Developer: Airship Syndicate
Publisher: THQ Nordic
Rrp: £24.99 (Steam, gog.com and Humblebundle)
Released: 3rd October 2017
Available on: Steam, Gog.com and Humblebundle
Played Using: Mouse and Keyboard
Approximate game length: 30 hours
Crowdfunding is an amazing thing when you think about it, so many projects that would never get the funding before now can find their audience. This had lead to quite a few unique games of both the video and table top variety to appear. Of course for every success there are hundreds of failures and even being funded successfully doesn’t hold any guarantee that the project will be good or even come into existence.
Battle Chasers: Nightwar is an JRPG style RPG that is based on a comic book series that bares of the same name (minus the Nightwar part). The comic was created by Joe Madureira who also happens to be the artist for this game.
In the interests of full disclosure I want this known that this is a game I backed on Kickstarter and received a copy of as part of my reward.
The game is split into three parts, the overworld, exploration areas (which includes the dungeons) and combat. The overworld essentially acts as a level select screen, although its one where you can fight monsters and find treasure. One note to add about the fighting of monsters, there are no random encounters a’ la Final Fantasy VII, instead you can see them coming and perhaps can plan a way around them, although usually there isn’t an option for this. As you progress through the game and become more powerful the weaker monsters on the map will allow you to pass right by so you won’t get bogged down fighting creatures you don’t have to.
Exploration mode occurs when you enter a location or dungeon. One you enter the active, or lead, character can be swapped out allowing you to make use of their unique abilities. An example being that the character Gully can punch certain walls to reveal hidden rooms. These abilities can only be used a limited number of times but can be recharged by sleeping at an inn. So what are three things that you expect to find in a dungeon? If you answered monsters, treasure and traps you’d be right. Just like in the overworld there are no random encounters, all the monsters are wandering the room, however unlike on the overworld, if they see you coming they’ll make head straight for you.
The dungeons are made of several rooms that are generated randomly although will have certain locations the same each time such as entry ways and boss rooms. Upon entering a dungeon you get to choose the difficulty level. The higher the difficulty you choose the greater the reward is at the end.
I hope you like turn based combat because if you don’t you’re really not going to enjoy this game.
You can attack enemies using regular attacks or abilities. Using abilities drains some of your mana, or if you have it, some of your overcharge. Overcharge is generated by attacking enemies with regular attacks or by defending attacks. Using overcharge to power an ability can add extra effects to the ability (though not in every case, the abilities description will tell you if using overcharge makes a difference). Overcharge doesn’t usually carry over from combat to combat, although there are some characters who can save a portion of it to use in the next combat.
Every character also comes with special moves that can only be used once a meter is filled, these special moves are named ‘Bursts’. Bursts are powerful abilities that when used correctly can change the course of a battle. Not all ‘Bursts’ damage the enemy, for example Gully has one that provides a shield around her allies and increases their attack power for a few turns. The burst meter fills a little with every attack that you perform or take damage from. Unlike overcharge the burst bar doesn’t empty after each fight and instead allows you to save it for when you really need it.
The more you fight creatures the more you learn about them. The first time you fight a creature you only know its name, after a few encounters you’ll also know it’s health and finally you’ll learn the name of the attack its lining up as well being able to see its stats and abilities on the bestiary screen.
If you’re defeated in combat you lose some money and awaken back in town, unless its a boss fight, in that case you’ll be taken to the ‘boss stone’ which will stand just outside of the encounter.
In the usual RPG fashion combat grants experience (and bonus experience if you manage to perform certain feats in the combat, like not taking damage). However only characters actively being played as gain any experience, so rotating out member of your party is generally a good idea.
As you level up your characters become more potent and unlock new attacks and abilities.
You characters aren’t the only things that can become more potent, your weapons and armour can too. Occasionally within a dungeon you’ll find a crafting bench where you can create weapons, armour, and items for your characters to wear using items found as you play in conjunction with using the appropriate work station. The crafting goes a bit further than just merely creating a weapon, if you’re lucky enough to find one you may also find a enchanting altar. It’s upon this altar that you can put an additional effect on you weapon or armour, perhaps you want the blade to add fire damage or maybe instead you can have it give a few of your stats some bonuses… that decision is up to you and the material you have on hand.
To top it off even if you don’t have all the necessary ingredients to create your weapon or add an enchantment you can still give it a go. The chances of success will be significantly lowered if you do but it means you can run the risk of having no item and losing all the material you have already.
The animations on display are smooth and emotive, this goes well with the sharp, rich colours that really cause the scenes to pop. This level of detail also shows in the sound design which has some really meaty effects that make you feel like your blows have had a real impact.
Full controller support is available but I chose to use mouse and keyboard for the majority of my playthrough. However when I did try using the control pad I did find one fairly important problem which was that I couldn’t access the pause menu without using the keyboard. Actually it seems like playing with a control pad puts the player at a slight of a disadvantage compared to the keyboard and mouse particularly when in combat. What do I mean? Well some enemies when they attack you will give your character a debuff, this is represented by a small symbol by the characters health bar. If you’re using the mouse you can hover over it and a tool-tip will appear letting you know what the affect of this debuff is. There doesn’t seem to be any way to see this using a control pad.
I have to say this is definitely a Kickstarter that I’m quite glad I backed, I got
everything I expected and much more. That isn’t to say that this game is anywhere near perfect, for example it would have been nice to have had an option for some kind of auto-resolution in the combat which would have helped with some of the feeling of grind.
That’s the thing this is an extremely ‘grindy’ game. Sure, it offers lots of ways to perform said grinding such as increasing the dungeon difficulties, battling in arenas, hunting bounties etc but at the end of the day its still grinding.
If this appeals to you perhaps try;
Grandia 2
The Torchlight Series
I Am Setsuna
