Recent reviews by Admiral Meaples

Finished the first run in 12 hrs and 58% achievements, expect maybe another 3-5 hrs of content (excluding difficulty play achievements) to speedrun alternate paths.
PS: I heard about this game via splattercat's run of the demo and I knew I had to get it.

What is it?
- New unique IP story card game that reminds me of foretales/ witcher-thronebreaker/ black book mechanically. Very nice art and clearly made by a team of dedicated developers who want to create. World concept and general story are set in medieval-esque europe/france with relics instead of magic.

You play as a band of Paladins on a quest to escort some important folk before it escalates into something more....

Review: 8/10
GOOD:
A. Excellent aesthetic, art style and environment presentation. Presentations of Paladins are put together with care even if you only ever see them once. World building sets a nice tone with different parts of the story showing unique areas within the kingdom.

B. A straightforward plot but filled with choices that impact decisions and who you fight. I like that the points of critical pivot give you enough weight to feel unsure of the choice's outcome which to me indicates good buildup.

C. Music is top notch for the size of the team. While tracks are not super varied, they do change during key moments but I feel that the vocals for one of the songs may be overbearing in the scene it was used.

D. Boss battles. Good and varied, with plenty of challenges to ensure you use your Paladins to their full potential. Each boss has somewhat unique mechanics that challenges the player. Not dark souls level but fun enough for any card game player to comprehend.

E. Responsive developers. Very active in the steam discussion and solved a game breaking patch pretty quickly. I like that there are still small indie devs who really want their game to do well and I applaud and support their ambition, maybe pushing for a sequel as their world is already built up.

NEEDS IMPROVEMENT:
A. Customization and replayability.
- While the core concept of each paladin's playstyle is unique, it does automatically funnel you into a specific overarching style of play for said paladin. I think it would be more fun/unique to actually change the deck or skill trees when you obtain relics from another paladin. This may open up the gameplay options and boss encounters more at the cost of balancing.
- When replaying the game, there could be an idea to swap out Paladins instead to encourage replaying the main story, maybe even writing some specific dialogues for special scenarios.
- You could see how knights in tight spaces handled the variability and rogue-like progression.

B. Context and exploration.
- While I give praise to the main story for being straightforward, I still felt that the plot moved very quickly, without opening up areas to exploration and sidequests. One could argue that the plot has sidequests built in, but I would like to spend more time idle chatting with characters and learn more about the world/organizations or paladins.
- An idea would have been to weave vulnerabilities to these conversations or even clues as to how certain Paladins would fight.
- Another idea would be to weave choices hidden in casual dialogue that only show up later in the game.
- Another idea would be to put a decision tree in to see how much of the world you've covered.
- Most of the additional context/information is written in the game's wiki, but I would prefer a show, don't tell approach to worldbuilding.

C. Mechanics.
- The core game takes place on a single board with limited mobility options.
- As an idea, why not try different board formats with larger rooms to give a sense of mobility. Example could be to use multi-floor boards or board-to-board connections which makes combat larger/more varied.
- See tactical breach wizards and knights in tight spaces.

What is it?
Harry potter SWAT team + Into the breach
- Bought after watching splattercat + I've played their original gunpoint so these guys are legit.
- The game is closer to a puzzle strategy rather than an XCOM-esque style open world game.

THE GOOD:
A. Excellent well thought out mechanics.
- Taking inspiration from Into the Breach, TBW (Tactical Breach Wizards) follows a turn based strategic turn formula that allows the player to completely see the turn before it happens without the BS 99% missed shots.
- No save scumming required as you can redo your entire turn (but not your previous turn) to optimize your combat outcome.
- Each ability in the game from each character is unique, complimentary and set up for combos. You can see that the developers have done their homework to make each ability useful in specific applications.
- Confidence (extra objectives) are a good way to test your skills and understanding of the mechanics but I really appreciate the developers did not purposely make the objectives unachievable during your first play of the mission. Gameplay padding is a pet peeve of mine and I HIGHLY commend the developers for respecting my time.

B. Excellent story, characters and pace.
- Story is clear, straightforward and engaging.
- All characters are extremely relatable (as much as wizards can be) and bounce off each other with unique personalities. Zan, Jen, Dall, Rion and Banks are well written with the expected quickfire quips you'd expect from the same Gunpoint developer.
- Stakes are clear with a believable big bad and escalation build up without dumping too much on the player.

