Category: Game Releases

Smell that my friends? That is the smell of sales. We love a good sale here at Pocket Tactics, so much so that sometimes we’ll even post about them separate from their usual slot on Friday’s Weekender Update. A handful of interesting deals have cropped recently, so we thought we’d take a break from our usual schedule to make you aware of the latest discounts.

This War of Mine (iOS & Android): $2.99

11 Bit Studio’s excellent survival/adventure game set in a war-torn modern state is definitely one of those seminal works that must be experienced before you die. You play as a group of civilians trying to survive in a city turned into a warzone, and is based on real-life experiences from the Balkan conflict in the 90’s.

At $2.99 (down from $14.99), it’s a steal. This isn’t the cheapest price its ever been, but it’s the first time the game’s been on sale since last May, so who knows when it may drop in price again. If you haven’t picked it up yet, we suggest you do so now.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XI_c0lp68RY?controls=0]

Ticket to Ride (iOS & Android) (Review): $2.99

One of our favourite digital boardgames is going cheap again. Ticket to Ride pits 2 – 5 players against each other as they collect cards and connect cities to their train network in an attempt to meet hidden objectives and score the most victory points. It’s an excellent game to play solo, hot-seat on a single device or over the internet, and it’s currently half price.

Colt Express  (iOS & Android) (Review): $1.99

Another Asmodee Digital title, Colt Express wasn’t in the best of states when it launched (hence our review), but Asmodee made some much needed fixes to multiplayer in the months following launch. It’s still not perfect, but at half price it might be worth a try if you’ve been looking for another digital board game to fill your boots.

To finish off the list, we also spotted that word puzzle app WindWord was being given away for free. We haven’t looked at it ourselves, but one our readers recommended it on our best word puzzle list. Given the circumstances, I think you can certainly afford to check it out!

Let us know if you spot any other good deals, otherwise we’ll check in again during Friday’s update!

By Joe Robinson 11 Mar 2019

Playing Card Crusade made this reviewer crave pizza…because it called to mind a shared truism between the two. You know what they say about pizza, when it’s good, it’s great, when it’s ‘meh’ it’s still pretty good. Well the same goes for roguelikes, a crowded yet beloved genre for pretty much the same reason. Few of them will reach the heights of, say, Dream Quest or Slay the Spire, but that doesn’t mean the also-rans of the genre aren’t any good.

It does mean that their fun and inventiveness are relatively limited. Card Crusade is satisfying to play but also suffers from some mediocrities. It’s quick and light and the development cycle shows future promise, but as-is needs a skosh more variety and challenge to stand on its own merits. Criticism aside, I couldn’t put it down.

The setup: a tale as old as time, an adventurer travels ever-deeper into a ten-level dungeon to face a final boss. The map in Card Crusade is almost entirely cosmetic, with a simple tap sending the player character scurrying to that precise spot. Tap to open doors and treasure and wander too close to draw aggro of the hostile mobs, which will hound you down once provoked. Battles ensue, with a turn-based, energy-limited card system.

It’s standard fare, with block, energy and health resources working just as you’d expect, along with a pretty nice suite of status effects to spice things up. Each piece of equipment you pick up adds a card to your deck, which starts off trim but needs to bulk up quickly in order to power through the scaling difficulties of the lower levels. Early mobs of packs of dogs or swarms of horseflies are child’s play to clear, but later on Witches and Eyeball Monsters (I guess they can’t call them Beholders?) will present a stiff challenge.

Each room with an enemy also contains a chest, which presents one of two possible new cards. While there are unique classes with abilities and a class-specific starting card, the rest of the possible card pool is totally open. Anyone can use poison, magic, a crossbow, a ‘metallicize’ defense. So in terms of deck-building the game is rather generous and free-form, which gives it a relaxed, sandbox quality. I love this, because it means that failed runs happen because of choices along the way rather than loot. The downside is repeat runs feel samey.

Battles have an unusual tempo to them. Of course it’s always best to clear the field as soon as possible, but the game usually proceeds in bursts of activity, with some turns devoted to healing and survival while others see play of an especially strong card to eliminate a key foe. Here Card Crusade breaks with longstanding roguelike tradition and does not offer full healing upon level-up or floor clear, which means damage suffered becomes persistent. This is one of the game’s smartest choices, adding a sense of pressure while simultaneously rewarding clean strategy and play. It unfortunately also weights defensive builds more positively and taxes health-sacrificing ones further.

