Forgive me Father Review

Forgive me Father by developer Byte Barrel and publisher 1C entertainment—PC (Steam) review written by Pierre-Yves with a copy provided by the publisher.

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

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Having released in Early Access late last fall, Byte Barrel and 1C Entertainment's Lovecraftian first person shooter Forgive Me Father has recently fully launched its madness. Combining a 2D/3D comic book visual style with a retro-like gameplay, there's plenty for multiple genre fans to enjoy here as we keep seeing an amazing resurgence of the retro FPS style.

With nothing but good things to say back in November when I first previewed Forgive me Father, I find myself with one issue today after full launch. I've already said everything that needed to be said back in November. Forgive Me Father continues to be a very well built and designed retro based First Person Shooter taking Lovecraftian lore and putting its own spin on it. The length and pacing of the adventure however all depends on how afraid you are of the dark…

I think it goes without saying, I am, so any area where I had to hold up my lantern instead of my weapons would bring me to a crawl or a full stop. This was especially the case within the asylum where you could just hear things right outside of your vision but had no idea where it really was. Was it around the corner? On the floor above? The floor beneath? Or was it all in your head? In either case the audio design of your adventure will only ever make the visual presentation better.

Set in a first person view, you’ll be moving around a comic book styled world. Whether in normal resolutions or widescreen, the visuals ranged from bright and less creepy to dark and super creepy making you wonder just what was waiting for you around that next corner. Within this comic book styled world is perhaps the element that I enjoyed the most which was the enemy design. Designed in 2D but moving in 3D, these creatures range from undead looking zombies that can replace their heads as you land headshots over to more Cthulhu based beings with guns and tanks that can be exploded.

Regardless of the type of enemy, it’s not until you slow down and see that the enemy always turns to face you head-on where the 2D to 3D magic happens. It’s very well done and makes you think while racing around each level that you are playing a 3D based game even if most of the assets are in very well done 2D. Adding in the elements such as the above mentioned zombies being able to switch heads to keep coming at you and a variety of other madness inspired nightmares, there’s plenty to look at as you try to survive.

To survive these nightmares, you’ll start off with a knife and a pistol before picking up a double barreled shotgun and then an inaccurate submachine gun. Thankfully spray and pray works really well with this gun in large crowds so you just need to know when to use it! Short of these basic weapons, you’ll be able to pick up other new tools such as secret weapons that will last until their ammo counts are empty and you’re back to your own personal arsenal.

Adding to these weapons are limited use “items” which act as abilities as long as you can raise your madness high enough to bank it for further use such as a Healing Cross to restore some of your health or a Necronomicon… because that never ends badly… to give you a few seconds of invulnerability. This is where the twist in the Lovecraftian madness really comes into play. Unlike most other adventures where you have to worry about descending into madness, here you can almost revel in it as not only can you stock up on your item usage but you also become stronger and tougher the higher your madness.

So while it’s generally not recommended to pack an area full of enemies, in this case it can work to your benefit as you can feed off of the increasing madness to help you out later when only going through a few enemies and potentially being at a disadvantage. Also to help out is that you’ll be gaining experience and leveling up which grants you points to use in a skill tree. This tree varies from more health, brighter lanterns if you’re afraid of the dark, NO I DIDN’T TAKE THIS OPTION, being able to gain experience points faster or to be able to morph your weapons into newer and more powerful versions. There’s no right answer and experimenting is the only way to find out for sure.

If I were to have perhaps one complaint, and it’s not really that much of one because of the upsides, it would be the visual presentation when descending into madness. Whether bright and colorful or dark and requiring a lantern to banish the darkness, it’s always easy to see where you’re going and what’s coming towards you. Descending into madness however will steadily greyscale your screen making it harder and harder to see things as everything becomes dark gray against black meaning that you generally have to hope that unless you’re firing at the giant boss in the room that the area is packed with enemies and you can’t really miss even if you wanted to.

Summary

Overall though, Byte Barrel and 1C Entertainment's Lovecraftian first person shooter Forgive Me Father was both very well done and awesome to sit down to. Whether you only have time for a quick level or have an afternoon to dedicate to it, the short levels can cater to both allowing you to decide just how far into madness you want to descend.

Score: 8.25 / 10

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Forgive me Father - PC Preview

Forgive me Father by developer Byte Barrel and publisher 1C entertainment—PC preview written by Pierre-Yves with a copy provided by the publisher.

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

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Having just launched into Early Access, Byte Barrel’s Forgive me Father is a Lovecraftian retro inspired first person shooter taking the idea of madness to a different level. Split into stages where you must shoot or slash your way through hordes of nightmare fueled beings, this priest, to quote a 1992 movie directed by Peter Jackson (Dead Alive), “kicks ass for the lord!!”.

Coming out at a great time, Forgive me Father is fitting right in with other retro inspired first person shooters such as Saibot Studio’s Hellbound that’s channeling some good old fashioned Doom over to Slipgate Ironworks’ Graven that’s brought Hexen into the modern day. Unlike these two titles though, Byte Barrel has gone in a different direction channeling some good old fashioned H.P. Lovecraft that allows them to just really do whatever they want to do. When it comes to Lovecraftian horrors, there’s no right or wrong way as it’s all maddening in the end.

What impressed me immediately, other than the smooth controls and the ability to use a controller if wanted, were the graphics. I was a bit unsure of how well the comic book style would work in motion but it felt smooth and fluid for a rather 2D medium which also helps sell the retro from a time where all we really had were 2D models to look at on a screen. The colors chosen also help create a smooth rolling experience while running through halls of closed doors or outside in the gardens and the city. There’s nothing harsh on the eyes unless you consider the crazy sights of “undead”, blood, guts and gore that’s flying around everywhere as you pull the trigger on your firearms.

