Winter Voices
Once upon a time, there was an unlucky girl.
~Rule of Rose
Steam library is full of hidden gems. And today, ladies and gentlemen, I’ll tell you about one of them. Winter Voices. An episodic RPG from a small team of talented French people. By looking on screenshots, you, probably, already got some impressions about what this game may be, but let me tell you something – forget it. Winter Voices is not what it seems (Twin Peaks pun intended).
First of all, battles in this game… are not really battles. Even though they’ll look a lot like our usual TBS battles and there’ll be a lot of various skills to learn, the “battles” here feel more like puzzles. Sounds weird and, well, it is. Even though I’ve finished thousands of games in my life, I don’t think I remember anything like that. Your character will have proper TBS-like stats, HP and skills, but you’ll rarely get a chance to directly attack your enemies and the goals will rarely ask you to kill something. Most of the time you’ll need to avoid the enemies, or push them to achieve certain goals. Which can be tricky. To say the least. The “battles” may be pretty hard and confusing, but I ended up liking them a lot. Because of how challenging they were, because of how different they were and, of course, because of the story.
– Real player with 133.3 hrs in game
Read More: Best RPG Indie Games.
Winter Voices is an indie text heavy RPG a bit akin to Planescape: Torment, but also very different. Its strongest point is its fairly linear psychological and existential story centred on some of the darker aspects of us humans, but ultimately it’s an experience of struggle, development, hope and growth; made with psychological insight. Next its “combat” encounters and its weakest the free roam hub-sections like the starting village. The game has a lovely artistic vision and ambience created by its hand-in-hand art direction, soundscape and writing. Which all have a wonderful poetic feel and are tied into the “combat system” beautifully. Plus if you are fond of metaphorical writing in works like “Thus Spoke Zarathustra” by Nietzsche, then you’re bound to find the dream sequences interesting, as they employ metaphors to great effect. That said the English translation can be a bit iffy, so play it in its native French if you can.
– Real player with 56.4 hrs in game
Dragon Age: Origins - Ultimate Edition
Dragon Age: Origins is a God-Tier RPG. However I like to elaborate on my reviews, and so let me elaborate. I will try to keep spoilers to a minimum, but please note that I might let a couple things slip.
Now as a prelude, I’ll cover the gameplay, graphics and mechanics. Personally in RPGs this matters so little to me. I still play Fallout 2 and enjoy the hell out of KOTOR and Mass Effect. But…lets be real here. They suck. The graphics are…okay-ish? The gameplay has the pacing of tetris and the mechanics are just…old. None of it is fast paced nor are there any really cool abilities looks-wise. None of this is important to me, in fact, its clunkiness brings out a personal enjoyment. But yeah…its definitely really aged. It would also be remiss of me not to mention the fact that the game is ancient, and therefore crashes on newer PCs. About once an hour for me personally. Now I was able to fix it by way of a guide a while back, but going into it expect performance to be less than stellar. Now onto the meat.
– Real player with 182.8 hrs in game
Read More: Best RPG Fantasy Games.
❤ Audience ❤
☑ Beginner
☑ Casual
☑ Hardcore
☼ Graphics ☼
☐ Bad
☑ Alright
☐ Good
☐ Beautiful
☐ Fantastic
♬ Music ♬
☐ Bad
☐ Alright
☐ Good
☐ Beautiful
☑ Fantastic
☠ Difficulty ☠
☐ Easy
☑ Average
☐ Challenging
☐ Hard
☐ Brutal
§ Bugs §
☐ Bugs make the game almost unplayable
☐ Lots of bugs
☑ Few bugs
☐ Insignificant or contains humorous glitches
☐ None encountered during normal gameplay
☯ Story ☯
☐ There is none
☐ Bad
☐ Alright
☐ Good
☑ Fantastic
⚔ Gameplay ⚔
☐ Frustrating
☐ Repetitive
☐ Boring
– Real player with 170.9 hrs in game
The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings Enhanced Edition
This game was made for Team Triss 😍!
And oh yeah, its a great rpg in the Witcher franchise, you wont be disappointed!
– Real player with 130.8 hrs in game
Read More: Best RPG Fantasy Games.
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– Real player with 98.1 hrs in game
ANOTHER EDEN
This is actually the 2nd time I’ve started this game. I first played this game on mobile when it first launched on mobile. This was during the launch period when Mariel was considered the best 5star and Toova and Mighty were strong offense. Things have changed a lot since then. I lost my mobile account because they did not have a google link at that time. So I’m literally starting from the beginning.
