Tainted Grail: Conquest
Song: Tainted Grail Artist: Vlakabaka
“Sometimes I feel I’ve got to, run away, i’ve got to, play a chill card game for a run or two
And the love we shaaare for card games is all in d’ere, with 9 classes, lots of deckbuilding and re-play-aability
Some runs might end baaad and some might go well but with this game time seems to goo noo-where
And this Tainted Grail is full of story, voiiiice acted characters in a daark tainted woorld
So taaake Gabens tears awaaay and buyy diz game here, cause you dont want to hear any-moe from mee
– Real player with 73.6 hrs in game
Read More: Best Dark Fantasy Turn-Based Games.
It’s very similar to Slay the Spire and Monster Train but you’ll like it more than either of those if you prefer a dark aesthetic. The music and story are also more substantial here than other games in the genre. You get access to 3 classes (basically archer, fighter, invoker) which determine the type of base deck you’ll play. Every class is broken into 3 subclasses (i.e. invokers can be summoners, blood mages, or necromancers) that each have unique passives and a unique subclass ability. It’s honestly pretty remarkable how each subclass feels very distinct from its counterparts.
– Real player with 69.4 hrs in game
Olden: Card Game
Olden: Card Game is designed in such a way that every battle will give a different and unique experience. A mix of overpowered and weak cards in your hand and deck will constantly test you and your opponent ability to adapt and make the best out of the current situation. In order to give players a form of individuality and theory crafting outside the match, the game offers unique talent systems per every avatar that will help the player with various perks.
In this battle of entities there is no deck building and no card collecting, so all you need to do in order to enter the match is to choose your avatar and hit the play button.
For now, there is: Entity of Light, Death, Chaos and Life.
Your entity will give your troops a unique bonus during the whole length of the game.
Basic rules
To win the game, the player needs to harvest 300 value points. Your entity receives value points whenever you sacrifice your own cards.
Once your turn begins, you receive 2 tokens: an action token and a draw token. Your options are to:
- Play a card and build your board presence
or
- Engage in combat by attacking one of your opponents’ cards
or
- sacrifice your own card, so you can harvest its current value.
Doing any one of these three things will consume your action token.
To consume your draw token, simply click on the main deck to draw a card, and that’s it.
For now, there are 3 card abilities, effect, passive and combat.
Effect is something that will happen only once, at the moment a card is played by the player. A card’s effect does not trigger in cases where you summon or resurrect it with other cards. Effects take place only if they are played directly from your hand.
A card’s passive ability will be present so long as the chosen card is on the board. Once the card with the passive ability is removed from the board, its passive ability will go away along with it.
Combat ability is something that will only trigger once that card engages in combat with an enemy card.
As mentioned, you can use your turn to perform an attack action and engage in combat. To perform an attack, simply place your card on the top of the opponent card. After one turn, your card value number will sink its value into the opposing card. If your card has enough value to destroy your opponent’s card, it will do so, and then it will return to your side of the board.
If your card does not have enough value to destroy an opponent’s card, it will do its damage after one turn, and then be destroyed.
You can engage in combat with cards that are already on the board, or with the cards from your hand.
One card can be attacked by multiple cards at the same time.
To win the game, a player needs to harvest 300 value points. Players can harvest value points by sacrificing their own cards that are not currently in combat. To perform a card sacrifice, select your card, and then click on its respective altar. Performing a card sacrifice will consume your action token.
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We thank you for having the time to check out our first game.
Read More: Best Dark Fantasy Turn-Based Combat Games.
Aeon’s End
If you want to try out Aeons End, or really prefer to play games digitally, it’s pretty good but brief. If you have all the physical base sets, expansions, and so forth, I don’t think you’ll be getting rid of them anytime soon for this (unlike, say, how Sentinels of the Multiverse is so good on digital that I’ll never play the physical edition again).
I won’t comment on game play and such, but there’s a decent tutorial that goes over most concepts (while letting players discover the synergies of the game themselves). There’s also currently no multiplayer for those who demand it (I suspect it’s in the works though), nor AI players either; one player controls all the mages' actions (although you could potentially do “pass and play” gaming). It’s a non-issue to me, but a determining factor for others.
– Real player with 86.2 hrs in game
Read More: Best Dark Fantasy Dystopian Games.
My Biases: I backed this on kickstarter not because I have played the physical game but because I really like the developer and the game seemed to be very fun if their streams were any indication. I really enjoy the game from what I have done so far.
