There are two reviews and steam links on my news thread as well.
When you do, please share your impressions with us.
SSIGuy
An Islander Returned
Fully agree with this... the turn-based tactics space has become really crowded and for me games need to hit a higher bar to make it on my play list.
Farflame
SasqWatch
Yeah. But it looked pretty good.
Probably another game that was released too soon because of... lack of funding and plan of the publisher.
I wonder if it has pretty decent story or something barely serviceable. The latter one is more likely.
Vaelith
Lawful Evil Harbinger
I'm at the moment progressing through Act 3, and I can say this game is pretty rough around the edges, though there's fun to be had. It reminds me a lot of Solasta, minus the DnD/fantasy setting in favor of a more historic one, which to some will be a minus, and to others a plus.
Generally, combat works and it's challenging. It's not overwhelming or unfair as some critic review that was posted in these boards. At the highest difficulty, it's just right. You have to play tactically and clever, mistakes are punished, I like that.
But like Solasta, it fails in its flatness. Uninteresting standard actions end up boring the hell out of you as every battle feels like deja vu. You move up to an enemy, you attack. If you're an archer, you move up to some cover, and attack. This is where great games like BG3 manage to keep things interesting, and Crown Wars: Black Prince falls short.
The story is presented almost nonchalantly, as background chatter, with no build up or magnificent appeal. You go from one battle to the next with no interaction or regard. At chapter ends, you get a static "cinematic" that tells you what's going on. You make no choices, or take no paths, it simply plays out as scripted. Endless random filler battles pop up left and right to provide resources so that you can be strong enough to the next story mission, which is not that much more elaborate than the filler mission you just did.
A little bit of an annoying thing, this game is crashing me to desktop every third mission or so. Luckily, it seems to happen only when the mission begins, right after the autosave, so it's a minor inconvenience, but still not something I've experienced with way more demanding games for months, if not years, in my current rig.
All in all, I'd give it a 6/10, maybe push to 7/10 if you like the theme and/or challenging TB battles, but as mentioned above, I get the exact same vibes as I did when playing Solasta - close to being a great game, but falling just short in every metric.
Generally, combat works and it's challenging. It's not overwhelming or unfair as some critic review that was posted in these boards. At the highest difficulty, it's just right. You have to play tactically and clever, mistakes are punished, I like that.
But like Solasta, it fails in its flatness. Uninteresting standard actions end up boring the hell out of you as every battle feels like deja vu. You move up to an enemy, you attack. If you're an archer, you move up to some cover, and attack. This is where great games like BG3 manage to keep things interesting, and Crown Wars: Black Prince falls short.
The story is presented almost nonchalantly, as background chatter, with no build up or magnificent appeal. You go from one battle to the next with no interaction or regard. At chapter ends, you get a static "cinematic" that tells you what's going on. You make no choices, or take no paths, it simply plays out as scripted. Endless random filler battles pop up left and right to provide resources so that you can be strong enough to the next story mission, which is not that much more elaborate than the filler mission you just did.
A little bit of an annoying thing, this game is crashing me to desktop every third mission or so. Luckily, it seems to happen only when the mission begins, right after the autosave, so it's a minor inconvenience, but still not something I've experienced with way more demanding games for months, if not years, in my current rig.
All in all, I'd give it a 6/10, maybe push to 7/10 if you like the theme and/or challenging TB battles, but as mentioned above, I get the exact same vibes as I did when playing Solasta - close to being a great game, but falling just short in every metric.
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Nod 6/10 sounds about right. It was rushed out due to lack of funds.
vanedor
Keeper of the Watch
I played the demo of Crown Wars and feels this is a bit unfair to Solasta. Solasta played like a full fledged RPG while Crown Wars... It's a tactical battle simulators that railroad you one battle after the other. Much like the King Arthur games. This sort of game, with limited freedom, exploration and character building, tend to bore me to death. Meanwhile, if it had some shortcoming, I enjoyed Solasta, completed the main game and its first expansion. It's something I don't do much nowadays!
Vaelith
Lawful Evil Harbinger
I have 132 hours on Solasta, completed it with the DLC too. I just get the same "empty husk" feeling of being railroaded from one mission to another, plain battle after plain battle, fighting always the same enemies, and still today I'm traumatized by Solasta's travel system and random encounters, though I imagine being DnD earns that game a lot of extra points for many oldschool RPG fans.
For that alone, probably I'd choose Solasta over Crown Wars too.
For that alone, probably I'd choose Solasta over Crown Wars too.
Farflame
SasqWatch
"The duty to play bad games" - new virus...Must have been pretty traumatic indeed to play for 132 hours.
Vaelith
Lawful Evil Harbinger
It's a DnD game where you can create your party; I made a party with characters I love and saw them through their story. To me, at the time, that was quite addictive. But smoking is also addictive, and it gives you lung cancer.
There hadn't been any games like that for a decade when Solasta was released, so the quality mattered less than the ability to play something like that. Doesn't mean it's a great game. Metacritic user score is at 70/100, which is pretty much how I feel about it.
Had it been a common type of game, I would have quit it pretty fast. But beggars can't be choosers, it's how it is.
There hadn't been any games like that for a decade when Solasta was released, so the quality mattered less than the ability to play something like that. Doesn't mean it's a great game. Metacritic user score is at 70/100, which is pretty much how I feel about it.
Had it been a common type of game, I would have quit it pretty fast. But beggars can't be choosers, it's how it is.