THE MIDDLE:
A. Effectiveness of ability upgrades and character falloff towards late game.
- During the game, upgrades can be purchased for each of your characters as they level up. However, due to the game mechanics, some upgrades are definitely worth more than the others in terms of general applicability vs special circumstance. I understand that balancing abilities while ramping difficulty is quite a conundrum and I think the developers opted to use level design as a balancing factor. This in turn makes "generally applicable" upgrades better overall compared to situational setups.
- Due to the uniqueness of characters and difficulty escalation towards late game, some characters tend to become overshadowed. For example -> Zan with upgraded clones and supporting fire are in general more effective action wise due to the refund of clone upon death. Paired with Dall's infinite charge and friend swap, this combo overshadows Jen and Rion in the late game.*
*Due to the mission team setup, I think this is less of a concern as the player will only see the effects of overshadowing when the full team is present.

NEEDS IMPROVEMENT:
A. None - this is an excellent title.

RECOMMENDATIONS:
A. Please consider more DLC story content (i.e. Navy Seer Liz / Zan stories) with more STEVE.
B. Making a PVP squad builder team system could be a fun addition although balancing will go out the window.

Disclaimer: Encountered game breaking bug towards end of the game and unable to progress and complete the game. Buyer beware.

What is it?
Slavic/Eastern European folklore action RPG. Novel when it comes to storytelling, full voice acting but gameplay is basic. Would give it a strong 7/10, but my current score is 5.5/10 due to game breaking bug with no remedy. An earlier save cannot be loaded due to the nature of the save system.
- Bought after seeing splattercat's video on it.

THE GOOD:
A. Environments, world building and exploration.
- Eastern/Slavic folklore is not regularly touched on in action RPGs, think Witcher light with similar influences from black book (card game). The devs have wonderfully implemented interesting maps and environments which make you go -> "Hey I want to go there". Ironically, the lack of any point of interest markers like in Assassin creed encourages players to simply walk around and explore the map (which is hand drawn and very nice).
B. Voice acted interesting characters.
- Surprisingly, the voice acting in this game ranges from medium to great. Some characters are played extremely well and come off as high quality/memorable such as the lead (Yaga)/ mushrooms (BB and SJ). However, the casting of some of the cast feels a bit off due to the heavy accent (narrator/cat).
C. Novel story.
- I haven't played a game with a story like this, almost reminding me of an Alice in Wonderland book but Slavic. I would like to see the story expanded in a sequel, like a modern (cyberpunk fantasy?) rendition with Yaga in full Adidas tracksuit.

THE MIDDLE:
A. Mobility.
- Surprisingly, this game has quite a few varied ways of moving around, from dash/sprint/teleportation/warp and builds the environment where the player has freedom to use any/all options available. The inclusion of late game areas with "destructible" environments should be expanded on in the sequel to encourage revisiting early areas and puzzle solving.

NEEDS IMPROVEMENT:
A. Combat.
- Ranged is the only viable option in this game and while serviceable, needs to be strengthened. Pacing of enemies and difficulty curve when you do not have access to specific upgrades make combat extremely janky and frustrating. IE: Encounters involving unseen enemies (rushman) can easily swarm players because the hit registration is hella jank and the delay + difficulty to register a pushback using F makes for a dead player very quickly.
- The method of save point utilization to prevent save scumming makes the walk back to the encounter a slog depending on how far you are from the spawn point, which can be quite far away. Save point allocation around the map is either too sparse or too many for some reason. No idea why.

B. Platforming.
- I have not experienced such janky 2d platforming on mouse and keyboard, but maybe this was not the intended mode of play. However, it is extremely difficult to listen to the story and dialogue when you are time pressured to platform while doing so.
- See recommendations.

C. Inventory and crafting.
- Ironically, you have an inventory screen, but don't have any notable items/weapons to use that aren't pre-assigned a hotkey to use. All materials for crafting are fairly generous, but there is actually no "loot" in this game. Not sure what the intent of the crafting/inventory system was by the devs.

RECOMMENDATIONS:
A. Expand ranged combat with more branches/skills/arrows. IE: Expanded skill trees to fire faster / stronger / AOE arrows and you could include even more arrows -> Teleport/portal, healing, protection, summoning arrows and a user customizable "magazine" with combo effects would amplify the gameplay significantly. You could also implement a completely real archery system with all the explanations so players can learn how archery works -> Think workbench with modifications/upgrades to the bow itself. Currently there are only 3 arrows with a special skill F to last you 20 hours. If your only option is to use ranged combat, it should be satisfying rather than frustrating.

B. Remove stealth completely or allow for encounters to be skipped. There is no point in stealth because all chests are locked behind pre-requisite clearing an area. This can be changed to support some encounters to focus on stealth and reward the player for avoiding enemies. Alternatively, some area designs can factor in unkillable enemies/turrets that forces players to stealth.

C. Allow for melee combat or expanded magic abilities. The lack of other viable options to complete encounters other than spamming arrows limits the player to a single playstyle. This is fundamentally not a bad decision but the ranged combat must be extremely satisfactory to succeed.