Speaking of brilliant and potentially maddening was how long it took me to realize that any of these being rushing at you while holding heads in their hands could use those heads in order to slap it right atop of their shoulders and keep charging you. With the words “headshot” on screen you wonder why they keep charging, well, that would be why and it makes you re-evaluate your approach to how much ammo you’re willing to spend upfront. Thankfully as long as you’re not too trigger happy there tends to be plenty of explosive barrels kicking around in order to get them to do your work for you as long as you have a clean shot towards them.

Adding an extra layer of “scary” is the ability to use a lantern to see in the dark. Scary you say? Scary I say as like Doom 3 you can either use your light source or your weapon, not both. So in these moments while both underground in the darkness or at the rising sun when it’s still not entirely light out, you may need this light to show you what lies just beyond and be quick enough to put it away and pull the trigger on the weapon that you are currently using whether your trusty revolver, your shotgun or the knife if you’re good enough to not get hit while using it… I wasn’t so I stuck to my VERY trusty six-shooter.

Stages themselves are not overly long and also thankfully not overly “hard”. Playing on normal felt like a decent challenge but nothing that would make me want to run and cry. It was enjoyable and I was happy to have the option to play at an enjoyable difficulty scale. Along with the stages not being very long as are checkpoints in the shape of Cthulhu themselves chilling with the words “SAVE” over their head making you potentially wonder if it’s not a trick of the imagination, but no, thankfully you can either quick save or make a proper save as sometimes what’s just beyond is enough reason to use these checkpoints as you may not survive them the first time.

Now for the pièce de résistance is how Forgive me Father deals with the madness. Normally, the worse it gets, the harder things are to do such as within Red Hook Studios' Darkest Dungeon and Frogware's The Sinking City. Unlike these two and again making it its own, as you increase in madness within this fast paced shooter you'll be stronger and tougher instead of weaker and potentially seeing things that while not really there will kill you all the same. Adding in a bonus to this twist is that eventually you can even channel this madness into a cross in order to heal yourself. It's a different twist and a welcomed one at that.

Summary

So currently within Early Access and still more content to come, Byte Barrel’s Forgive me Father is a fun retro inspired first person shooter in the Lovecraftian vein of crazy. Great visuals, smooth gameplay and a charged soundtrack that can also make you wonder if you’re hearing things, I look forward to seeing the rest once it’s finished.

Score: N/A

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Lords and Villeins - PC Preview

Lords & Villeins by developer Honestly Games and publisher 1C Entertainment—PC (Steam) preview written by Hayden with a copy provided by the publisher.

Estimated reading time: 6 minutes

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Lords & Villeins by developer Honestly Games is a peaceful colony builder in a top-down, grid-aligned graphics style reminiscent of Rimworld and other Dwarf Fortress descendents. The game places the player into the role of a medieval lord granted a charter to found a new settlement, with yearly taxes in goods and money from the King suggesting that there is a world beyond the borders of the map. Game developer Honestly Games describes the game as "…a lighthearted city-building strategy simulation of a medieval society where you shape the dynasty of the ruling family. In this game, you're not drowned in managing every detail of your villager's daily life; instead, staying true to your role, you focus on the big picture and deal with whole families and their descendants."

Settlement layout in Lords & Villeins is done by zoning sections of the map for particular uses, and then assigning each zone to a particular villager family. Each family has a particular skill set, and you need to match these in order for production to occur. Assigning a family of farmers to the blacksmith shop, for example, will yield you neither crops nor tools. In true medieval style, the player can also set the terms under which the villager is allowed to use the zone: a seasonal rent of money, a percentage of their production as a tax, free usage of the area, or even being paid by the player to live/work there in exchange for 100 percent of their production output.

At this level, the developer's description of the game as "not drowned in managing every detail" certainly works. Unfortunately, that ideal breaks down when you realize that your villagers will not develop these zones themselves - you must designate where every wall, bed, storage chest and piece of production equipment goes, as well as having control over what the production priority of the villagers is. For farmers this extends to telling them what crops to plant in what ratio, how many of each kind of animal to keep and which secondary products you want them to prioritize producing. At that point, you start to wonder how many other levels of detail the developers thought they were saving you from! (The answer, unfortunately, is ‘enough to micromanage your way around other issues', which I'll touch on below.)

As a colony sim game, Lords & Villeins has the sort of multi-tier economic system that you would expect from this genre. Farmers plant and harvest wheat, then thresh it to make grain, which is sold to a Miller to grind into Flour, which is sold to a Baker to make bread, which is sold to everyone in the populace who all need food. Two problems currently hamstring the economic system in the game, both likely attributable to the early-Early Access state of development and hopefully solved as other features in the game's roadmap (link) are implemented:

1. Some chains result in products for which there is minimal/no ongoing natural demand. Masons, for example, produce stone products that are used during construction but never beyond that. This results in your Masoning family (or families) running out of money for food since nobody is buying their products, and they will starve and die without constant intervention by the player. This looks like it may be solved during the developer's planned "EA Update #1" which will introduce deterioration of structures and equipment, but we will have to wait and see.
2. The game randomly chooses which families will ask to move into the settlement, which can make it extremely hard to complete production chains. Accepting a family of Bakers who showed up before you got a family of Millers will leave you having to constantly intervene to keep the Bakers alive, as they don't have anyone to produce the Flour they need to make their end product for sale. Similarly, having a Tanner family in town before you get a Leatherworker will leave the Tanners with piles of leather that nobody wants to buy. This is somewhat mitigated through a "King's favour" system that lets you request from a slate of three families, but the player cannot access this until near the end of the settlement's second year - a long time to be babysitting families that keep running out of food and money.