The enemies have a little more variety to their abilities and effects. Some multiply and fill the field, others passively buff themselves until they hit like a truck. Their move sets are all made available right from the get-go, making planning a must for efficient clears. Aside from battling and choosing loot, the game offers nothing else, so its appeal lives or dies on the merits of these alone. The battles aren’t especially difficult, but the enemy variety is nice and refreshing, and the health margins for making it to the final boss are surprisingly slim. If the game feels relaxing or ‘easy’ this is a side-effect of its deliberately generous, low-variance design.

It also has some nice flourishes to differentiate repeat plays. Yes, the classes all work differently, but there are also Shrines which offer an optional benefit and drawback. (The closest analogue I can think of would be the excellent Desktop Dungeon’s shrine & faith system). They might boost poison, healing, burning or health, but the shrines always take a toll. The exchange is mostly fair, well-balanced and most importantly of all, well-advertised. 

That’s probably the most just assessment of the game as a whole, honestly: fair and as-advertised. It might get quickly solved if you’ve already blazed through Dream Quest, Meteorfall, Night of the Full Moon, Slay the Spire, and every other card battler out there, but it’s still got enough meat on its bones to be worth the price of admission. Diverting, a fun time-sink whose future updates will hopefully add more cards and classes, maybe even a hard mode for those of us ready for a bigger challenge. It is undoubtedly good reliable fun, but this rush is half-nostalgia and half-quality. Here’s hoping the game continues to improve and enrich itself.

Well I don’t know about you guys but I’ve had an enjoyable week – we managed to get some key reviews online and there’s been some interesting new games to pad out one’s collection, depending on your preferences. It feels like we’re finally getting out of the slump that struck the start of the year, at least.

Don’t forget to check out our competition for a chance to win a free iOS code for Shieldwall Chronicles, by the way! First competition we’ve done in a while so you don’t’ want to miss out.

Meanwhile, In mobile gaming…

Out Now

Pirate Outlaws (iOS & Android) – Full review coming soon!

Our main game highlight of the week is this roguelike/card game hybrid that features turn-based combat. We’ve always got a lot of time for card mechanics here and there’s been some very interesting games that play around with roguelike concepts, so we’re hoping this one can live up to the emerging genre hits.

There are six playable characters, each with a pre-made deck. A further 250 cards and 80 relics are available to find and collect within a procedurally generated world. A unique feature appears to be the presence of ammunition, whereby you’ll have to make sure your abilities or attacks are ‘loaded’ before you use them. It’s worth noting that while the base game is only a dollar, there are IAPs covering the various in-game resources & currencies. We’ve got someone working on a full review of this so we’ll let you know the full score ASAP.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmLzS46t310?controls=0]

PS4 Remote Play (iOS and Android)

Utility and gaming-adjacent apps is something I’ve thought about covering more of here – after all, we all have interested beyond just mobile gaming and the great thing about mobile is that you can get apps that support your other hobbies. As a PS4 owner myself, the recently released PS4 Remote Play app on iOS would in theory be right up my street… except I’m not on iOS. Sadly, the Android version only supports Sony-made phones and tablets. Guess I’ll just have to play my PS4 on an actual TV, like a pleb.

If you are an iOS user and have a PS4, however, this might be relevant to your interests. Reports vary on how well the app performs, but Mikhail Madnani over at Touch Arcade has done some testing which is worth a read. Personally, I wish they’d bring back the second-screen initiative a bunch of games dabbled with half-a-decade ago, but there you go.

Tides of Time (iOS & Android) – Full review coming soon!

This isn’t actually due out till tomorrow (who launches a game on a Saturday? I mean really!), but I don’t want to sit on this for an entire week until the next Weekender update. I’m flagging this up to you now instead, although note we don’t have store links at the time of writing. Hats off to Dave for pointing this out – I would have missed it otherwise.

This is a two-player micro-game that involves card-drafting, set collection and combos to score victory points. The premise is you’re laying out the wonders of your Kingdom through time, with each round representing an ‘Age’. As time moves on, your achievements crumble but you get to keep one card from the previous round as a kind of ancient legacy to inform your future strategy.

I’ve actually got the physical game and it’s a relaxing, fun experience for two people that can be played quite quickly and only requires some light record keeping. It’s not something you can play a lot off, mind, but It’s a good a candidate as any for a digital conversion. According to the devs it’ll feature solo-play vs. and AI, as well as hotseat multiplayer with a friend or loved one.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8TI2W1RvH8?controls=0]

Updates

Unless I’ve gone blind, there doesn’t appear to have been any updates of note this week but do let readers know in the comments if you’ve spotted something I haven’t. One thing: Even though Shieldwall Chronicles launched its’ 1.03 update yesterday, 1.04 has already been released to fix some critical bugs that cropped up.