D. Separate story experience from platforming. While 2D platforming sessions were limited to a few sessions during a full game, there was a design choice to enforce a "time pressure" on the player. While this is not a bad thing, it is very difficult to focus on the good dialogue/story when you are trying to time jumps with the janky platforming system.
- A way to work it in is to have "pause" sessions in between the time pressure, like a time slowdown or mini flash back to let the player experience the story and keep the platforming time pressure segments separate.

Game completed in current early access build (2 songs or campaigns) in 24 hrs. Bought the game because of Splattercat!

Overall: 8/10

What is it?
- Turn based high fantasy strategy where you control heroes (wielders) traversing around a map completing objectives. Campaigns focuses on intertwined stories between the factions (2 in current early access build, 4 factions total).

The good:
- Extremely unique and fresh pixel design. I have seen other reviewers compare this to might and magic, which I missed out during my younger years. However, the sheer amount of color and eyecatching map design is really something that looks like a labour of love from the devs.
- Good mix of building management and tactical positioning. While the overall mechanics are simple to grasp, mastering efficient timing of building management, gold/cash flow and army strength is something players will have to learn quickly, if they are to progress in the campaign. How to spend your early turns are crucial to winning this game.
- Satisfying game art/cutscenes. Possibly some inspiration from Thronebreaker in terms of storytelling, but the minstrel song cutscenes are an extremely good addition and I wish to hear MOAR! Think Dandelion singing the tale of Geralt after each adventure.
- Good fantasy setting/story and engaging characters. While side characters don't stick around for long, the main character arcs are pretty decent as far as fantasy writing goes. Some may call it simple, but not every story needs to be complex. I like the setup and delivery of the story as told.

The middle:
- Battle strategy. I think that battles in the game are fine as it is, but the system doesn't provide alot of room to maneuver units properly. When you start stacking large amount of units, the battelfield can become very cluttered.
- Economy balancing. Factions tend to have just better "meta" unit compositions, leading to unused unit rosters due to either poor value return or difficulty in sustaining a combined arms army with limited building space. IE: In the Rana campaign, I didn't see the point of guards/tremors when beast cavalry were a much better option for the effort. In the human campaign, Faey noble guards are a much better value option than say foot soldiers. What could help is a display chart / tutorial of what role each unit is expected to fill and allow that unit to fulfill it well.

Needs improvement.
1. Early turn steam rolling: During my playthroughs, I noticed that the first 20 turns for the campaign were absolutely crucial, up to defeating the first AI army. This is strange because the difficulty looks like a massive mountain, followed by a snowball into victory. Basically, if you beat the first AI army to hit your settlements, you've basically won.
- Recommendation: The AI could be written to send medium sized armies but more frequently so you have to keep a standing army around, rather than a big doomstack once and then nothing. This allows players to "push and pull" fights towards enemy territory rather than a complete loss or victory.

2. Wielder balancing: Lets face it, magic is ludicrously dominating in SoC due to the sheer amount of BS mage class heroes can put out before the battle even begins.
- Recommendation: "Normal" or non-magic wielders should be given their own clear, but distinct advantage such as more equipment slots / more unit stack capacities / faster upgrades for standing armies / etc. A mage with the same unit cap as other non-mage heroes are stupidly overpowered.
- Recommendation: Players should be able to purchase "loadout" armies that they can select from the available units in a spawning pool, rather than checking each and every camp/settlement.
- Recommendation: Players should be able to purchase "commanders" that can serve as "faster to field" units that have less skills/abilities (or no magic at all) so it opens up more tactics/strategies to play with.

3. Mutual destruction / snowballing: Due to the long unit production lead times/ availability depending on structure set up, a large army loss is basically game over. While you can split your forces up, it does appear that medium sized forces can't really chip/stop a doomstack even as a stopgap nor serve as a neutral army killer due to the losses you take relative to the map coverage with hero movement.
- Recommendation: Early game unit recruitment should be increased to possibly double / turn. This allows players to have more standing armies available and diversify options. I currently see only doomstack to doomstack builds, with the rest of your heroes just running around collecting scraps due to the risk of an outright loss trying to field 3 medium sized armies.
- During my campaign runs, I always needed a doomstack to counter the AI doomstack rather than trying to field medium sized combined arms armies because of the relative attrition or total loss rates you will take going against a doomstack.
- Recommendation: You could also provide a joint wielder battle where multiple wielders can take part so you don't always have to doomstack one hero. This allows for more roaming armies and greater variety of play.

Finished one thorough playthrough in 36.5 hrs over 3 days mind you, which is very close to my playthrough of Thronebreaker (35.4 hrs). Accomplished 44/50 achievements, but steam did not record 2 which I think were during an update. You can probably do it faster if you don't gamble too much with Durak lol.