One other issue keeps me from playing Lords & Villeins for long periods, and has consistently hit several settlement attempts after 2-3 hours of play time - some villagers seem to forget how to cook/eat. Families with food ingredients, firewood, access to fresh water and all the tools they need to cook simply…don't eat. My most recent playthrough before writing this was stymied when two out of three members of a farming family simply opted to starve to death next to a full larder, and another 18 villagers were showing impending starvation messages for similar reasons. With no way to prioritize the tasks a villager does, or to directly command them to perform an action, this situation can rapidly change a growing settlement into a virtual graveyard of emaciated grey pixel-bodies next to colorful stacks of food items.

Leaving aside the issues detailed above, Lords & Villeins still delivers a solid basis on which a stellar game could take shape as it moves through Early Access. A consistent graphical style and easy to understand basic concepts makes it a pleasant experience as you learn the game through the already-present tutorial level, and a variety of biome maps coupled with the randomized arrival of family types gives decent replayability to the game. What appears to be a fairly well-defined roadmap gives hope of a smooth progression through the Early Access process, and offers promise of features that will solve (or at least minimize) issues that currently undermine the in-game economy.

My feeling on Lords & Villeins is that while it is a game worth keeping an eye on, players may want to wait until after the first major update promised by the roadmap before putting money on the table to buy it. In the state it was released into Early Access, Lords & Villeins provides several hours of solid entertainment building a peaceful settlement. Long-duration play is currently hindered by an incomplete economic system and hard-to-solve breakdowns of basic systems as the settlement grows, but the game already shows a solid foundation for the developers to build on. A good game for players looking for a casual colony builder. I would currently rate this at a 6.5/10, but with the potential to be a solid 8 or 9 if the developers follow through with their roadmap features as currently presented and do a few passes to squash bugs.

Summary

In the state it was released into Early Access, Lords & Villeins provides several hours of solid entertainment building a peaceful settlement. Long-duration play is currently hindered by an incomplete economic system and hard-to-solve breakdowns of basic systems as the settlement grows, but the game already shows a solid foundation for the developers to build on. A good game for players looking for a casual colony builder in its current state, but players seeking a longer commitment should wait until a few more updates have occurred.

Score: N/A

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Graven Demo - PC Preview

Graven by developer Slipgate Ironworks and publishers 3D Realms and 1C Entertainment—PC (Steam) preview written by Pierre-Yves with a limited time demo.

Estimated reading time: 4 minutes

I couldn't even tell you when I originally played Hexen. Windows 95? Windows 98? I think the last that I played one was Hexen 64 to be honest. Regardless, it was so long ago and loading up Graven brought me all the way back to those days of what we considered high and amazing graphics. Like Hellbound by Saibot Studios that I reviewed earlier this year, Graven brings back that more pixelated first person shooter age but with a design for today’s technologies.

As part of the Video Game Awards, like Echo Generation earlier this week, Graven's developers treated players to a limited time demo which ended back on Sunday. This demo spanned about the course of an hour and about three quests to start to get a feel for the gameplay mechanics. Honestly making me think of Might and Magic by 3DO back in the day, you've got your staff, crossbow, flail, dart gun and both fire and electricity magics to slay your way through hordes of zombies and mutant dogs?

If there's one thing to be said about the gameplay it is that it is smooth. Running, sprinting, jumping, attacking with a staff or a flail where the timing is different or shooting something with your crossbow. It all happens when you want it to happen. If there is a negative to be said on the combat, it’s that enemies hit fairly hard and your health doesn’t last long. While it makes sense that you need to learn enemy movements, such as zombies will sprint forward so you need to learn to move sideways not backwards, it's that you're going to die a fair amount of times if you're not careful.

Otherwise while taking out all these undead beings that are currently plaguing the village that you find yourself in, you're going to have a little bit of creative problem solving. Starting off with the task of unclogging the sewage drains from piles of corpses that have piled up during a plague, you'll also have to relight a lighthouse. To do either of these you're going to need to find levers, throw switches, fight your way through hordes of enemies and then you're going to have to make it back in one piece.

It works fairly well as you are slowly given new weapons and new ways to approach situations, but at the same time, I don't know how long it can hold up in the long run. Unlike Hellbound which is designed as an homage to Doom where you just get more and more weapons as time goes by, Graven feels a little more RPG-like but without the RPG system. So over the course of an hour yes you got new weapons, yes you got some items such as a ring that would allow for more healing after the initial burst, but without picking up floating runes your magic was basically useless and it’s not like it looks like you can level up your mana pools.

On that subject I found that most situations were better approached physically than magically. The reason is a lot of your spells while they look powerful, they don't do much damage. Setting enemies on fire looks cool but then they still shamble towards you or run full tilt if they were mutant dogs. Using electricity can arc between enemies and even set an entire body of water crackling, but enemies are still going to come at you. It looked cool, but it just didn't have that oomph that I was looking for and because of this I honestly didn't even use it as part of my combat solutions. Magic is really going to need a boost if it's actually going to be useful once the full version drops.

Summary

As demos are generally only a quick look at the whole with plenty of balancing to come, perhaps my issues with the magic system will be fixed by the full version. That's sad, the rest of it was just simply awesome. The way the environment is designed in that old school style that feels old but looks new and just how it played out it was clear that this should be worth sitting down to next year on full release.