Aeon’s end is a cooperative deck builder game where up to 4 mages try to beat back monsters that seek to destroy humanity. The game is an uphill battle but certainly winnable. There are many ways to approach the battles and lots of variability depending on the mages and supply cards you use.
– Real player with 70.1 hrs in game
Cardlings
I really want to like this game! It has such an interesting dynamic game flow. The push and pull of timing your plays to be as precise and efficient as possible to end your turn before your opponent gets a chance to build up as much is very interesting. Sadly, the parts I was most looking forward to are the parts that could still use some work. The card based unit selection is fine, if a bit random. Card based building however seems to have some issues. If the game goes on long enough, I end up with a hand full of entirely gold mines turn after turn, when there are at most 2-3 on the map at any given time and once they’re built they’re either destroyed or bribed, so there’s no reason to have more than 3-4 in the entire ‘deck’. Being able to view the ‘deck’ for units and buildings or at least know what the hand drawing mechanics are would help me feel less frustrated about this.
– Real player with 14.1 hrs in game
I’d like to see more for this game. It has really no ‘story’ mode or anything that keeps you playing it, it ends rather quickly unless you want to go online. I’d like to see a story mode, card upgrades, transforms, things that add more depth. For a cheap game it’s good but I won’t spend hours playing it. I would love to see the ability to rotate buildings or destroy plants / stones that are in the way, as well as the ability to go THROUGH buildings with your troops or around trees as it can be too easy to trap the troops.
– Real player with 5.5 hrs in game
Clash of Legions
Not a terribly sophisticated game…easy to play…easy to understand…easy to spend money. If you want to play a quick, fun, and low level of intensity game this is the one that fits the bill.
– Real player with 119.6 hrs in game
64 hours an frustrated. I love this style of game and when this one works its really fun. However do not spend money on any rubies. Actually don’t spend any of the rubies you earn right now. So much of this game is broken in a horrid way. The pet shop doesn’t work at all but it will take your 200 rubies or 50000 gold every time you try it. I lost 150k/600 rubies testing this. Thats 3 REAL DOLLARS of in game currency. The honor store doesn’t work. You grind pvp battles to earn enough points and then can’t do nothing with it. You grind MP Dungeons and get lucky picks then you just don’t get the rewards. Packs cost to much for what you get. I opened 10 packs at once 3 times with rubies. ONE ORANGE PER 10 PACKS! THAT’S $21 REAL DOLLARS WORTH! The creators carbon copied a super fun game from Kongregate and are now using it to rob fokes. This is a FULL RELEASE! How is that even possible. It should be early access with 0 pay features. Y’all owe me actual paper fools. Just gonna take my rubies and dip wit the package. Y’all should be ashamed of yourselves. Did I forget to mention the devs don’t exist. 0 contact with players and no way to complain. I wanted this game to do well but it flopped all over my face. if the Devs exist y’all got some serious butt to kiss. Its to late for me. I’m in way to deep already. If you want to save yourself DO NOT JUMP DOWN THIS HOLE! Its a cold hole.
– Real player with 116.5 hrs in game
Armello
I always come back to this game when I have time on my hands, and I’m itching for a good dice/card game. Which this game has both! I love that no matter wwhich character you use, there is always a chance to win. dlc characters are less ‘pay to win’ and more of exploring different playstyles over multiple games. there are some very pretty dice that’re so satisfying to hear/use in game.
– Real player with 171.7 hrs in game
I recommend the game but I have to put a negative review because the multiplayer doesn’t allow users to reconnect once we get disconnected for a few seconds. Therefore if we have connection issues for a few seconds. we loose our games, can’t move the character. Such a shame.
– Real player with 164.1 hrs in game
Cards of Cthulhu
Cards of Cthulhu is a casual little game, simple in design but with suprising depth. You pick cards for your deck from a choice of random two. Two cards at the beginning and more are added as you progress through the battles. Then you jump onto your motorcycle, grab your shotgun and ride across the wasteland to face off against Cthulhu himself - who stole your girlfriend, as villains in games have traditionally been fond to do.
Each opponent you meet on your way you fight by playing your cards (and autoattacking with your shotgun). Simple enough? The depth of the game is knowing when during a combat round to play each card, in battles with consequitive fights of more than one enemy which card to save for the next enemy, which card in a given situation perhaps not to use at all, which cards to deny your enemy from playing, and when to not play cards.
– Real player with 13.4 hrs in game
This game packs a lot of style and fun in a simple package, It is relentlessly focussed on play dropping you right in the game and back to the start when the game ends, which is minor but a refreshing change from the typical game with lots of menus and cut scenes wasting your time. This one has confidence in what it is delivering and delivers it proudly.