What is it? Rating 8/10
- Think Witcher (Thronebreaker) format of play, but as Yennefer instead of Geralt (Sorcerer). You traverse the wilds/rural farms of turn of the century industrial Russia, where superstition and god fearing folk are rampant. You provide shaman-esque services whilst pursuing your quest to see your beloved husband who had passed. Game mechanics and Lore are what hooks you in. Middling voice acting and artwork. Needs improvement on UI/some card tweaks.

GOOD:
+ Lore/Writing/Story and consistency: Some very interesting insights into Russian folklore which I presume are well researched by the developers (not that I can really call out inaccuracies). Basically, everything morally considered "bad" has a Chort (Demon) behind it, unseen by humans other than Koldun (sorcerers). The clashing systems of belief between modern industrial Tsar Russia and rural life are prevalent here. The Story as a whole is consistent, and while straightforward, is written well and as engaging as Thronebreaker IMO.

+ Decisions: Something that is usually overlooked, but the game does allow you to fail non-essential tasks. I actually like this since the minor decisions are reflected way later in the game in a mostly meaningful way. Most new games tend to baby the player into making decisions, but Blackbook does give you room to make choices, moral or not (except for the main story ofc).

+ Combat/Deck building system: Appears shallow at the start, with limited customization, but builds open up once about 1/3 through the game. Once the reins are off, you can pretty much build whatever silly deck you want up to a 33 deck limit. The card mechanics are engaging enough to hook you once you get the hang of it, similar to Gwent. Durak (a minigame cardgame in a cardgame game) is VERY frustrating at first as the rules/videos are not exactly clear, but once it starts to "click", it is additive. By endgame, I still managed to hold my own against demons with no cheating.
- Extra tip: My midgame/endgame deck were pretty much status effect builds (Waste/Curse) as the speed at which you can rack up both offence/defence is insanely quick. I switched from a waste deck as someone called EZ mode to a Curse/Blessed combo deck for extra spicy memes, reaching 3000 damage in a single turn.
- Extra tip: Developers did not put too much emphasis on Knowledge (Skill tree) and you can pretty much survive 3/4 of the game with midgame cards with little invested in the combat skill trees.

MIDDLE + IMPROVEMENT
+ Voice acting (English): The game is fully voiced acted in ALL scenes and you can tell work went into it, but the tone/character matching is sometimes really off that it feels like the Devs pulled the nearest available person from the street to voice a character. You could very well say some characters were the same VA trying his very best to mimic a sound that he does not make naturally lol.
- What irks me sometimes is that you have a switch between a really good Russian local accent, to a UK slang (Russians use the word lad?) and it feels off. A recommendation here for future titles is to consider a primary language to save costs, and just do an excellent job matching characters once. IMO, I read most of the text anyway, and wouldn't mind a stronger "Russian" VA experience to increase immersion.

+ Artwork/Scenery: To be honest, this looks like a Unity game, with low poly characters and really basic scenery. What is strange is that the 2D elements (Cards/Map) are really well done, with its own unique vibe. I can understand that the costs to do every scene/area in the style of 2D drawings are probably higher than the 3D jank.
- Recommendations for the future: I'd actually say that the game will elevate to an easy 9/10 with upgraded full 2D elements (like Thronebreaker or Darkest dungeon) instead of a hybrid 2D/3D format. I think that the lore allows the artists to really come up with great designs, and this is a game which can benefit from true artistic creativity.

NEEDS IMPROVEMENT
- Translations/Card texts: This may be a result of localization/translation into English, but I'll split the improvements into 3 parts:
A. Translations: The Lore/Folklore stories that you use to make educated guesses to questions are actually not intuitive and a bit hard to comprehend. I did like the help text highlights for both the card texts and general subtitles, they really help alot. IE: Somewhere in the story, there was a "fiery serpant" type demon, and I had absolutely no idea where it came from or what it was, despite our character having the knowledge to answer the question.
IMPROVEMENT: Could consider putting in a Bestiary based on what your main character has learned over the years. For undiscovered enemies/demons, you could put a general description of what they do so that it is easier to reference than folklore tales.

B. Card texts: This could be a translation issue, but sometimes the hard descriptions on cards are difficult to accurately determine what they do and in what order.
IMPROVEMENT: Help texts do assist here, but I only found them useful for explaining the text itself, and not the order at which it is executed. Consider adding a "Game Board" explanation to explain order of status effects and executions and/or add examples of how a card is played as a tooltip.

C. MAP: This is a minor quality of life recommendation, but a prompt that tells you "Please finish your exploration, this is a point of no return" would be extremely useful on the map where the final destination is not the end of the map.
- IE: Due to the way autosave works, once you hit the end area scenario of the map, you cannot return to the previous areas to finish exploring if you missed anything. You will then have to reload a prior manual save, and that can be quite far behind.