Score: N/A

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Deep Sky Derelicts: Definitive Edition - PS4 Review

Deep Sky Derelicts: Definitive Edition by developer Snowhound Games and publisher 1C Publishing—Sony PlayStation 4 review written by Nick with a copy provided by the publisher.

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

Just about everything in Deep Sky Derelicts tickles the nerdiest of my fancies. Turn-based combat, card-based combat, lots of RPG elements and more came together in a way that really made this sci-fi game click for me. It is a hybrid of genres and ideas, not unlike Darkest Dungeon, and for those willing to brave a slower pace with a lot of management sprinkled in, Deep Sky Derelicts will likely appeal to you as well.

Things kick off a little awkwardly – there is nothing much in the way of tutorials right out of the gate, leaving you to put together a team of three without really knowing what they are used for or how they function. There are a couple of lightweight boxes that try to describe what a stat or function does, but really I went in fairly blind while assembling my first time. I was mostly focused on the different number values of their characters and picking different classes, since I didn’t really know what any of them did.

Thankfully, the training wheels are a bit better once you get past the team makeup session. The gist of it is your party is being asked to jaunt around from derelict to derelict in the area, to see what you can find. There’s a bit of backstory about a high-up military person with a particular item they want found, but really you spend most of your time just picking these defunct ships to wander about a gridded map. There are a couple of interesting risk / reward balances to manage. One is pretty standard – characters have shield and life points and you don’t want them to die. The other is your energy, which you use when fighting and also exploring – and you don’t want to strand your team without it, so trying to ration how far to explore the ship before heading back becomes a serious consideration.

Combat itself is turn-based with initiative determining who goes first. For those familiar with the fantastic Slay the Spire, the principle is kind of the same. Each character has their own deck of cards, so each time one of them is up, they have a hand for you to choose from. Early on, the options are pretty limited, with basic attacks, maybe weaker spread attacks, attacks that can stun a person or have protective properties like raising shields. There is plenty of room for customization, not just in attaining new cards, but new equipment – much of which can be further modified – and also in gaining levels. Each level generally gives you a couple of skill points you can use. By the time you hit the cap of ten, you can have some pretty unique character combinations.

There is a lot of depth to not just the card system and customization of characters, but the way the levels themselves play out. Some rooms have traps, others enemies, some potential trade partners or friends. Some of the rooms also have innate effects that simply take place or impact your team (or the enemies) in various ways. Those are not always clear without checking the in-game legend, but after awhile I got a feel for what the different symbols along the way meant. There is a lot of fun to be had in spelunking through these old ships.

Despite having been a PC game originally, I would say that the overall controls are pretty good. For one, enemy selection works well, menus are easy to navigate and so on. I could quibble a bit that the map sensitivity is a little strange at times when you are in the datapad mode and selecting rooms. Here is how you move about, with a grid that you can either walk around blindly (not recommended) or scan somewhat frequently (but burning that all-important energy you don’t want to run out of) to reveal more rooms on the map. Sometimes the screen jumps and jars about in unwieldy fashion, which is mildly annoying when you are sliding to the edges of the map and things have to start scrolling.

The sound was perfectly fine, with some pretty basic sounds, and while the graphics are far from AAA quality, there is a novel comic book style to it that actually looks really nice. Action panels during combat are colorful, and locations like the tavern look suitably drenched in a sort of neon, sci-fi glow. Text can be a bit small to read on the television at times, but it is not terrible or headache-inducing by any means either. As nice as the game’s visuals look during combat and story sections, the datapad screen is pretty bland. It’s completely functional (except for that sort of twitchy edging when moving around), which is certainly more important, but it feels slightly lacking when compared to the rest of the game’s highly stylized aesthetic.

Deep Sky Derelicts does a pretty good job of mashing together a few different types of game. Visually it is pleasing to look at, and there is plenty of strategy to be had when venturing out into the old ships. Progression is fun, because it happens in multiple ways, and this game definitely had me wanting to do ‘just one more run’ pretty regularly. There are a few rough edges here and there along the way, but the overall experience was my cup of tea.

 

Score: 7.5 / 10

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Conglomerate 451 - PC Review

Conglomerate 451 by developer RuneHeads and publishers 34BigThings and 1C Publishing—PC (Steam) review written by Pierre-Yves with a copy provided by the publisher.

Estimated reading time: 4 minutes

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Having taken a look at Conglomerate 451 back in early October, this Cyberpunk, Team Based, First Person Dungeon Crawler with a clone army is finally ready and I’ll be damned if it isn’t glorious. After a botched mission, that you were designed to fail at to test your mettle, you are given a promotion of being Director at an agency designed to clean up the 451 ward of the city Conglomerate. With plenty of cloning options at hand and the ability to research more, your only limitations are how far you’re personally willing to go.

Overall, between the preview and the fully launched version, not much has changed. There’s more in the narrative department and the gameplay is loads smoother as I haven’t had a single bug yet. Otherwise? It plays just as smoothly and offers just as much smooth dungeon crawling than it used to. The major bonus? Conglomerate 451 now has controller support if you feel like just putting your feet up on the coffee table!

Taking it from the top for those of you joining us now, Conglomerate 451 is a first person dungeon crawler that has you select teams of three for missions into the various areas of the district in order to reduce the influence of the companies. Selecting specialists from a variety of backgrounds to get the work done, there's no right answer but you'll soon find strategies with each specialist that either work great for certain enemies or that overall work for you.

