Similar games

[Timmy the Tooth]

Any game suggestions of similar? I've probably played them already but I'm sure I missed a few.

[Wenju]

Fell Seal for tactical game. (starts good, but i got bored and didnt finish it.
Gladiator guild manager, Arena gladiator. Feels a bit too mobile for me.
Adventurer manager, bit old but the closest you get to this style. you manage a guild and hire adventurers to adventure :). Gets very grindy, but i do recommend.

[Timmy the Tooth]

Thanks Wenju, I'll look into all of those!

[Rubidium]

You may have already played it, but if not Battle Brothers was clearly an influence on the design of this game, and is certainly worth playing for its own sake. You are in charge of a company of mercenaries and go around doing quests/fighting monsters.

There are also a whole slew of JRPGs, particularly, in the SRPG space. Things like Triangle Strategy, Tactics Ogre, etc.

[Timmy the Tooth]

Thanks Rubi. It's funny, I am loading up battle brothers now. I've had it for years, but haven't played it in..well probably a year.

[Timmy the Tooth]

Ended up getting all the battle brothers DLC, so it's going to be like a new game to me :)

[Letterit]

Similar games, not really, even games as Battle Brothers don't match but it's a pertinent suggestion because of random recruits, roster management, party building with some depth, RNG aspects.

The classics match and worth a try if you didn't tried them already, for example:
- Final Fantasy Tactics, Jagged Alliance 1&2 yep 1 too which is very different than the 2, Fireaxis XCOM1&2, Long War 1&2 (XCOM 1&2 mods), Phoenix Point, Battletech, Gears Tactic, various classic Tactical JPRG I never played :-) and more.

But then there's also more indie games not similar but with some similarities that are great if you can go past various indie aspects:

- Ultimate Space Commando:
Positive: Sophisticated combats, very organic missions because terrains evolve a lot from enemies and from squad, fire that spread, explosion, doors broken or locked, crates pushed/pulled to block a path, walls digging by enemies or squad, pool of acid from killing enemies, more.
Negative for OAG similarities: You start with a full roster and can't hire new, it uses puzzles to open locked doors or lock them which can annoy some players, not Fantasy but TB shooter.

- USC Counterforce:
Positive: Sophisticated combats, complex squad management, very high level procedure generation and I did 3 full plays without having this feeling to play a mission that is a hidden copy of a previous. No puzzles as USC, less dynamic terrains than USC but still more than most similar games.
Negative: Very limited campaign and story very few story missions, but procedural generation is at high level, did 3 campaigns, at third I was still having missions not feeling a hidden copy of another.

- Urtuk The Desolation:
Positive: Sophisticated combats, very good procedure generation of missions that is third after USC Counterforce and XCOM2, good complexity of roster management.
Negative: Some can find the graphics ugly, procedure generation has low control on difficulty changes from it.

- Fell Seal Arbiter's Mark:
Positive: Achieves have a game with jobs that don't require any grinding that's quite a difference with FFT that inspired it a lot.
Negative: Eventually cloning too much FFT, as OAG combats simplified too much terrains mechanic to match FFT combats.

- Storm Guard Darkness is Coming:
Positive: Very similar to OAG even if simpler, but original combats with many nice mechanics and depth, for example the best AOO/AOC system I ever played, a great facing system without being too much burdening, more.
Negative: Very low budget, simplified by the budget.

- Temple Battleforce:
Positive: Very good game, combats, roster management and building, good indie writing but not at level of AOG. Evokes a lot Warhammer and Space Hulk.
Negative for OAG similarities: Very centered on a main story campaign and main missions, grinding is very limited, not Fantasy.

And some less indies but still not that much known at least mush less than classics:

- Expeditions Rome:
Positive: Great original tactical RPG.
Negative for OAG similarities: Grinding has serious limits, no random new hires, not really Fantasy.

- Jagged Alliance 3:
Positive: Very good Tactical RPG even if it's no Jagged Alliance 2 or 1, still the best follow up of JA2.
Negative for OAG similarities: No random hires but a JA like system. Last time I played the combat sytem still had some OP holes requesting you don't over exploit them if you don't want combats become a bit repetitive but the dev was still tuning the game whne I finished my second full play so I don't know now. No Fantasy but TB shooter very inspired by JA1&2.

- Solasta Crown of the Magister:
Positive: Great combats using very well the D&D 5e system, very good tactical RPG with nice RPG mood elements.
Negative for OAG similarities: Solid indie writing but I'd wish has it at OAG level. No random hires, not much grinding but by generating random encounters during travels.

- Phantom Doctrine:
Positive: Great combats and combats system, no RNG system but for some enemies AI aspects, and the no RNG is well hidden. Nice campaign and roster management.
Negative for OAG similarities: A stealth game but much more develop for combats, and still many stealth required and main story very stealth and spies oriented, when the stealth system lacks of depth to sustain the campaign duration. Not Fantasy but TB Shooter.

[Wenju]

Kenshi
More of a hardcore sandbox rpg squad/survival/build manager.
Feel silly i didnt recommend it.
Takes a bit to learn, but man this game is loved for a good reason.

[ragnarok666]

TROUBLESHOOTER: Abandoned Children !

[Timmy the Tooth]

Originally posted by Wenju:

Kenshi
More of a hardcore sandbox rpg squad/survival/build manager.
Feel silly i didnt recommend it.
Takes a bit to learn, but man this game is loved for a good reason.