Finished the game in ~15-17 hours with most side quests completed. Expect another 15-20 hours to finish it with friends. No additional endgame content at the moment post final mission. Overall an enjoyable time in both single/multi player modes with minor bugs.

What is it?
The game takes place in a post space-travel world, but adhering hard to the industrial-corporate dystopian hellscape we have come to love with the genre. You play as an "indent" (read: pleb cannonfodder) doing odd jobs and generally acting like a blunt force problem solver. Think classic rpg meets a light dungeon crawler, maybe some shadowrunner.

RATING - 8.5/10
THE GOOD
++ Aesthetics: I cannot stress how well the art direction and landscape design is for The Ascent. Every level/stage and instance is consistent in theme and feel, capturing the overall dystopian environment of a corpo-controlled world. Full marks for world-building, extra points for scenery design for each zone to make them feel distinct and unique. You can see the effort the team put in here period.

++ Sound design: This together with the Aesthetics push this game up from a 6.5-7/10 to what it is. ALL the weapons sound and feel weighty, just like you want it to. "Indent" mode is something I've never experienced before, and I gotta say, I want more of it. Full marks to the sound engineer who made it, as the sound and ambiance meet and exceed expectations.

+ Abilities and Weapons: While some abilities and weapons are more useful than the rest, I believe that the varied design of the abilities/weapons allows players to experiment quite well. IE: I could not really see a single overpowering weapon/ability combo at the end of the game where you would be at a disadvantage if you did not use.

MIDDLE
- Tactical charge: Tactical charge is usually a deployable or grenade type item that your character has access to when racking up kills. However, throughout my playtime, I have not found the tactical charge very useful, as compared to raw weapon damage or special abilities. IE: Deployable turrets/grenades refresh at a rate too slow even at max skill rank that you would rather rely on your weapon + special ability when facing hordes of enemies.

- Augments: Augments are basically additional passive abilities that give you more health/heal faster/dash faster, but have very few items to say it adds anything substantial to the combat system. However, this should be easy to expand with new variants.

- Gear: Unlike weapons, gear progression is pretty much a straight upgrade. An improvement here is to further differentiate each manufacturers build even toward the endgame. Another suggestion would be to combine the augments with armor slots so that certain brands can have more augments/less armour or vice versa. IE: There was a clear stat difference between the best armour by endgame, and there wasn't even a good reason to use other variants that were lower.

NEEDS IMPROVEMENT
- Quest design: It could be by design that the quests were straightforward slugfests, but I did not really see deviation from the go there - shoot that variant for each quest in both main/side quest.
+ An improvement would be to include puzzle sections and/or non-linear approaches to the main quest missions. IE: Providing alternate pathways/ pathways only available when you listen or do a specific thing that isn't on the quest prompt or bring a special ability.
+ Another improvement would be to expand on dialogue and/or quest freedom so that players have to listen to the world around them. Many games do not allow the player to fail, and I am an advocate for open quest design.

- COOP experience: A few game crashing bugs were observed during my playthough with friends, which isn't too bad since the game starts up fast and we can rejoin fairly quickly. The multiplayer experience is acceptable, with a few improvements to add below.
+ Improvement: Would adjust spawning rates of bullet sponge/large enemies. Tachikoma (big spooderbots) are definitely on the super tanky side, and having 3 of them appear end game is really a tedious task to go through.
+ Improvement: Player icons are difficult to see on both the map/minimap, making it quite hard to coordinate properly. Recommend that highlights/map displays show other players more clearly.

"Finished" the game around the 30-40 hour mark, and by that I mean going once through all written campaigns, including 2 with a total of 3 friends. Last tracked hours were faffing about doing stupid builds.

What is it?
- I'd describe it as a light classic RPG with linear overarching story progression but complete freedom for wild and interesting scenarios for the "in the chapter" part of the story. Playing this solo or with friends always turn up unique due to the great storytelling AI they have in the background. Close comparison could be a streamlined DnD/Pathfinder or hex and tile combat system mixed with basic campaign planning. The game wants you to PLAY rather than neckbeard min/max stats, and I am fine with that.

RATING: 9/10
GOOD:
A. Great art style and character reflections: While basic in nature, the evolving art style as your character becomes more deformed through doing stupid things is a really welcome addition, just because of how ridiculous you can make it. The Enemy/Campaign/Character/Boss designs are top notch, with a clear amount of effort making each one unique. No such thing as cookie-cutter mooks here.

B. Legacy and AI storytelling - I think both of these systems are really seamless in how they present the player with "progression" as well as situations to make decisions. There are alot of scenarios written, each one with a unique outcome that allows for the truly unique campaign by campaign gameplay. The Legacy/retirement system is something more games should really take note off in how its done and how well it was implemented. Kudos to the design/playtesting team for putting this one out. It may not be the first system ever, but the first I've seen translated well to a video game.