The only reason I’m willing to do this is because of this game’s permanent content system. All events are retained permanently. For every other gatcha game I’ve ever played, I never see myself as a returning player. So this is the best thing I want to praise about Another Eden. I really like the permanent content and in my opinion, this makes it far better than all the other gatcha games. Just this point alone.
– Real player with 630.0 hrs in game
Another Eden is a spiritual successor to Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross with some members of the original team (like Masato Kato and Yasunori Mitsuda) onboard, a love letter to jRPGs of the 90s with a modern feel.
The game itself is massive and is similar in scope to live-service MMOs, except Another Eden is a purely single-player 2.5D jRPG. New story content for it is still being released on a regular basis, expanding it even more with each new update.
=GAMEPLAY=
The gameplay here is of a classic turn-based jRPG with random encounters and limit breaks (called Another Force here). The biggest difference from the classics is that this game has gacha mechanics for acquiring additional characters, each of which has their own set of story quests. The amount of stones for pulls the game gives its players is pretty generous though, the pulls contain only characters and nothing else, additional styles or class upgrades for owned characters can be unlocked through farming certain in-game resources instead of pulling for them, and the characters that can be unlocked as rewards for story progression can be quite powerful as well, especially the ones from ‘Tales of’ and ‘Persona 5’ collaborations. Unlike character banners, all the story and crossover events don’t expire (except for the most recent Chrono Cross collaboration, which has a 5-year license, but hopefully they’ll be able to extend it).
– Real player with 374.9 hrs in game
Starstruck: Prologue
Starstruck is an unconventional rhythm adventure game that harkens back to the glory days of quirky Japanese passion projects from the early PS2 era. Not to say that the game relies on nostalgia, but it has that same intangible charm you can find in games like Gitaroo Man, Stretch Panic and Chulip.
Although cast in the same mold, Starstruck very much has its own identity. The game goes for a miniature aesthetic and it’s used to great effect. The lighting is gorgeous and you can often spot deliberate imperfections like fingerprints in the 3D models that really sell the hand-crafted look. This paired with the sublime composition and sound design— heavily featuring LIVE instruments— culminate into creating an alluring, dreamlike atmosphere that’s simply a joy to take in.
– Real player with 20.2 hrs in game
Words cannot describe the sheer delight I had playing this game. It’s really something special.
A friend of mine described it as “A playable rock opera straight off the Dreamcast/PS2” and I couldn’t agree more with that statement.
To me, the world and characters of Starstruck have that kind of magic that, like, a 1970s or 80s children show has. There’s a unique kind of nostalgia that I get from playing this game; it really takes me back to my youth, playing with my Thomas the Tank Engine table set and knocking down the little cutout trees, buildings, and people with my hands.
– Real player with 19.1 hrs in game
Starstruck: Hands of Time
Play guitar in an interactive rock opera
Play guitar in musical story segments, with a catchy soundtrack featuring live instruments and singing by Elsie Lovelock (Hazbin Hotel). If you still have your Guitar Hero or Rock Band guitar controller, dust it off, because this game supports it!
Destroy the world as a giant human hand
Demolish houses, solve puzzles, and open new paths for other characters as a giant hand. Unleash your destructive potential using hammers, screwdrivers, and more.
A strange game set in a miniature world
Save the future by exploring the strange diorama world of 20XX. Meet weirdly cute characters and unravel the mystery of how their little lives are connected to the end of mankind.
No rhythm? No problem
If you want to experience the music and story without the stresses of rhythm gameplay, you can enable “Autoplay” in the options menu. When Autoplay is enabled, the rhythm gameplay sections will play themselves.
Features
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Explore three intertwined adventures set in a charming diorama world, switching characters to solve puzzles and change the future.
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Play guitar and dodge attacks to an original soundtrack in catchy musical story segments.
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Destroy the world as a giant human hand in hectic action-puzzle gameplay. (By the way, you can also customize the hand’s size and skin color.)
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Extensive controller support allows you to play with your keyboard, Xbox controller, PS4 controller, Switch Pro Controller, or even guitar controller! You can also remap controls as you wish for the rhythm gameplay.
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Adjust the difficulty level between “Normal” and “Master” mode for the rhythm gameplay to suit your style, or just sit back and watch with “Autoplay” mode.
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Original soundtrack by acclaimed composer Andrew Allanson features live instruments and vocals spanning many genres.