Don't feel silly it's vastly different but you're right, it does scratch a similar itch (think I have almost 2k hours in Kenshi).

[Timmy the Tooth]

Thanks for all the great suggestions guys! This is exactly the list I was looking for because I have most of these and they are all high on my list games. I'm going to do another BattleBro's playthrough with the DLC (last time I didn't have dlc) and then finally install Solasta, it's been sitting uninstalled since I bought it on a sale a year or so ago.

[Nimring]

Disgaea

[Iguana-on-a-stick]

I've had Kenshi sitting in my library for ages, never installed it though. Maybe I'll give it a try... when I have time.

One of the reason I like this game is that you can play for an hour after work when you're tired and it makes you think a bit, but does not exhaust you even more.

But an interesting list, especially Letterit's. I need to bookmark this in case I ever need more games. :-)


Of the ones I've played:

* Fell Seal: I liked it, though if that is the "less grinding" I never want to play Final Fantasy Tactics. Story is mediocre but presentation is good and combats and character build are varied and fun.

* Solasta: Writing is terrible. Area design is okay... but the implementation of the combat system is pretty great. Also has a lot of mods that offer additional adventures, though I didn't try those much and probably the quality isn't that great.

* Expeditions Rome: It's terrible history. But kind of fun anyway in a campy Gladiator-style kind of way. I enjoyed it but kind of felt like my old history professors would be mad at me for enjoying it. Combat was pretty unbalanced, but I loved the big battle mechanic where you had multiple parties pursuing different objectives as part of a linked series of battles.

* TROUBLESHOOTER: Abandoned Children -> The most ridiculously convoluted mechanics I ever encountered. Even with a guide I understood about half of it. And the story was kind of all over the place, setting up a lot of scenarios and revealing quite interesting characters but not coming to any conclusions. Fun anyway.

And I'll add one of my own favourites:

Symphony of War - The Nephilim Saga

It's not quite a squad-based tactics game, but more an army-builder tactics game. You command an army in a civil war, but the squads you create battle automatically when they encounter others, so winning comes down to A] building good squads and B] ensuring they are in the right position, fighting the right enemies in the right terrain, etc. You spend about half your time designing effective squads and the other half moving them on the map to wage war,

The squad building part is ridiculously addictive and the maps have good challenges. Story is okay. No grinding either.

[Wenju]

Originally posted by Iguana-on-a-stick:

I've had Kenshi sitting in my library for ages, never installed it though. Maybe I'll give it a try... when I have time.

Should give it a try. takes a while to "get it", but once you do, that feeling of "one more turn, just 1 more raid" and ahhhhh there goes all night.

Symphony of War - The Nephilim Saga
Loved it, story is silly, but definitely and better clone than fire emblem if you ask me. But not the same vibe. But you are not wrong.

[Timmy the Tooth]

Yeah man, Kenshi is great. And when you play enough of vanilla, there are tons of mods! Enough to make it a whole new experience.

[Letterit]

Originally posted by Iguana-on-a-stick:

* Fell Seal: I liked it, though if that is the "less grinding" I never want to play Final Fantasy Tactics. Story is mediocre but presentation is good and combats and character build are varied and fun.

The few grinding is with Normal difficulty, with FFT Normal difficulty there's a lot more grinding either during combats so each get much more XP, either with more combats. And there's more grinding in OAG so I'm surprised by your comment. That said FSAM max difficulty requires perhaps a ton of grinding, never tried.

Originally posted by Iguana-on-a-stick:

* Solasta: Writing is terrible. Area design is okay... but the implementation of the combat system is pretty great. Also has a lot of mods that offer additional adventures, though I didn't try those much and probably the quality isn't that great.

Area design, you probably mean from RPG perspective knowing that for AOG it's much lower quality. Ok first town was too much for the project, but otherwise...

If your comments was combat terrains related, they are high quality, not many games compare, XCOM1&2, BG3, eventually FFT, I don't remind anything else.

Originally posted by Iguana-on-a-stick:

* Expeditions Rome: It's terrible history. But kind of fun anyway in a campy Gladiator-style kind of way. I enjoyed it but kind of felt like my old history professors would be mad at me for enjoying it. Combat was pretty unbalanced, but I loved the big battle mechanic where you had multiple parties pursuing different objectives as part of a linked series of battles.

You are very difficult with the writing, I don't find it that terrible for a video game.

I don't remind Combats was unbalanced.

Originally posted by Iguana-on-a-stick:

* TROUBLESHOOTER: Abandoned Children -> The most ridiculously convoluted mechanics I ever encountered. Even with a guide I understood about half of it. And the story was kind of all over the place, setting up a lot of scenarios and revealing quite interesting characters but not coming to any conclusions. Fun anyway.

I did my best and played multiple missions, but no, mood, story, characters, combats, building, I enjoyed nothing.

Originally posted by Iguana-on-a-stick:

And I'll add one of my own favourites:

Symphony of War - The Nephilim Saga

Not played, but I played many you didn't and will probably never. :-)

I checked a let play quickly, for combats that's an auto battler? I would never thought quote such genre for AOG context. Never tried any auto battler, this one seems quite influenced by Heroes of Might & Magic for global map but with units not stacks so sort of more like Age of Wonders 1&2 perhaps 3 too I forgot, but very different too very obviously.

I'm not a in a strategy period, I haven't played any 4X since some years for example, I'm not sure what was the last I played.