C. Seamless multiplayer - Simple connection, and quick to start the campaign. I would say that getting a bunch of friends to play this over the weekend as a standalone adventure is super fun. You can all easily take part in both the campaign and battles, with no connectivity issues experienced for the majority of both my sessions with friends.
- Minor improvement: Enable options to fast forward text scenarios to progress. Sometimes when a few friends are AFK and we've been through the dialogue, it can stall the game. While it may be an issue implementing this in public servers, I don't think it would need more than a gentlemen's agreement to not abuse it. YMMV.
- Minor improvement: At the start of the battle, you should have a prompt to give certain characters to players for commanding. This can speed up who controls what and avoid confusion where 2 people try to control a neutral/later game character and basically end up messing the whole action turn.

D. Simple, but effective combat system - Not much more to say here. This is a tried and true AP based hex and tile combat system with 3 effective main classes to choose from. Combat is streamlined, with surprisingly alot of depth if you play long enough to learn the quirks of the system.
- Minor improvement: Enemy abilities are not always the easiest to read off the profile cards for some reason. I think a handy summary of the enemy types and role at the start of the battle would give players a sense of what they need to prioritize. The rule of bigger is badder is pretty evident, but not always the case.

MIDDLE
A. Explanation or customization of player characters - Wildermyth has pretty minimal customization options provided to the player stat wise, and not much of an explanation what or how you get better at being an adventurer. Maybe this is the developers goal to avoid min/maxing perfect stat builds, but I would recommend an "unlocked" or even a respec pathway scenario for legacy or just old characters to be upgraded.
- Potential idea: It could actually be part of a radiant or uniquely written short campaign for your legacy character to quest for a "holy grail" or "an ancient one" or some big bad with the power to change myths and legends, effectively writing a change unto your character, probably at a cost. Do it too many times based on a roll% that decreases in success each time you run this questline and your character permanently gets written off.

B. Sounds - Combat sound is fine and crisp. I played mostly with music off, but while it was on, serviceable though nothing to write home about.

NEEDS IMPROVEMENT
A. Slightly clearer description of what abilities work with what deformations. I re-call on my earlier playthroughs that it wasn't explicit what kind of deformations will work with abilities.
- Improvement idea: Either at the scenario screen or post chapter fusing, list the abilities that would not work if your character accepts the transformation.

B. Transformations - Extremely neat in idea, and probably a developer decision, but I've noticed that most fully transformed characters are just outclassed by partially transformed or "bred for purpose" chimera characters during the mid-endgame, even with any potential boost provided for a fully transformed status.
- Improvement idea: Instead of an overhaul, you could provide a substantial boost to a character based on a single, but full transformation. However, the character's playstyle will be very specific to the traits of the transformation, eventhough amplified.

C. Equipment and dummy testing range during post chapter sequence - A pet peeve of mine where weapons are not immediately unique enough to gauge how well they work in scenarios.
- Improvement idea: Provide an optional training ground/dummy post that you can test out character weapon and item combos in their current state to check and see what kind of damage you can expect for performance gauging, rather than the "trial-by-fire" approach. Extremely useful for higher difficulties to work strategies out beforehand.

D. The "Lived in world" - Wildermyth primarily focuses on hobbit-esque 3rd world early settler/iron age societies, with references to old kingdoms of ages past. Your adventurers are basically the heroes of the realm, and no one is somehow capable of establishing a city state structure during a multi-year campaign :/. Feels like all the people in the world acknowledge a big bad is coming for them, but expect 5 mutants / cripples to do something about it alone. PROBABLY true in real life if it ever happens, but this is a game, and there should be a better representation of humanity.
- Improvement idea: Standing militia / men-at-arms or even equipped mercenaries should be an option to bolster your heroes during main battles and/or defences, provided you spend actual resources on them (not campaign time). They should still be led by a "hero" but can be customized from a "light" version of the 3 classes with some basic abilities and armour/weapons. TLDR: Farmers are trash tier mob infantry that are practically useless, and you can't upgrade them.

Finished the game in 11 hours, 100% complete on PC in about 2-3 playthroughs for achievements.

What is it?
- Think LA Noire / LA confidential, but with an animal protagonist. Completely voice acted visual novel. Takes most of the cues from that era of "Noir"-esque writing, which can be good/bad depending on how well you like the genre. A point-and-click adventure style format light detective game but really, you're here for a story more than anything else.

RATING: 7/10
GOOD:
A. Top notch voice acting, including distinct characters. Animal characters have both stereotypical accents from various earth-like "regions/countries" alongside quirky animal "ticks". I believe every line (or close to) is fully voice acted to an AAA degree, which elevates this above a simple text adventure Noir tale.