Moving through the "dungeons" you'll be taking step by step in similar laid out dungeons that come in a variety of visuals from dirty cyberpunk slums to fancy atriums with pretty colors. Your goals in these locations is what will change and what you find inside will either make you gleefully happy as you uncover more tech points for research, or sweat with dread as your team becomes battered and bruised from the physical attacks and the strain of their cybernetic implants.

The idea of your units needing to heal up and recover isn't a new one but Conglomerate 451 does it well. Only having to deal with physical traumas in the first few weeks, the toxicity levels of your implants only come out to play once you've had time to get familiar with the mechanics and have time to look over what kinds of research that you wanted to specialize in. New tanks for healing physical wounds and new tanks for toxin removals are nice as you can do more units at a time, but, you also want to look into new bonuses for new clones as you're going to need more than one group on hand to send out.

If there had to be a downside to all of this clone business, it would be that clones can die and the experience that they earned goes with them. Yes, you can make new ones. Yes, your new clones are already a notch above their predecessors. But man does it suck. Hell, even if you retire a clone because you have too many others that are in healthier conditions, it doesn't give you anything more than an extra slot in your overall roster.

So a little like The Stranger of Sword City, you'll want to rotate your lower level characters into higher level missions with veteran troops, or, put all of your newbies into low level missions while your higher level heal up. How you approach this is entirely up to you, but you'll want more than one group ready to go and with clones? You can literally have multiple same set up groups on rotation so that it always FEELS like it's the same team.

So overall, especially for fans of dungeon crawlers, Conglomerate 451 is worth it. With plenty of missions with different objectives to keep you going and tons of research to make better and better versions of your squads, taking a city back from evil corporations will keep you both entertained and occupied for quite a while.

Score: 8.5 / 10

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Devil's Hunt - PC Review

Sometimes, life just doesn’t go your way. Super rich boy, epic sized house, amazing looking car and hot shot on the underground boxing circuit, there’s nothing that could go wrong for Desmond. That is until he’s blamed for a business deal turned sour from his father’s company, his newly ringed fiance was cheating on him with a close friend and he lost horrible to someone who he was pretty sure he knocked out in a fight. Concussed, angry, and honestly stupid about it, Desmond took his car in a chase out and wound up killing himself as he drove it off of a bridge.

Devil’s Hunt is something that hit my radar pretty close to launch. From the little that I had seen, I was thinking that it was a Soulsborne which would have made for the third one this month alongside Code Vein and The Surge 2. Instead, once actually in my hands I was pleasantly surprised that it was instead a fast paced action brawler like the Devil May Cry series. Getting the chance to beat up some demons and bad guys with a combo system that doesn’t actual rewards you with another more than keeping you alive, Desmond’s adventure is an interesting one, if yet, a lackluster one.

Waking up in hell, you’ll find yourself on the path of a mysterious figure in order to get some answers as to what the hell is going on. Catching up to him and told that it’s about time you showed up, you soon find yourself in front of one of the big men of history, Lucifer himself. Saying that you’ll do ANYTHING to go back, how could he pass that up? Setting you aflame in order to grant you demonic powers making you much more than you once were, you head back to Earth in order to start getting revenge on those that did you wrong and to those that simply just have it coming.

Now here’s a fine line to walk. I don’t mind an “on rail” adventure as long as it is done well. Love it or hate it, Final Fantasy X and XIII followed the same formula. Linear path for half, open space for a quarter, linear path for the finale. More controversial yet, The Order: 1866, was a full blown straight path of a ten hour adventure. So have been the entries in the Gears series. The fine line to walk is how much it feels like you’re walking it versus how much it feels like you’re being made to walk it. Devil’s Hunt? Often would have been better to have someone else move your feet as there was no point of giving you control to simply move from one hallway into a room just to have control removed again as there was yet another cutscene.

And this goes on for quite a while and some portions are much worse than others with an entire chapter really being you moving for two minutes to jump over a few ledges and then let go of the controller again. It’s not just the gameplay being on and off again though. For a lot of Devil’s Hunt, things are just… meh. In contrast with the actual opening chapter the rest felt like a let down as the first chapter is full of flames, and demons and things burning all over before you get into an epic boss fight. I was hooked. Then it goes back in time and you wonder, where did all of the awesome go?

If anything, Devil’s Hunt would have been at home in the late PS2 or early PS3 era. Graphically it feels dated, environmentally you are so blocked off from moving anywhere but where you are supposed to go I had to wonder at some points why I even had to be the one to move around as there’s no puzzle solving. There’s no backtracking. It’s just hop one or two ledges, fight, hope three or four ledges, fight, ledge, boss fight. There was no real oomph to it and this goes even into the combat.

When playing a game, especially a brawler base like this, there’s one thing above all else that is needed, and I say this even on top of a good story. It’s the satisfaction of landing a hit on your enemy. If your combat system is solid, that is often more than enough to go through to the end even if the tale is cheesy or lackluster. Unfortunately, the combat system isn’t which is a true shame as your main weapon, hell just about your only weapon, are your fists. You spend your time punching and dashing around like the boxer you were before you died which ties that part in nicely, but it’s just not satisfying. Your enemies never flinch, they don’t go flying and bosses really don’t care about your pitiful hits.

Even leveling up doesn’t really help on the above problem. You get new abilities sure, but the enemies can just hit you as you’re doing them. Blocking can only really be done when you see the prompt for it, otherwise you have to dodge or you take damage. It’s not even a case of getting the timing right. It’s you dodge, or you parry. There’s no real in between and adding that on top of the lack of oomph. I was left wanting so much more.

