Final Thoughts (spoilers)

[x_equals_speed]

I just finished the game, it was a great ride. I enjoyed playing a lot, but it's linear enough that I doubt I'll play it twice (I figured that in advance so played Nightmare the first time round to get the most out of my play)

---Thoughts on characters---

Gin was that guy who meant shotguns were redundant for most of the game. The 100% no cover bullet line was often vital to clearing big mobs as it let him reduce a lot of them to low hp so the rest of the team could clear. Less good in vertical maps and no option to swap him out, about half of the time he was "guy with gun and essentially no special"

Flynn was MVP from the start to the end. Swapping positions solves so many problems, towards the start she was mostly positioning other people. Then she got the repeater rifle and luck refills that for a while left her dominating maps by swapping to high ground and executing everything. Once enemies got too tough for that to work she was briefly back to positioning other characters (usually Bill) to get the most out of their big AoE powers and then we got the high ace cards and could stack all of the +bullseye on her at which point she could clear maps almost alone (the arithmetic of "how many people can I get in a cone" and "what are the odds of a crit on one of them so I bravado" is exponential as damage, crit multiplier, enemy density, crit chance and cone size all go up as the game goes on)

I dropped Laughing Deer almost immediately. His charge was impressive and is an excellent feature but the rest of his turns were less impressive and he can wind up fairly vulnerable.

Bill hit his stride in the middle game. Once I'd got more practice with positioning and the line of sight system it became easier to get him to catch a dozen enemies at a time in his special. I've heard good things about getting him to low hp first but it was rarely necessary, often a small packet of damage was enough to reduce an enemy to within a shot of death at which point any character could walk down the line and execute them one by one. Late game he left my standard squad not because he was bad but because Cal'lish and Flynn were better and I didn't have the option to ditch Gin.

Cal'ish dominated my squad early game, I gave her a full house as soon as she joined (most of my cards) because having an extra body capable of attacking and soaking hits was just so useful. That body didn't get much better as the game went on so was less useful by the end of chapter three but by then she'd transitioned to melee kills and was great at them. She cleared most of the chapter 2 final mission solo because she was meleeing for 6 which meant all of those 12hp baddies were 100% kill and bravado if within a move of her (and on that mission they were all within a move of each other). In the final chapter she fell behind a little, I probably should've swapped Bill back in.

Lazarus didn't get added to the squad for ages. I saw the potential in his ability from the offset but it wasn't going to be good until it could swap hp with enemies and sparing the cards for that was a hard sell given some of the other characters competing for those cards. As we got later to the game and swapping 1hp to an enemy was the equivalent of doing 24 damage instead of 11 damage I added him to the squad and regretted nothing. For a while the pistol of daze self made him a monster who'd kill someone and then disable another enemy, but the final fight enemies were immune to that nonsense.

The advancement system, the direct effects of cards and the trinkets added up to providing interesting ways to build the characters. It was nice that so many things made a big enough difference to be noticed rather than fussing around in the margins. Every damage counted!

---Thoughts on enemies---

The shotgun/pistol/rifle distinction that the game made over several enemy types worked well. Each having a strength and a weakness. Shotguns weren't too threatening and tended to be front and centre, but had a big hp pool so you needed one character to weaken and another to finish. Rifles had crappy hp so were easy to bravado off while advancing or using an AoE to also weaken something tougher, but tended to be miles away and were dangerous even from miles away and with cover. Pistols were too dangerous to ignore and had middling hp pools that meant finding a way to fire a rifle at them to bring them down in a hit, but rifles can't move and shoot so that needed some setup.

Blackhearts introduced "Kill this enemy in one turn or you'll regret it" that was later reinforced by the undead. These introductions seemed a little bit back to front in that an enemy healing to full is less dangerous than an enemy swapping hp with you healing itself and crippling you. When I first mouse over'd "Heals at the end of the round" I was like "Oh, we've beaten the hard version of that already" but it does make a difference in kind for every enemy on the table to be doing it.

The melee enemies made me think about distance a lot. In their ideal play they run out of cover, hit you so you can't move and run back into cover so you can't hurt them because you can't move. In my ideal play they were too far away to attack and ran towards me only to be gunned down when they got there. The bump from 10hp enemies to 12hp enemies was noticable too - you can get to 10 with a rifle and a +1 skill but getting up to dealing 12 damage took some thinking and they were much more threatening enemies if you couldn't one shot them.

