t use a lot of other cards, I can definitely see some ideas on how to use them for other play styles so I like that there is multiple options on how to play.
– Real player with 38.5 hrs in game
Rise of Humanity
Super fun game for X Com and Deck Building fans. Seems difficult at first, till you learn the amazing combo’s you can make (just make sure you don’t damage your team mates … too much !)
It’s still early access so there’s only 6 story missions yet, but there are side missions up for grabs!
Daily challenges are also a hoot, Hoping to see some real battles for the top of the leader board!
– Real player with 56.5 hrs in game
An interesting twist on XCOM2…
XCOM2 but with cards, is how this game can best be described. Now, this game doesn’t have the budget behind it that XCOM2 had, which almost automatically means that it’s going into a gun-fight with XCOM2 but this game is armed with a pistol and XCOM2 has a hellfire missile launcher… not very fair, but that’s the fight that the devs have chosen to engage in, and good luck to them… they’re gonna need it.
Pros: #1. Very good graphics (I’d say it’s almost as good as XCOM2)
– Real player with 32.4 hrs in game
Rust Raiders
Become a robot pirate captain in this roguelike deckbuilding game and defeat the evil Captain LeCrank. Rust Raiders brings the fun of deckbuilding games and the thrill of Roguelikes in a world filled with robot pirates controlled by an evil warlord called Captain LeCrank. Forge cards to improve their power, augment your ship with gadgets and build your own Deck! Experience the unique card system crafted exclusively for Rust Raiders.
Main Mechanics
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Build your Deck: Build your deck on the run by choosing from hundreds of cards in shops, battles, and treasure chests.
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Forge Cards: Collect cards to forge them into stronger versions of themselves in the Deck Forge.
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Dynamic Routes: Every time you set sail, your route will be different! You may choose your own path through forks, dangers, and treasures to reach the mighty LeCrank.
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Augment your ship with Gadgets: Find powerful Gadgets to augment your ship and be ready for each battle. Gadgets are available throughout the world on treasure chests and as rewards from the most difficult battles. Get them if you think you’re up to it!
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Unique Card System: Rust Raiders has a unique card system based on Captain/Crew/Ship card classes and Strategy/Attack/Mechanism card types. Create your strategies to defeat enemies and get the most out of each battle with card combos!
Prismata
The easiest way to describe Prismata is to call it a RTS-themed (think Starcraft) chess. Chess comparison comes from the fact it has 0 RNG of any kind and no hidden info so the game is deterministic i.e. one of the players has a guaranteed win based on the starting positions. But just like Chess, Prismata is incredibly complex where solving it is impossible.
Players start with 6 or 7 Drones that harvest gold (2nd player starts with 1 extra drone to compensate), gold buys you technology structures that produce blue/red/green resources (not official names, but that’s the accepted naming convention in the community). Subsequently gold and tech resources buy attackers/defenders and your goal is to kill opponent’s units while protecting your fragile drones and attackers. Sounds simple at its core.
– Real player with 981.4 hrs in game
EDIT: I almost don’t believe it. Within two days the devs released an update that addressed several of these issues. That’s just awesome. You hardly see that happen for any game these days.
Thumbs up for quality of life updates, and a great strategy game. There’s still room for improvement with drone defaulting to block and such, oh well. Game is good though.
Outdated:
I really want to love Prismata. At a glance, this could be the first truly free to play strategy “card” game without any of the pay to win nonsense, and a potentially fantastic game at that. But for a game that tries so hard to be different than all the others in its genre, why are there so many familiar disappointments?
– Real player with 203.9 hrs in game
Dark Cards
The other games by these devs are underappreciated gems, particularly Dark Mist, but also the better known Blood Card, both of which are fantastic. In this case, however, the devs have missed the mark, badly.
It’s worth noting up front that Dark Cards at this point is essentially abandonware… which is a good thing, in my opinion. Get the message that your game isn’t working, ask Steam to withdraw the game from sale, write this game off to experience and move on with your lives. Continuous microimprovements really aren’t going to be enough to make this game any better without breaking the entire thing down and starting again from scratch.
– Real player with 3.7 hrs in game
I would not recommend the game in its current state.
The game’s idea is fun and all but at this point it feels like an unfinished product. This game requires a lot of polish to become a good game. the animations aren’t that smooth and feel a bit laggy, which can be seen in the few examples in the store page. I also encountered two bugs which broke the game and stopped it from responding to alt-F4 in my 30 mins of play time. Nevertheless I still believe in its potential so I will leave my review positive for now.
– Real player with 0.8 hrs in game