Finally, I think one of the biggest issues that I had with Devil’s Hunt is two fold. The first is that the story, the actual story, takes at least two real hours to get rolling before something interestingly enough happens to make you wonder as to what’s really going on. The second, was that Desmond is un-relatable. This rich laissez-faire spoiled whatever he actually does, has almost next to no personality until someone threatens his ex-fiancee. Really is an ex by this point as Desmond did die. But outside of that, it’s not like Dante or Nero that I want to know what happens next. One’s obnoxious in the best of ways while the other is a good touchou hot head that will do anything for the woman he loves even after having his demonic arm ripped off by someone. I won’t spoil that one!

So that’s it really. Devil’s Hunt feels dated and it probably could have done with a bit more polish to add in what this style of title needs the most. Oomph. You need to be able to feel the power behind your hits. The story is cheesy and that would have been fine as I love a good dose of cheese, but without a system to back it up and actually make it fun going between those doses of cheesiness? It gets really hard to want to continue as it just becomes a mindless and un-entertaining trek forward.

Game Information

Platform:
PC
Developer(s):
Layopi Games
Publisher(s):
1C Entertainment
Genre(s):
Action, Brawler
Mode(s):
Single Player
Other Platform(s):
Consoles later

Source:
Provided by Publisher

Article by Pierre-Yves

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Conglomerate 451 - PC Preview

Conglomerate 451 is something that caught my eye for two reasons. The first is that I absolutely love a good cyberpunk and the other is that I absolutely love a good “old schooled” dungeon crawler. Granting me both, this currently in Early Access project is showing a lot of promise and I can’t wait to see the full version once the bugs have all been ironed out.

Other than having a neat name, it wasn’t until the opening cinematic that Conglomerate 451 made sense. Diving into the 451 Ward of the city of Conglomerate, it’s up to you to clone an army of soldiers in order to remove the corporations from its grounds. The idea of cloning your units fits the ideas behind this dungeon crawler much better than simply hiring a bunch of mercs to do the work. When you’re told that that human life is worth little more than the meat that you buy in a supermarket? Why would any merc take up that job?

So Conglomerate 451 has you take on two roles. The first, and the more principal one, is that of the Division leader that makes the big decisions. Which clones should be “bred”? Which missions should be undertaken? Which technological advancements should be researched or held off on? Each of these will affect how well your party of three fairs once you send them out the front door into violent territories.

Once out on the streets and looking for your goal, you’ll be moving your party in a first person mode, once space at a time. Moving smoothly, yet slowly enough as it is one space at a time, this old schooled style allows you to really take in and appreciate the neon colours and the cyberpunk vibes that the city has going on. While moving about, you’ll have the chance to explore the city a little bit, trade with merchants as long as your reputation is high enough, fight thugs out for your blood and hack terminals for a bonus of your choice if you’re successful.

Hacking was a bit neat. Given a line of code, you have to match it up to its identical partner that is moving through the terminals sub routines. Matching up the first will then bring about a second and then a third at the basic levels. I’m assuming that the harder the difficulty, the more lines that need to be matched. If you’ve managed to hack into the console, you’ll have the choice of several options as to what you want to do. Unlocking doors and showing the entire map are two very useful options especially when you’re either stuck on the other side of a locked door or aren’t sure where to go in order to start your mission.

Missions themselves are kind of neat. While technically starting the moment that you’ve been deployed from headquarters, they only really start once you managed to make it to the destination. Here’s the tricky part. Your team of three is basically on their own the second that you’ve left the front door. This means that if you keep getting into fights and your health is low, you may have a harder time in order to complete the actual mission especially if it’s a takedown requiring you to eliminate xth number of enemies.

To eliminate your enemies, you’ll be doing so in initiative based turns with you’ll whole party in one space and the enemies in front and able to move around. Starting off this didn’t feel fair until I realized that you can move your entire party back several spaces in order to make a buffer between you and them. Merging some other ideas in the mix, on top of the distance between you and the enemy, range plays a large factor in which abilities can be used and the percentage of chance that you have to hit. Having straight up to hit chances lets you know a bit more about what is a good idea and what isn’t.

While I didn’t mind the to hit chances on my enemies, what I really enjoyed was being able to choose where I wanted to hit them. You can target the head, chest, arms and legs. Each has its own chance to hit and regardless of where you’re hitting, if you do hit, you do damage and not just, from what I’ve seen, damage allocated to that body part. What I mean by this is that I’ve flat out taken out enemies shields and health by targeting their right leg since it was closest to be.

Finally, the one thing that I’ll gush a little about is that enemies may not immediately die once you’ve gotten rid of all of their hit points. Often times what will happen is that they’ll fall to the ground and have a chance of being helped back up or healed. This can cause a bit of a distraction to the rest and if they move in closer? That’s the perfect chance to blast them all with an area attack.

Now this isn’t to say that my time with Conglomerate 451 was perfect. There are bugs that can happen but the devs have been up front about it. I may have found a new one though as I got stuck on a mission where the only two people left that I could see to eliminate were so far away and on the other side of a space that I could not get to, that I had to quit the mission and conceded hard won influence back to the corporations that I had taken it from as there was literally no way forward as I couldn't even ride the elevator back downstairs.

With a very solid base in place, Conglomerate 451 is looking pretty good. With different mission types and the ability to expand your clone army’s options by developing the tech and research for it, the design options only help to improve the gameplay’s first person dungeon crawling aspects. I’m looking forward to seeing the final version!