Each game you collect a small deck of cards each of which can be used once against a monster or set of monsters. In this way each run feels fresh because you are building a new deck which will be played differently than other decks.
– Real player with 8.2 hrs in game
FORWARD: Escape the Fold
FORWARD: Escape the Fold was created to be the perfect bitesized roguelike dungeon crawler. Choose your champion and face a relentless crawl through the card-based dungeons, collect items to power your abilities and defeat the gruesome monsters facing you. But keep going FORWARD!
FEATURES
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Unique Progression System: Make your way through the dungeons by choosing a path from 3 cards at every turn but choose wisely! One bad decision can lead you to the graveyard. Select the next card which will help you get one step closer to redemption!
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High Energy Roguelike: You will need to make decisions at every step of the way. Crawl one card at a time and combine objects found in chests, markets and at the end of each dungeon to bolster your character’s abilities. Beware of the cursed items and their devastating effects!
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Just One More Turn: In the Fold, you will never feel prepared. Designed for replayability, each ascent is original and will feel fresh and challenging even to the most experienced player. Use your instincts and knowledge of your champion to fight away the gruelling beasts that populate the underworld.
WHAT YOU WILL DISCOVER IN THE FOLD
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9 Champions to unlock with unique powers and backstories. Learn more about this mysterious underworld and understand what brought these enigmatic champions there. Additionally, master their powers as they will alter radically your ascent and your playstyle.
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100+ fully detailed item-cards to discover.
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Leaderboards for the most powerful players. Easier said than done to be up there.
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Fast-paced gameplay enabled by the one-input gameplay. Keeps the game dynamic at all times.
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Gorgeous 2D pixel-art.
ABOUT TWO TINY DICE
Two Tiny Dice is the result of Christophe Coyard’s journey through indie development. He is the solo-developer of FORWARD: Escape the Fold and has previously worked on various small mobile games with the aim of developing his game design skills. Driven by passion, Christophe Coyard built this game from scratch for a 2019 GameJam and has since then worked hard to develop the ultimate bitesized roguelike game.
You can follow him on Twitter @twotinydice !
Heroes of Zaruban
This is an adaptation of a board game for two players.
The game takes place on one playing field. In turn with the enemy, you make moves with your cards or use objects. To win the game, you need to destroy the main card (Place of Power) of the enemy. There are no pre-prepared decks here - all cards and items are selected in turn from the general list. Already at the stage of choosing and placing cards, you can get a significant advantage over the enemy by blocking or taking the cards he needs.
All cards in the game (Heroes and Places of Power) have basic characteristics (attack, defense, health) and 2-3 unique skills. Items play a supporting role. They can both enhance the basic parameters of your cards, and inflict direct damage to enemy cards.
For a comfortable game, it is better to start playing with a friend, gradually learning the abilities of different cards and objects, their strengths and weaknesses. There are currently 35 Hero cards in the game, 6 Power Place cards and about 50 items.
Kingslayer Tactics
Kingslayer Tactics is a unique low fantasy game set in the chambers of European castles at the turn of the sixteenth and seventeenth century. You play as the Kingslayer called “The Raven”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wQd55tNpUc
In this interesting and mysterious renaissance world you will learn the tactics, strategy and adventure of a person dedicated to his goal. Sneaking through castle corridors and fighting with hordes of royal guards is not the only thing you need to do. Planning your next step and upgrading your weapons is equally as important.
Interesting and mysterious world
The game world is inspired by the European kingdoms and principalities, but the realities of the game are far from historical facts. The game takes the player on a journey through mysterious lands, set in an alternative version of the Renaissance Europe
The story
Enter a dark and mysterious story about “The Raven” and discover his secrets. Since the story about the Kingslayer was told for the first time in a tavern, it is still floating around among european sorcerers.
Tactics, strategy and adventure
Kingslayer is a unique combination of tactics, strategy and adventure in one game. Top-down shooter mechanics mixed up with stealth gameplay elements and RPG features creates an interesting and addictive gameplay.
Unique gameplay features
1. Upgrade your weapon by replacing steel parts with unique elements made of precious metals.
2. Turn into a raven in order to avoid a deadly threat and get into hidden and protected chambers.
3. Explore the refined locations, wander around the world of the 12 Kingdoms in the form of a “Raven”.
4. Collect important information about your goals, learn about the game universe and obtain rare artefacts by completing artfully designed quests.
5. Learn the story about a complicated character that combines the characteristics of a villain and a noble knight, but gives no pretext for clearly define his moral choice.
