Developer: Image & Form Games
Publisher: Thunderfall Publishing
Rrp: £22.49 (Gog.com and Steam)
Released: 30th May 2019
Available on: Gog.com and Steam
Played Using: Mouse and keyboard
Approximate game length: 16 hours
I have to admit I really do love the Steamworld series of games, so far I’ve played every single one of them that’s been released barring one and I’ve loved them all. So why write this? Well the reason is simple, I want you the reader to know that I will be trying to not allow this bias into my review but that it may end up being there anyway. Anyway… on with the review!
Steamworld Quest: Hand of Gilgamech is a RPG deckbuilder, now I’ve played a few of these both in digital and analogue forms and this one is a bit different from any other I have played. The main difference being that while most deckbuilders have you building a single deck where all your cards come from this one has you build three decks of eight that are combined into a single deck of twenty-four cards.
When you start the game you only have two team members, those being Armilly and Copernica, a third by the name of Galleo is added to the roster soon after and two others (though technically its three since one of the members is actually a brother and sister double act) will join. You can only have three active members in your party but the other two are available to swap in at any time, excluding in combat.
Since I mentioned combat I may as well start with that. To be honest combat is really the majority of what you’ll do in this game. Whenever you enter into combat you’ll draw a hand of six cards, each card is a move that you can perform and within each turn you can play three cards.
If you play three cards that are for the same hero it causes a ‘Heroic Chain’ which has a follow up effect at the end of the attack series. This effect depends on what weapon the hero has equipped at the time.
Cards come in three varieties; strikes, upgrades and skills. As you play strike and upgrade cards your heroes build up steam pressure, which is represented on a bar at the top of the screen. This resource is used to play skill cards which expends it by the amount indicated on the card. These skills tend to be very potent and can turn the tide in a combat.
Being that this game is an RPG defeating enemies does the expected thing of granting experience, gold and resources. These resources are used to craft new cards or upgrade existing ones at the shopkeeper that mysteriously (and inexplicably) appears in nearly every level.
You save your progress at statues of Gilgamech (of which there is usually only one per level), doing this will also restore your health as well as respawn all the enemies in the level. Yes, I know, its very ‘Dark Souls’ to have that mechanic but I honestly don’t have an issue with it.
If you’re the sort of person that enjoys grinding in an RPG, or just finding all the secrets in a level then you’ll be pleased to hear that you can choose to revisit levels as many times as you wish.
This was a game that I probably sunk way more hours than I really needed to. It’s lore isn’t deep and the story isn’t really much to speak of either but I enjoyed the moment to moment gameplay of it enough that I not only finished it but also played the New Game plus twice over.
If this appeals to you perhaps try;
Slay the Spire
Griftlands
Tharsis