Game Information

Platform:
PC
Developer(s):
Runeheads
Publisher(s):
1C Entertainment
Genre(s):
Dungeon Crawler, Simulation, RPG
Mode(s):
Single Player
Other Platform(s):
N/A

Source:
Provided by Publisher

Article by Pierre-Yves

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Ancestors Legacy - PS4 Review

After a successful launch on PC last year, Ancestors Legacy has made the long trek to console gaming. of course, the question any time you have a port is how well does it come over to its new platform? Adding to that concern, the RTS genre has had a lot of mixed results over the year when making the transition from mouse and keyboard to controller. The good news is, Ancestors Legacy feels as though it was originally designed with a controller in mind, and as a result this game plays right at home on the PlayStation 4.

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Secret Government Launching into Early Access in October!

Tuesday, July 30th, 2019 - Publisher 1C Entertainment is excited to introduce its latest partnership - talented Russian developer, GameTrek - and shine a spotlight on their upcoming grand strategy game: Secret Government. Arriving on Steam Early Access this October, get ready to step into the shadows and manage your very own secret society, complete with all the geopolitical perks you’d expect from manipulating the world’s superpowers.

Taking place from the 18th century to the present day, Secret Government tasks you with leading a secret society as you spread your influence across the globe, rewriting key historical events - from the War of Independence to the French and Napoleonic Wars. Manage your resources as you manipulate the actions of the world’s leaders. From strategically planting your agents in vulnerable regions, to infiltrating powerful institutions of authority, anyone can be your pawn as you exploit their resources and seize control over key decision-makers.

You’re not the only secret society lurking in the shadows, though. Be wary, as a rival secret society exists... and they aren’t afraid to manipulate their way into the history books. Make every action and choice count as you outthink the competition and maintain your hard-earned secrecy and level of infiltration in the shadows.

Secret Government slips its way out of the shadows and onto Steam Early Access this October. For more information, be sure to Wishlist the game on Steam and follow GameTrek and 1C Entertainment on Twitter.


Key Features:

• Rewrite History - From the 18th century to the present day, the War of Independence to the French and Napoleonic Wars, each mission will drop players into major global conflicts, tasking them with manipulating the outcome to serve the Brotherhood’s ambitions.
• Play Your Pawns - The world’s most powerful figures - from national rulers to military superpowers - are but mere pawns to you. Learn to manipulate their complex AI machinations as you leverage their unique abilities to shape the world to your needs.
• Indirect Influence - Why should you have to do the heavy lifting of executing your diplomatic, economic, and militaristic ambitions? Plant your own agents and indirectly coerce others to do your bidding with over 50 types of actions intended to upend the world’s balance in your favor while keeping your hands clean.
• Manipulate a Living World - From ideologies to social classes, taxes to civil unrest, the world of Secret Government is comprised of countless interconnected sociopolitical systems that effectively simulate a believable and reactionary world. While world leaders strive to maintain the status quo, how will you destabilize the system and trigger worldwide change?
• You’re Not Alone in the Shadows - Facing down a hostile secret organization that isn’t afraid to manipulate their way into the history books, make every action and choice count in order to outthink the competition and maintain your hard-earned secrecy and level of infiltration in the shadows.

Secret Government slips its way out of the shadows and onto Steam Early Access this October. For more information, be sure to Wishlist the game on Steam and follow GameTrek and 1C Entertainment on Twitter.


Latest releases:
1C has recently released FELL SEAL: ARBITER’S MARK, CONGLOMERATE 451 (IN EA), ETERNITY: THE LAST UNICORN, RE-LEGION, DEEP SKY DERELICTS, ANCESTORS LEGACY

About 1C Entertainment

1C Entertainment is an international group with offices located in Warsaw, Gdansk, Prague, Budapest and Moscow and operating in the segments of game production, distribution and services for video game developers. The company releases video games for all platforms through its global network of partners digitally and in retail.

1C Entertainment has successfully launched over 100 game titles including critically acclaimed series - IL-2 Sturmovik, King’s Bounty, Men of War and Space Rangers. Recent releases include such games as Ancestors Legacy and Deep Sky Derelicts. For more information about 1C Entertainment and their games, please visit the official 1C Entertainment website.

About GameTrek

New game studio from Moscow. Established in 2013 and since that time have been developing business games, gamification and business simulators for Russian enterprise companies. Two years ago the studio launched games development. Except for Secret Government the studio released DJ Whip VR game.



Article by Susan N.

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Ion Fury Launches August 15th on PC!

DALLAS, TX – JULY 11, 2019 – Ion Maiden, the old-school first-person shooter developed by Voidpoint and published by 3D Realms and 1C Entertainment, will release under a new title to avoid legal issues with a certain popular heavy metal band. Ion Fury fires out of Early Access and 1.0 bursts onto PC August 15, with Nintendo Switch™, PlayStation® 4 and Xbox One coming later. To celebrate, PC Big Box-style physical copies are now available for pre-order.

Shelly “Bombshell” Harrison finally has a deadly date on her calendar with Dr. Jadus Heskel and his army of cyber-cultists. With signature weapons including her Loverboy revolver and Bowling Bombs, every cyborg she sees is about four seconds away from being nothing but gibs n’ gore.

Lovingly crafted in the Build engine which powered ‘90s classics such as Duke Nukem 3D, Blood and Shadow Warrior, Ion Fury fuses nostalgic looks with today’s technology to create the ultimate shooter. Modern features like auto-saves, improved physics and map interactivity, headshots, and widescreen functionality simply weren’t possible back then, but Ion Fury brings the best of both worlds.

To celebrate the sheer madness of a modern shooter made in the Build engine, Shelly’s getting the Big Box she deserves. This edition includes a Bowling Bomb-shaped USB Drive loaded with a DRM-Free version of the game and Soundtrack, a poster, a keycard based on the ones Shelly finds in-game, a making-of booklet, a Bowling Bomb sticker set, and of course Ion Fury, all for $59.99.

