izigame.me

Perfect game that lands the MEDIEVAL-TACTICS theme, all while pulling from obvious inspirations; "xcom", "battle brothers", "darkest dungeon", "othercide", etc; especially... the difficulty.
** Game is quite unbalanced, and favors the A.I heavily.
** Clearly an unfinished product with the SHEER AMOUNT OF BUGS/PROBLEMS.
** Re-used/skinned assets from Nacons "War Hospital".
* MISSIONS ARE A COIN-TOSS
- "Easy", "Normal", "Hard"; all this means is x . The unbalance here is this scale is on an exponential curve the further you progress. Well into mid-late game, even those "Easy" missions become a burden because of how hard the Enemy out-paces you in terms of "HP"/"Abilities"/"Stats", where it might be few, but you're still drowning in Poison/Bleed/Crits. Early Game, its a test of patience to get over this face-smashing-wall so you can get Units that aren't entirely useless, but even after that remain useless because of the sheer powercreep.
- Mission TYPES, are what makes the Game actually HARD, regardless of the Difficulty; "Hard Assassination"(Escort/Rescue/Capture) Missions are all the same, and are actually Easy. Because you enter, kill a group of 8-10 Units, then flee for the Extract before the next groups of 6-8 Spawn; "Hard Skirmish" is only Hard because you're racing against a clock/Turn-Timer; "Hard Defend" Missions are stupid impossible - You land in a random location,(usually with a Ballista staring you down), and need to hold for 10 Turns while absurd groups spawn directly ontop of you every Turn.
- The A.I is BRUTALLY SMART. They will always take the most convenient and affordable pathing for them to maneuver around your flank. They have ZERO Self-Preservation, in that they will always move out of an Attack of Opportunity(AOP) just to Single-Out the Lowest HP/Armor Unit nearby(e.g -ALWAYS- TARGETING YOUR ANIMAL), and Poison Bomb their own people. Additionally, the A.I inherently knows where an OBSERVATION outline is or an Artillery Line of Sight, and will always deadstop exactly outside despite having a clear path and target to approach. Intentionally wasting the "Timed-Turned-Limit".
* POWERCREEP
-The Enemy blatantly outpaces you; which adds another layer to the artificial difficulty. Every time you upgrade, the A.I Units do as well - so you never really "get stronger". Upgrades and levels feel like you're scrapping by at higher difficulties, meanwhile the enemy "upgrades" are about 2-3 steps further ahead in comparison; via, HP and Abilities. The Turn-Economy violently shifts from focusing on DMG/Kills to "My Unit DIES next". Especially because now they CRIT far more than you, cheat Mechanics with +ACC, and given more utility to play "Debuff-The-Game" = PoisonCritPoisonGunnerBleedShivPoisonCritHeadshotCrit.
-*SPOILER* Upgrading the Domain, and unlocking Companion Slots for Missions? The Enemy does as well. Which automatically adds more layers behind "Missions", as its +. So getting that extra 1 or 2 Units, then means you've got to deal with another 1-2 multiplier. Easy? It's still 16-22 Enemies. Hard? Yeah, 24-32; not including potential Animals.
-Isn't that GameDesign101? "Let the Player feel like they're getting stronger as they progress", but instead, its just "I'm being matched with the same odds, and the A.I is rigged, so it's still getting harder".
* POSITIONING BE DAMNED
- Okay. THIS. Is the BIG NOTE. "Positioning in a Turn-Based-Tactics-RPG" should matter, but falls flat in this Game.
- First, Attacks of Opportunity(AOP), are inconsistent AF; There is no point in locking down a Group of Enemy Units with a Single-Tank, because the AOP is; 1 Unit, per, 1 Unit. Literally, your Unit's will only have a single AOP proc per turn, regardless of positioning. Other times, it doesn't proc entirely; I've had Enemy Units WALK A TILE AWAY to flank someone else, or they dance around to stab my back; yet, YOU'll get an AOP for doing the same maneuver. So, why even bother?