Sales

It’s not a great week for sales of note, unfortunately, although as a nice change of pace we actually have an Android-exclusive sale to flag up this time around:

Rusted Warfare RTS (Android) (Review): $0.99 

This hidden gem of an RTS game came out in 2012, but we only did our official review in 2017 after the developer decided to launch the steam version. It’s a great strategy title that pays homage to the genre greats like C&C. If you’re still wary, there is a Demo version you can try as well.

Evoland II (iOS & Android): $0.99

This is one of those games that we keep talking about but have never formally reviewed. This RPG adventure title about playing your way through different game genres is going for just a buck.

Seen anything else you liked, played any of the above? Let us know in the comments!

A couple of years ago, Demon’s Rise 2 was Pocket Tactics’ RPG Game of the Year: a hex-based fantasy RPG laser-focused on complex tactical gameplay. Now, Wave Light has released the Shieldwall Chronicles: a hex-based fantasy RPG laser-focused on complex tactical gameplay. How does this new entry compare to such an illustrious predecessor?

Like Demon’s Rise, Shieldwall is an extremely crunchy game. Your standard attack calculation figures in the character’s skill minus distance, evasion, and cover, and then subtracts armor from your damage if you get a hit. Then the target may get a chance at a counterattack of the same complexity. With buffs and special attacks, you’re looking at a lot of calculations for each move. All this math can result in frustrating situations where two characters with piles of health can’t hit each other at all or can only plink off single health points at a time, dragging out the battles. 

Luckily, you can play in ‘simple’ and ‘complex’ mode and slide the difficulty of each mission up and down on the fly. Complex mode makes you use action points for everything, including moving and making attacks, while simple mode gives each character a set number of attacks and movement distance. In simple mode, you only need to be concerned about whether you have enough action points for the special ability you want to use, or if you should save them for the next round. These abilities are mostly determined by your characters class and level. 

The characters come with both male and female models. Happily, the two models are statistically identical but visually totally unique designs, giving your team a lot of flair. Character animations are varied and give your characters and their individual moves some personality, even though they occasionally bug out and send them moonwalking across the tavern floor. Spell and damage effects are also well-done, especially the satisfying sprays of blood that accompany a direct hit and the molten fireball effects. Although the game runs on phones, it’s definitely meant for tablet-sized devices.

Each of the fifteen character types has its own set of special abilities. It takes some time to learn what they are all capable of, but eventually you’ll get some interesting tactical choices to make, even in simple mode.  Back off and heal? Buff your attack and go for the kill? Which character best supports the others? Some specials are equivalent to more advanced attacks. Others are buffs or debuffs that can make the difference between your attacks bouncing off armor or scoring a critical hit. Magical items and gear also sometimes provide special abilities including bonus attacks. You’ll pick up one for free after each level and between missions, you can freely buy from a massive selection of loot.

You also need to be concerned with your units’ morale, which provides some realistic reactions to various battlefield situations, leading to panic if your units are surrounded or see their comrade fall. The consequences of panic are actually a bit too light, since it just removes the unit’s ability to use special moves. I’d rather see something like XCOM where the AI takes over control of a panicked character. This can still lead to a failure spiral, if you suddenly desperately need your cleric to calm down and heal. 

Maps have a lot of variety, including cramped indoor hallways, urban streets and squares, and wide outdoor spaces. The terrain makes a big difference in strategy, especially the many opportunities to take full or half cover. Cover makes a huge difference in reducing your chances of getting hit, making careful flanking moves a vital strategy and ranged units in good cover particularly deadly.

The storyline is well-written enough, but it doesn’t stray from fantasy adventure tropes. This is a little disappointing considering the Demon’s Rise series had you leading a party of devil-worshipers. In Shieldwall, you head a generic mercenary company that gradually gets pulled into to a larger conflict. There are a few choices to be made, but they are more of the “turn left” or “turn right” variety than critical dilemmas, mostly seeming to affect the next map you’ll be fighting on. Your characters don’t really have an individual impact on the story, and any one that drops during a mission will be right as rain during the next one. Mission failure just means trying again, and you can freely swap units to try a different strategy. The storyline is simply something to hang the tactical game on and provide an excuse for all the swords and arrows. It is very, very long, though: at least 40 hours.

If you’re already a fan of Wave Light’s Demon’s Rise series, Shieldwall Chronicles is more of the same but with a somewhat less interesting setting and slightly more complex gameplay. New players who are after some RPG tactics with lots of math will also love this game.