Haven’t played yet, and find that trigger finger is getting itchy? The Digital edition of Ion Fury is available now on Steam Early Access in English, for $19.99. As the game has doubled in planned scope since its unveiling, the price will rise to $24.99 one week from today on July 18. Now’s the perfect time to pick it up and start blasting.

“After careful consideration, we’ve decided to rename our first-person-shooter “Ion Maiden” to “Ion Fury,” said Mike Nielsen, CEO of 3D Realms. “A lot of thought went into this, but most importantly it would be a disservice to our loyal fanbase and the fantastic developers, to drag out a long lawsuit. The amazing gameplay, interactivity and pure fun, is what makes Ion Fury a great game. Not the title.”

For more information please explore the official websites for 3D Realms, Ion Fury, and 1C Entertainment.

About 3D Realms

Founded 30 years ago, 3D Realms was the publisher, developer and creator of many legendary gaming franchises, most still going strong: Wolfenstein 3D, Duke Nukem, Shadow Warrior, Max Payne and Prey.

To learn more about 3D Realms please visit the studio’s official website.

About Voidpoint

Voidpoint was founded by veterans of the Build Engine modding scene and is comprised of worldwide talent with decades of combined development experience. The studio is proud to present Ion Fury as their debut title.

About 1C Entertainment

1C Entertainment is a global games publisher and developer with offices located in Warsaw, Gdansk, Prague, Budapest and Moscow. The company releases video games for all platforms through its global network of partners digitally and in retail.

1C has successfully launched over 100 game titles including critically acclaimed series - IL-2 Sturmovik, King’s Bounty, Men of War and Space Rangers. Recent releases include such games as Ancestors Legacy and Deep Sky Derelicts.

For more information about 1C and their games, please visit the official 1C website.

Article by Susan N.

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Fell Seal: Arbiter's Mark - PS4 Review

The RPG / strategy genre is arguably my favorite, dating all the way back to the Sega Genesis. To that end, Fell Seal: Arbiter's Mark is a glorious love letter to games like Fire Emblem, Final Fantasy Tactics, Warsong and Tactics Ogre to name a few of my favorites. The narrative has a few puzzling moments here and there along the way, but overall the story and the tactical gameplay come together to create a memorable experience.

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Conglomerate 451 Announcement Trailer by 1C Entertainment

Prague, Czech Republic, March 25th, 2019 - Today, 1C Entertainment and developer RuneHeads are excited to unveil their brand new game and an evolution of the classic, first-person dungeon crawler genre, datamoshed together with a cyberpunk twist. Say hello to Conglomerate 451 and goodbye to the limits of your human vessel, because this futuristic RPG will arrive on Steam Early Access (PC) soon.

Embracing its grid-based, dungeon crawling RPG roots, Conglomerate 451 offers players an evolution of one of gaming’s most beloved genres. Tasked with taking down the corrupt corporations that threaten sector 451 of Conglomerate city, establish and manage a crack team of cloned agents, altering their DNA and outfitting them with the latest in high-end cyberlimbs, implants and weaponry to best carve out an edge in this city-wide struggle.

Each encounter carries additional weight, however. Roguelike elements ensure that not only could each mission be an agent’s last, but that even the most inconsequential wound can evolve into a permanent status modifier, changing the way they approach future encounters. This means players will have to leverage everything from hacking and equippable agent skills, to strategic use of their personal R&D department to make it out alive.

Key Features:

• Classic dungeon crawling - Face your enemies in a cyberpunk take on classic, turn-based dungeon crawling gameplay by choosing the best strategy, taking advantage of their weak points and making the most out of your agents' skills
• Manage your resources - Make use of your own personal R&D department to research advanced technology, unlocking new features, powers and options for progression
• More than just body mods - In addition to upgrading weapon and armor proficiencies, augment your body with interchangeable cyber implants that completely change your agent’s skills and utility
• Pain and Trauma system - Even the smallest wounds can have a lasting impact. By taking damage in combat, agents risk generating permanent Traumas that will follow them between missions
• Procedural cyber dungeons - Experience the dungeon crawling you love, mixed with future technology as you take on procedurally-generated dungeons and missions
• If you die in the game... - Each mission could be your last thanks to agent permadeath. Consider every move, because if an agent dies in battle, they will be lost forever
• Hack the world - Enter cyberspace mid-mission and hack your way ahead of the competition to get crucial intel and give yourself the advantage

Conglomerate 451 arrives on Steam Early Access soon, with a full launch planned for later this year. Not only this, but if you’re attending PAX East 2019, don’t hesitate to stop by Booth #19115 and be among the first to get your hands on the game! For more information, be sure to check out the game on Steam and follow RuneHeads and 1C Entertainment on Twitter.

About 1C Entertainment

1C Entertainment is an international group with offices located in Warsaw, Gdansk, Prague, Budapest and Moscow and operating in the segments of game production, distribution and services for video game developers. The company releases video games for all platforms through its global network of partners digitally and in retail. 1C Entertainment has successfully launched over 100 game titles including critically acclaimed series - IL-2 Sturmovik, King’s Bounty, Men of War and Space Rangers. Recent releases include such games as Ancestors Legacy and Deep Sky Derelicts. For more information about 1C Entertainment and their games, please visit the official 1C Entertainment website.

About RuneHeads

RuneHeads is one of the most acclaimed independent game studios in Italy. Founded in 2017 by two industry veterans, it's a team driven by passion of making games they would love to play. For more information, please visit www.runeheads.com 

Article by Susan N.

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