The burning skull things and their daze attacks were a real pain. The first time they hit my squad was too diffuse and if a character can't attack they need someone else to come and rescue them. They created a dual pressure of wanting the team to be close together as well as being something that's a high priority to take down quickly (This is good for the game because the balance of priorities between something you want to take down vs something you can take down in a way that gives more turns or better positioning is one of those meaningful choices that makes games good)

Most hated enemy was a tie between things throwing bleed bombs and enemy Flynn spirits. On the one hand bleed was pretty much a reload status until Lazarus got going, since it has such a long duration and is so incredibly deadly. On the other a Flynn spirit swapping a character out to the other side of the map where they're immediately killed by a room of mates was just plain mean. Fortunately the latter only occurs on two levels while enemies with bleed grenades were more common and there's that famously dangerous pair of them in pretty much an ideal circumstance for them.

I was a little impressed that the late game managed to innovate on regular human enemies a bit in ways that made them interesting to fight rather than the same thing with bigger numbers. Riflemen getting duelist meant trying to kill them in quite specific ways. Gunners getting ricochet changed how I looked at the levels and cover. Shotguns...well those seemed to stay more or less the same.

---Boss Missions---

The chapter 1 final mission was a highlight. Moving from one train to another made mobility skills important and is probably the level that made the biggest deal of the train/horse thing. It was also the first use of the "double mission" thing that I liked a lot, if only for the encouragement to try characters I played less often in order to give the wounded a rest. I'd have liked to see that mechanic used more (or perhaps in different ways with two teams attempting related objectives like one fighting on a train while the other is trying to take a point and change where the train is goign).

The chapter 2 final mission was a damp squib. It didn't really introduce anything new and was only a single mission. For all of its setup it was very routine, no new enemy types or features. It's a shame you go to all of that trouble to get a gattling gun and then doing get to use it in the mission. A fixed position gun with tremendous cone and effect would've been a difference in kind compared to previous missions.

The chapter 3 final mission was very atmospheric with the train rearranging itself and demons and all of the good stuff. It's a shame the boss didn't have anything more innovative than a big hp pool and the ability to inflict the unimpressive drunk status. Getting an extra character really filed off the difficulty too, I was expecting the enemy to get something punchier to work with. The scenery was very cool though.

Shoutout to the chapter 3 mission against Kestrel too, which seemed like a much better one. The player ghosts were good enemies since there were so many "oh ♥♥♥♥" moments where you realise what they can do if you leave a low hp lazarus or bill on the table and need to avoid all of the situations you're used to thinking of as good for your squad.

---Ending---

It came on a little quick, each chapter felt like it was half the length of the one before. It'd have been better paced to have them spread more evenly. It's hard to escape the impression that chapter 3 got placed on the chapter 2 map to save time or assets or something.

I thought "Gin gives his soul to Kestrel and throws him back into the world to have a chance at life and to fix things" seemed like a good ending. I think it'd have landed better if the setup had been handled better. The tutorial mission ending with Gin more explicitly having a chance to rescue Kestrel from the train but choosing Flynn/Deer or something else instead would make his bitterness at that have felt more real. Then his calling you out could be more about revenge than some weird "Don't get in my way with Mammon" thing that made no sense because you've got the same goal and none of your plans get in each others way in any meaningful sense. So I guess my feelings on the ending are that it was a good ending but it suffered for some fumbled story beats earlier in the game.

---Overall---

I took a chance on this the day after release while there weren't many reviews. I'm glad I did. I don't expect to play it again, but I'll have pleasant memories of it and wouldn't hesitate to recommend it to friends who I think'd enjoy it.

[Scape13]

Man... IMO, Laughing Deer is the MVP. Dude is a beast. When he has the abilities to gain Bullseye chance and damage with every melee attack and when killing enemies, he just runs all over the map mopping up. Flynn was also up there as her utility with swapping led to some pretty cool tricks you could do. My Gin was very powerful. Pistolero and rifleman, combined with 5 of a kind joker that has +1 damage gave him +2 damage to both weapons, going up to +3 when in bravado. Giving him +3 to all damage while in bravado made him super powerful. Anyways, I'm on the last battle right now, probably try it out tomorrow. I'm curious if it will be as challenging as the previous mission. All those ghost companions gave me a run for my money and was the first time in the game I thought all my characters might die.

[x_equals_speed]

I found I wanted the +1 damage joker on my meleeist because they'd attack 2-3 times per bravado so were getting +2-3 damage out of having it. Gin's passive abilities are great though, +1 damage on bravado is fantastic. It's just a shame his special doesn't work on maps with lots of elevation changes.