B. Good worldbuilding - As you spend time in basically furry LA, alot of the world building goes on around you in tabloid snippets and character dialogue. Makes it feel like a lived in universe.

C. Good writing - Again, this can be good/bad depending on your familiarity with Noir-esque work/film so I would say it matches what you'd expect from a gumshoe detective novel. Relatively decent villain though I consider it more black and white in terms of motivation and goals.

MIDDLE
A. Story length, replayability - While I got 11 hours of content from the game, I was expecting a 20-30 hour game with more subplots and story elements, or a padded out detective element to the game as mentioned in the "Needs improvement" part of my review. As a pure story and visual novel it does just enough to give enough screentime to characters making up the world, but not enough to truly make you remember them.

B. Visuals / Soundtrack - Visuals are unique, certainly not your average anime type or overtly western comic drawn game. May not be for everyone, but the tone and atmosphere reflects correctly to the 1920s they try to represent. They also have a locale reminiscent of Edward Hopper's Nighthawk painting, something that vibes with the era. Soundtrack is as you'd expect jazz, but nothing too memorable comes to mind.

NEEDS IMPROVEMENT
A. Being a detective - While it may not be the intention of the game, a rework to the interrogation gameplay for the next story might elevate this game from a pure visual novel, to a true crime game. The gameplay format used is adequate, but doesn't punish nor really reward the player for truly being a detective. IE: Interrogations use a multiple choice format to get the player through to a true confession, but doesn't quite give the player enough pathways to truly mess up. You basically have to not pay attention to fail the interrogation, and you don't really get a huge advantage if you 100% it.
- 1. Potential improvement: Write more options in, or have suspects throw you red herrings, or even have some suspects be a red herring themselves. Referencing board games like "sherlock holmes consulting detective", you can design it in a way where players have to read the tidbits/tabloids and the world around them to ask smart questions to get around an investigation.
- 2. Potential improvement: Blank out the "replay" option for the interrogation first playthrough. Sure it adds frustration, but if you have enough endings/dialogues, I don't think it'd be an issue.
- 3. Potential improvement: Time sensitive suspects. I don't mean a countdown clock. It could be that during each chapter where you interrogate key suspects, you can only select 1 out of the X suspects for the interrogation. Doing the wrong or red herring suspect will leave you with a different ending/outcome as each chapter goes by. This is where your writing gets to shine if you manage to give very plausible motivations for each character. The goal here is for players to separate coincidence from root cause.
- 4. Potential improvement: Case file examination could use a more hands off approach. Similar to the earlier recommendation, I think you should just let the player come up with his/her own motivations with the case board, but they have to present it to the captain at the end. As with everything else, a player who pays attention to the world should be able to succeed, while half-hearted detective-ing will have half-hearted results. Going the extra mile working with retired inspectors could bring some truly unique insights to a game like this.

B. Puzzles and flash type elements - Puzzles were ok, nothing too daunting, but the flash type elements didn't really add anything to the tension of the game. I understand trying to vary content here and there, but overall, it could just be replaced by a cutscene/dramatic writing, and more manpower directed to establishing great detective gameplay.

Finished the game in 14 hrs, with almost all achievements. I did this in 2 days mind you. Played on PC with a gamepad controller. Overall, a short high quality game that I would jump on a sequel for!
PS: I bought it based on Splattercat's 30 min video, and was sold on it.

What is it?
- I will best describe this game as a classic zelda with a touch of souls like atmosphere and environment. The premise is unique and plays on some of our superstition surrounding crows in the world. You traverse the varied regions adventuring with minimal guidance just like old Zelda games. IE: "Link, you need to get the triforce to defeat Gannondorf" and then proceeds to just let you get on.

Review: 9/10
GOOD:
A. Excellent aesthetic, art style and environment presentation. Can standalone as its own series to be continued with a sequel. Each region is distinct, and boy are they pretty. Bonus points for the Character/Boss introductions, very slick.

B. An interesting plot, and while simple in nature, is very consistent throughout. What I really like is that the "Big bad's" motivation is understandable / relatable, rather than being evil for evil's sake.

C. Music is top notch. This is some AAA grade music for such a short game. They appeared to have gone quality rather than quantity with this.

D. Boss battles. This is a special highlight because the end game bosses are super unique and I REALLY like what they've done to present some of them. May not be everyone's cup of tea, but I had some solid fun here.

E. FUN, with minimal padding. Taking queues from Nintendo Zelda type games, the game is "Easy" in terms of learning the mechanics, but difficult to pull off a no death run. No messing with stats or min-maxing, just take your sword, and reap some souls.

