Recent reviews by HaveaHeart

Edit : At 18 hours it finally clicked what this game really is, beyond everything everyone compares all the mechanics to. On the grand scale, this game is 3D Suikoden III. If you've been looking for something like Suikoden where you gather your comrades, restore your nation, and get involved with circumstances from petting cats to fighting bosses to trading pepper in a volatile stocks market, THIS is the game.

Original : At five hours I do think this is a cool game. The fact that every NPC has a rep stat you can increase (even all the cats and dogs) and the fact that you can pick up or steal or use everything you can see is just awesome. I am comparing getting used to the controls the same way I had to acclimate to souls games like Elden Ring. It's true that Square is used for interacting, catching, talking to and climbing, but it kind of makes sense once you're expecting it. I found that keyboard is way easier for looting, and way more difficult for combat, so learning the controller for everything just makes more sense for the combat style game.

I think if you stop comparing each piece of the game that's similar to other games and step back to look at a game that has SO MANY cool features you've liked, it's just a game with a lot of really cool features. And that's worth playing.

It's true this game is a lot like They are Billions but with seemingly more eventual paths and upgrades. However, this game is crippled by its pixel graphics in my opinion. All of the human units look basically the same at the middle zoom level. They are almost all blue sprays of pixels. All of the aliens look the same at the middle zoom level, they are purple sprays of pixels. Yes, there are a couple red or grey variations, but once you hit 20 clumped units, you can't tell what units are where. The robot faction is similarly uniform. Imagine if, in starcraft, M&M was the only way for any faction to play and the drop ships also look like floating marines.

This probably wont bother most people, but for those people who want to set up squads and micro units, I don't think it's good.

Look I know this is crazy, and i'll keep playing, but this game does not roll like a slot machine, nor make slot machine noises. And without that it feels like a free phone game. I know that's a stupid reason to not recommend a game, but "slot-machine" is in the description. It uses a table to assign the runes like multiple decks of cards, not the reels of a slot machine.

I wish it rolled like a slot machine.

I did not expect to be choosing this game as my nomination for game of the year, but it really is.

My main complaint with all these farming games is that they SAY you can play in any style you want, but really you're locked into the path and must spend ages fishing or selling things to the museum to restore the town hall or whatever the game decides you should be doing. In Fantasy Life i you really can JUST play the game as a dungeon crawler fighting game OR ignore the story and focus on the farming. You can do all the side quests OR focus on progression and min maxing. Not only are there no penalties for playing your preferred way, you can do it all the way through or change at any time and focus on other stuff.

AND there's a roguelite after story progression system that calls back to the item worlds of Disgaea.

What a great game.

This feels like two different experiences depending on your party size. The solo lobbies are great at asking questions to random people about quest objectives, and coming together to fight the Arc. And the squad lobbies are much more likely to erupt into pvp at any moment. The whole game feels like the world building supports the playstyles.

I don't usually interact with other players in games like these beyond fighting, but this game just feels different.

You can't buy this game any more because they rereleased the game as a new title. This first run wasn't really engaging when compared to similar titles.

It definitely isn't worth raising the price and selling it again. This isn't Stellaris we're talking about here.

I have completed the game and at the end, none of the characters really matter.

I completed the game with a team of my first character, the first offspring, and one several generations down the line. By the middle of Act 2, my first offspring was completing entire levels alone. In Act 3 I had one character at level 13 that ran ALL of the level 35 levels without damage.

I think the main problem with the game is that some of the stats are over powered, and some are useless. So when you get offered a level up trade of one stat for another, the choice is obvious for every character. Then you pair those stats with passive abilities that generate Dice and the game becomes soloable by any one character. It's made worse by the fact that all of the unlocks have a Health component. You can always choose the health decrease trade off without worry because everything gives characters more health along the way. And there's enough gold to heal all characters at the end of every zone.

Additionally, the story is linear and completed at the end. There aren't any item worlds like Disgaea, nor any endless mode, or some sort of chromatic zones that get harder and harder. There's no New Game +.

Act 1 of this game is awesome. But there isn't anything after Act 3, and so, the game is not recommended.

The CEO of this company said publicly that gamers like me aren't premium gamers and that we should refund the game if we are having issues playing it. But that's fine, there are other games.

Edit: Steam wouldn't give the refund at 15 hours, which we all knew wouldn't happen, so I finished the game. It literally crashed after the credits and the return to the main area.

Edit 2: I've been trying to work through the challenges to unlock the difficulties. I stop whenever the game crashes. They just added an update for a Halloween event in which I've seen 3 bosses just stop moving entirely and stand still while I shot them. Sometimes for multiple minutes. Seems like its getting worse, not better.

This virtual tabletop is great for designing, and not for playing.

You can load hundreds and hundreds of custom made, user made, levels and maps. They can be as simple as a road or as complex as entire villages and cities. And that part is great.

However to play with ONE other person using a custom mini they created, you'll need to pay $55 before tax.

Talespire: $24.99
Talespire 1 Seat: $15
Heroforge Subscription: $14.99

Talespire uses a nifty option to add seats to a campaign which can be paid for by the game owner or by the player. It also allows for custom hero forge minis to be loaded into the game. But HeroForge has this export ability locked behind a subscription for 5 mini exports a month. And that is a hard limit, so to do 6 minis you'd need two fully subscribed accounts.

A tabletop campaign with a GM and 5 players, if each wanted their own characters mini, plus the GM's custom NPCs(up to 5) would cost a whopping $120. The base game, two HeroForge subscriptions, and 5 player seats (4 pack at $50 + 1 $15 seat)

The best way to use this game is as JUST the map, while streaming the view of the GM to the players in discord. Otherwise, you could buy 6 copies of Tabletop Sim at full price and play every other game on the workshop as well as your Tabletop game, with custom minis and seats for everyone.

I haven’t played much of the game myself but instead have spent my time watching streamers and my friends play through. And their reactions and decisions have led to lots of wonderful discussions about who we are as people.

This is a great game because of how it allows people to take a look at themselves, while still being an experience that progresses towards a game conclusion.

It’s important to have this type of opportunity available, and this game is a great example of what can be achieved in a game, and outside of it.