izigame.me

Note : I haven't played the Gladiator DLC, I read that it doesn't add a lot of value and was actually potentially distracting when playing the first time, so I passed on that.
It's a pretty good game, it has few problems that can sometimes be annoying, but nothing game breaking as far as I know.
It can feel a little bit repetitive after playing for a while, it took me around 65hrs to finish the story on Iron Man mode.
Lots of choices are possible, but I didn't explore all of them yet (Played only 1 full game & on Iron Man so I couldn't reload earlier saves), so I can't vouch for how deeply it can affect the storylines.
Without spoiling, it follows some of the events that were unfolding basically during the lifetime of Julius Caesar.
It's great for all people liking a mix of turn-based strategy, a little bit of CRPG & looting/crafting, and a story with choices.
Also : Roman stuff. (Happens during the Republic Era so it's not about the Empire (yet)).
Bought at ~20€ during sales worth every penny.
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Main issues I had :
Armor/weapon list unnecessarily crowded : some objects are duplicate of each other and do not bring any value (they roll randomly the same characteristics when you craft them) apart from a different skin. Fro example, a roman or an egyptian sword will roll the same characteristics (like base damage, or critical damage) when you craft them so they don't need to be two different objects, just different skins under the same type of object.
It could be corrected by creating a skin system instead of separating every weapon or armor that actually that roll the same characteristics.
This problem also affect the quality of the items, you get the same sword 3 times in your list (decent quality, good quality, and pristine quality), and it could be made much more bearable by regrouping everything under the same object and creating a skin system.
It happens with every kind of objects (spear, pikes, helmets...), and it makes for a very bloated crafting list.
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Lack of contigencies in certain moments of the game. Without spoiling, at the beggining of the third act, I lost a main character just by being distracted by something on my phone while selecting my next destination on the world map in Rome.
When my character arrived, the next sequence immedialely launched without any interaction on my part (right after the loading) and I couldn't go back and load an earlier save since I was playing on Iron Man mode.
I also had a bug with a quest in Act III that could be launched in specific circumstances (the moment when you play another character than yours in a cave) while it shouldn't have been possible. It automatically made me fail the quest, since it starts a fight that I should be playing with my usual characters, and I had litteraly none of these characters available to take that fight.
You can feel a little lack of polish when you get closer to the end of the game.
Nothing terrible, but I felt like the devs had to wrap up the game and didn't have enough time to keep up with the quality of the rest of the game.
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Camp : I only understood that I could interact with the camp mecanics from OUTSIDE of the camp (by being beside it) when I was close to the end of the third Act, so very very late in the game.
I think it should be made clearer for the player, since it's something that's probably said in the early game with all the tutorials, but there is soooo much information that at some point you just fail to remember everything.
It makes for a tedious experience, having to load in and out all the time, but hey, maybe I'm the only one who missed this part.
It would be cool to be able to interact with the characters that are in your camp without having to load in though, like when you need to speak to your general or whatever to start a pacifying mission. It would make for a smoother experience.
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No almost no interactions with your crewmates in the world map.
You get random events on the world map that sometimes involves a little bit of discussion, but you can't just talk to them when on the world map, you have to go back to the camp and load in.
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Legion handling could be better.
When you click somewhere to send your legions, you often end up moving your own group of characters without intent. It's a little bit annoying.
Could be fixed by making the legions being "a character" like the group we usually use, when you select it on the UI.
Also, army battles end up being a gimmick without much interest, imo. You just "proceed" all of it and get it done as fast as possible after playing for a little while. It should feel more important and meaningful.
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Lack of romances ?
I put a question mark because, I'm not really into romances in video games. I refuses to flirt with two of the first choices the game propose to you, thinking that I was still in the beggining and I'd find other possibilities later.
Well, as far as my experience went, I only saw 3 (straight) possibilities, and since I passed on those three, I had no options anymore and ended up alone haha.
To explain myself, the 3 possibilities are either : fighters, or another important character of the story but only in one place in the world. Not in Rome. I expected a "normal" roman wife or something, but there was no option like that.
From what I've seen, there is only one character outside of your group you can romance, and I expected more. I didn't want to romance a character I could loose with perma death Iron Man enabled. Wanted a character outside of the fight haha.
But it's the least important issue I had with the game.
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Some UI problem that sometimes prevent you from seeing how much food & water you have left.
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Sometimes your characters are very "slow" when advancing on certain maps. Some maps also require you to back track all the way to the start to go back to the world map, and it can last a whole minute with nothing for you to do but for them to get there.