MIDDLE:
A. Difficulty spikes with certain enemies / bosses. I would say that I am not a dark souls player, so my timing/dodge rolling is not the greatest. Bosses would take me 2-3 tries to get the mechanics right before I nail it.
- However, some challenges where unique enemies spawn took me 10-15 tries just because of the chaos of managing everything going on. I would be ok with this except...
- Some of these challenge rooms are required to progress the game, IE: if you can't do it, well, you can't progress. Thankfully I wasn't stuck too long on this, but there are specific encounters that seem way more difficult than the rest in the same level.

B. Abilities
- Other might find success, but I could not utilize my abilities + attacks in an effective way. I played this game basically melee focused as encounters with so many different enemy types make it extremely risky to try for a bow/magic attack as you're venerable while charging. This could be a controller only issue.
- To give some perspective, you have to hold 3 buttons down (aiming stick + ability button + charge ability button) to get a shot off, and some abilities don't execute until the full charge. Fumbling will basically lose you an equivalent of ~2 dodges + 2-4 attacks which are much more controllable and reliable. Smart aiming so you only need 2 buttons might be a good shout here, or just git gud.

NEEDS IMPROVEMENT:
A. Weapons - Aside from the meme weapon, I didn't find a whole lot of reason to switch weapons aside from dagger/endgame sword, effectively negating 2/4 remaining weapons. Maybe for the future, the weapons could be designed around a distinct playstyle, such as no-damage long reach weapons to get you consistent ammo for bows/magic or a spear which has much longer reach but no sweep arc.
- Adding on to this, charge attack mechanics are good in theory, but I just could not make it effective. IE: The response from a dodge to normal attack feels like I am at less risk AND in greater control compared to the benefits of a charge attack or dodge into charge attack (more damage?). In a game where you get 4-6 HP, the risk reward for staying in place after a charge attack doesn't feel worth it.

B. Hitboxes, especially on the diagonal squares with a controller + camera angles.
- Could just be an engine capability (Unity), but I did find that some enemy/boss hitbox scanning or attack arcs are misleading. Some of them are too fast for the eye to catch when determining if you are "safe" so I had to dodge way out. In levels where you are fighting whilst balancing yourself on the environment, the upgraded dodge literally threw me out the map.
- Some encounters had a camera angle that made it difficult to catch enemy attack "tells".

I'd rank it somewhere like 8/10 (3 player experience for me so far)
POSITIVES
+ Non-pushover combat, but not grindy hard. Doesn't feel like enemies are too padded as damage sponges.
+ Super nice build system, very easy to build anywhere, on anything and with any structure. Like really, its along the lines of "yes I want to build there" and you can.
+ Biomes are distinct, need prep for early entry, but not too difficult once you've established a forward base. Only 5 for now, but the 2 "new" biomes should be an easy roadmap completion for the dev team, so I won't worry about it.
+ No bugs, crashes or multiplayer desyncs during my 40 hrs with 2 other friends (same country), game is easy to launch, connect and play for me. You can all build simultaneously and nothing gets loss.
+ RETURNS RESOURCES WHEN U BREAK DOWN STUFF, NONE OF THAT BS GAME PADDING TO RE-MINE MATERIALS. DON'T LIKE IT, REBUILD EZ PZ LEMON SQUEEZY

MIDDLING
+/- Good food/sleep system that incentivize actually sorting your ♥♥♥♥ out before going hunting/adventuring. Dying is not too bad, but you have to retrieve your corpse to get your stuff back (no one else can take it for you). Downside is that you might only have 1 good suit of armour to spare given the resources, so its a mad rush to get your stuff back.
+/- I find the resource tier progression OK, not too grindy that I'd need to run an area like 20+ times to get to the next stage, but I did do it with 2+ people, so YMMV. We're at T4 by 40 hrs in, including shipping a large metals deposit back to main base.
+/- Depending on your base project and scale with no. players, you may require absolute tonnes of resources to get the home of your dreams. Obviously you can scale down, but what pleb wants to do that.
+/- Not able to portal metals, so mid game progression is really dependent on how far you're willing to sail out and back, carrying valuable cargo at the mercy of the sea. You can portal everything else tho. Basically prepare for an expedition to gather resources, or straight up move your home like the vikings did.

NEGATIVES
- Best played > 1 person, just to split workload. Alot of pre-prep for new biome zones needs time to work on materials/food, leaving less time to explore, build or make a nice home. YMMV if you like playing solo without a support net of other friends to help out.
- Building roofs are hard, and I think there is a max size of a home at the "wood" tier stage, before you just can't structurally fit a roof. Creative engineering possible, but you're going to be sitting there for a good amount of time thinking it out.
- Melee on hills/swamps are a bit of a toss up on hitreg, so mid game can get a bit iffy if you went full melee.