- Second, Enemy Units DO NOT receive the same Mechanics treatment - I've had an Archer posted on the second floor, INSIDE, of a barn while an OUTSIDE, enemy Flayer, on the far other end, sent their Falcon inside to Mark me. NO Line of Sight; Then, having enemy Archers/Alchemist land shots/bombs around the most questionable of angles with absolute ACC/aim. The AI gets a blatant pass on some mechanics.
- Lastly, the "Positioning Bonus" is only for the A.I to exploit - You can have an Archer/Xbow in a Tower? Enemy will more often than not land a shot UPWARDS and CRIT, more than you will DOWNWARDS; Flanking Bonus is shifty at best - Enemy can be surrounded by a Flank and a Sword @95%ACC will still miss both Actions.(CANT STRESS THE AMOUNT OF TIMES A 95% MISSES. LIKE BRUH. ITS A BEAR, HIT IT), and they only need 1v1, while landing crits; Axe-Flayers have walked up to the Tile adjacent to an Archer that's a FULL Story/Elevation above them and still land BOTH Actions despite Cover+Elevation. Meanwhile, if you block a path that leads to an elevation (e.g, stacked boxes, etc), it DOES NOT provide any increase to ACC - I've had a Crusader block a Flayer trying to climb a half-elevation, and still miss @80%ACC; Also, Halberds CANNOT attack down ladders.
* THE TIMERS ARE TIMED.
**Patch Note 31/05/2024**
- The Dev's updated the Game by providing 5 more Turns to Skirmish/Capture Missions; having these extra 5 turns does help.
- Keep in Mind; it's less PvE and more YOU vs TIME; Fighting HARDER, more STURDY, with MUCH MORE HP type Enemy Units, spending a Single Turn to either Advance or Reposition literally means the difference between Winning/Losing some Missions. Which, creates a game-play loop of cherry-picking missions.
- Research, Time: Forge, Time: Recruit, Time: Broke, Time: Mission, Time; Some of that makes sense, some of that has me catching myself wondering "Oh fuck, am I playing a Moblie Game? Where are the Pay to Win MTX Menus? Is there a "Watch this AD now to Skip Waiting" button?"
** Speaking of MTX... 7$ Cosmetic on Launch? Damn, that's ballsy. Dev's better be buying some fine wine with that bread.
* Prison Concept is neat, but poorly executed.
- The Perk's don't stack//doesn't allow multiples of the same capture. Fair, they could get out of hand very easily. However the system was a last second add with how unpolished it is; with things like having a "Duelist Tough" not being allowed with "Crusader Tough" despite being different; or, "Mentor" NOT actually giving any extra XP.
*The Forge, and "I understand".
- Yeah, I know, I understand you finished that thing I told you to start a Month ago. Please. I'd like an easier way to "dismiss notifications" inside of the Forge. It's unnecessary to drag a scroll bar ALL THE WAY TO THE BACK of the "Completed Forges" every time, just to remove the " ! ".

*30 HOUR UPDATE
- I've had several Crashes now, usually when loading into a Mission. It's also a very common occurrence for Animations to trip over themselves to a point it backs up the Game. Sometimes, the AI/Game will initiate an attack, the Game will try and get ahead of itself and calculate either the DMG or Animation necessary and instead applies it all at the same time resulting in a messy-lag. The worst I've seen is when a turn starts, no one does anything during "Enemy Turn", then 3-minutes later combat catches up; and that's not a joke - I've had to force close the game at times because it lingers on "Enemy Turn" without anything happening.
- Poor Optimization.

The Game CAN be Enjoyable, and I will absolutely continue playing after this mild "I'm kinda tilted" type rant - but the "artificial" difficulty of just having RNG/Stats be in favor of the A.I doesn't make it actually difficult, or fun to play against.
It's like playing Dice Poker against rigged dice.