I should have a go with Laughing Deer and prioritising him for cards and gear. A lot of people swear by him, but I only ever experienced him as weak and vulnerable.

The ghost companions fight felt like the toughest in the game to me, but it might change depending on how you're playing and which squad you like. Let me know if the final fight seems like a trickier one to you.

[Good Shepherd Entertainment]

Wow, thanks so much for this comprehensive assessment. Please consider leaving a review if you haven't already?

[x_equals_speed]

I left a review, but it wasn't a spoilery as this, I tend to try to write reviews to help people know if they'll love a game or not rather than grind an axe one way or another.

It was

"A slightly unconventional squad level turn based strategy that depends upon a different set of constraints compared to others in the genre. That can either mean "A breath of fresh air" or "Bad because it's not what you're used to" depending on what you look for in a game.

The main mechanic that changes play is that killing an enemy refunds your action points, essentially giving the killing unit an extra turn. This makes it possible for your small team to beat many times their number by chaining kills to scythe through much bigger forces, but also that you'll be wiped off the face of the map by enemies that outnumber you if you don't do a good job of setting up and executing chains.

It's a little less random than some other games in the genre because it offers the ability to mitigate dice rolls. When you miss you gain "luck" equal to the chance to hit and when you attack you can spend it to raise your chance to hit up to 100% (at a 1:1 ratio) so a character who only takes 95% percent shots will only miss once per level because that miss will give them 95 luck and turning all future shots into 100% sure things costs 5 luck a time. Some players enjoy that thier strategy matters more than good dice, others find the game feels too puzzly because actions having deterministic results makes it feel like there's a single right answer (There isn't, there are videos of people playing the same level different ways, but emotionally it feels like there is).

There's a fair effort to make the different characters feel unique. Their personalities are fairly generic but the weird west setting affords the chance to give abilities that set them apart in terms of how they're used. A witch teleporting friends and enemies. A zombie exploding bullets from his body doing damage based on how much damage he's taken. A priest swapping health totals and statuses with enemies. There are six in total though you can only use four in a mission and it's easy to gravitate to a favourite four with the others not being of much use.

The battles themselves also have a fair bit of variety. You'll hit all of the trope staples: Ambushes, bank robberies, train heists and so on. Enemies are given schticks you need to play around that make them feel more varied than "Gun guy" "Gun guy with hat" "Gun guy with slightly bigger gun" which is a blessing and a curse. Some players find they hit a difficulty cliff when a new enemy with a massive difference in kind shows up, on the other hand it does make fights in later chapters feel legitimately different to earlier chapters rather than being the same thing with bigger numbers.

The rest of the game is there to bolt the fight sequences together and it works well enough. None of the writing is going to blow you away and the side quests aren't incredible, but nothing is bad enough to be distracting and it's nice to have a breather between action sequences.

It could use a bit of quality of life work. The loading times are longer than other games in the genre and there are annoyances like no "quit to desktop" button necessitating a loading screen to bring up the menu so you can tell it to quit. There are a few weird UI choices which make it possible to make accidental moves until you get used to them. It's all minor ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥* and the sort of thing that'll hopefully be patched over the next few month.

Overall, it's a good game if you like this sort of thing. Hope you have fun :)

* Spelled enn eye gee gee ell ee ess, defined as "a trivial criticism, discomfort, or annoyance." and having no history of use as either a curse word or a slur. Chill out censorbot."

[Thames]

My ending team was Lazarus, Bill, Flynn and Gin really makes the game easy.
I popped off 80 damage in a single turn with Bill which made me happy. (Give him all hearts Royal Flush, with Jar of Souls 46 and pop Holy water 50 then run him at 20 Hp all game which is base 3 plus 7 damage AOE hitting 10 baddies) did get Bill on 2 Hp and proc a 15 damage shot. That made me happy.

Lazarus single handy won me the campaign without question, run him with the burnt horseshoe (1 damage for 25 luck per turn, along with 2 gold nuggets and Royal Flush of Diamonds plus any plus 20 luck item and his Reverse Tell will proc every 4 turns to heal him to full) Most of the turns are let me steal Hp from an enemy, give it to a friend, pop a gold nugget to surpass 100 luck healing him also. Used Flynn to move him around and it ended up being stupid. The last mission I had Gin with bleeding got him to 5 Hp did my silliness with Lazarus then watched Gin proc a 22 damage shot. Also really love having Flynn with the 2 heal per kill which really came in handy.

Overall the game was a short fun time, just hoping for more or at least community support. Would like to have more of it.