Like last year, I played a few free indie titles from Itch marked as “Role Playing”. Like last year, it led me to games that are not RPGs, but that were made on the RPG Maker engine, but they were nice experiences and I decided to include them. Did I have more luck this year? Let’s find out.
Cold Front
Cold Front is a visual novel released on Aug 03, 2022 by Studio Investigrave. It uses the RPG Maker engine to tell the tale of two friends, Augustine and Winnie, who grew apart and want to mend their friendship before the latter leaves for college. They end up trapped in a strange blizzard and must work together to save themselves from the cold, a mysterious monster, and from each other, as their differences and resentment grow.
The game has a cute art style and some enjoyable spritework. It also has a “chase sequence” that is terrible. Remember to dash if you decide to play then game. The story is somewhat clichéd (even the characters make fun of it), but I enjoyed it nonetheless. It has two endings, so there is a little replay value.
Final opinion: recommended. It’s a nice way to spend a free hour if you’re into visual novels.
Die in the Dungeon CLASSIC
Die in the Dungeon is a turn-based, roguelike, deck-building (but with dices), game, in which you play as a frog knight who must fight many enemies to reach the top of an ominous tower. Who is this frog? Why they have to climb the tower? Who built this tower? Who cares? You have dices to roll. The game was released on Feb 21, 2021 and developed by Alarts, SexyBuggy, Jaun, ᴶᴼᴿᴶᴲ.
Gameplay consists of fighting turn-based battles and improving your dice pouch. Each floor will have a battle, a special event that may give you an improvement, or both. There are also some negative events, that will make you lose dices or HP. As any roguelike, what events will play out, which rewards you will gain, and the enemies you will face are randomly selected.
During battles, at the start of your turn, you will take dices from a draw pile and put them on your hand. These are your available actions, and usually consists of: attack, block (for defense), boost (which adds its value to other dices) and heal. Choose which you wish to use and position them on the board. You can heal, block damage, attack, and boost dices, increasing their value. Your enemies will do the same, and you can see their next actions by hoovering the mouse over a square above their heads. Used dices go to a discard pile, but they will be back on the draw pile when it doesn’t have enough dice for you to take.
At the end of every battle, the game will randomly offer you a reward: full HP, increase HP, improve a die, or new dice.
The music is ok but becomes repetitive if you play for a while. The graphics are great, very colorful, with expressive and well-animated sprites.
This was by far my second favorite game, and my favorite in gameplay terms. Like every good roguelike, it’s very addicting, and you always feel like going into your next run whenever you die. Each run took me around forty minutes to complete, and I had to stop myself from trying again.
The developers are working on a Steam release, having already released a simpler version called Die in the Dungeon Origins. It’s already on my wishlist.
Final opinion: very recommended. Addictive gameplay, great graphics, and frogs!
Journey to the East
Journey to the West is a game developed on the RPG Maker engine by Elf Games and released on Nov 06, 2017. It’s based on Journey to the West, the famous Chinese novel (it’s a fun book, I recommend it in small doses).
As the game begins, we discover that during the rule of Son Wukong, monkeys govern the world. They have a profound distaste for everything that is good, seeing as a demon a priestess who is gentle, happy, and kind to all creatures. To purge the world from such a foul creature, the sages choose the monkey Tricky to take her to the east. During their travels they will fight monkeys, kappas, and a killer hamster.
What convinced me on trying this game was its battle system. I’m a sucker for different implementations of turn-based battles, so I found its description very intriguing:
“Play a cool rhythm, turn-based combat system on a theatre stage.”
So as a battle starts, your party and the enemies are transported to a theatre. There, you must pick between three actions for each character. But do it quickly, otherwise they will lose their turn.
After deciding an action, the game will show a beat pattern. Repeat it to execute your action. The better you do it, the more effective your action will become. Effects will last longer (I think), attacks deliver more damage, and healing restores more HP. After a while, you will fill a special meter, that will unlock a special attack. After someone uses their special action, the meter will be depleted again.
It sounds fun, but as it takes too long to complete an attack, and enemies can take a beating, battles become a chore. It’s a pity, as I think that with a few tweaks it could become a fun experience. A detail that infuriated me is that to choose an action, you must select it at the right beat. Besides losing a turn, sometimes it led me to waste the special attacks so many times. Terrible.
The game has a simple story and a light-hearted sense of humor. As for appearances, the songs are nice, and the graphics are charming, looking like ancient Chinese paintings with a cartoonish aspect.
Final opinion: not recommended. The story isn’t particularly fun and Addictive gameplay, great graphics, and frogs!
Kid Canary & the Midnight Tower
Kid Canary & the Midnight Tower is a game developed by fake gamer comics / ashlander games and released on Aug 26, 2022. It’s a turn-based RPG, in which you control Kid Canary, who must ascend the Midnight Tower to defeat Lord Dredd.
The game is very simple, similar to a mobile game. You use your mouse to attack enemies, grab items and buy stuff from the vendor. Your objective is to kill enemies to increase your attributes, climbing the tower one fight at a time. Each floor will have a few enemies waiting for you. After defeating them, you can choose between two random items to increase one of your attributes. Sometimes a vendor will appear, offering you a few items in exchange for your coins. As a roguelike, the enemy and the rewards are randomly decided.
Where the game really shines is its dream atmosphere, fairy-tale like setting, and flavor text for items and enemies. The graphics are charming, and remind me of some children’s books, while the songs are relaxing, and complement the overall style.
Final opinion: a hard one to decide. It’s a nice way to kill twenty or so minutes, but there isn’t much going for it. Play it if you’re curious, but don’t expect too much.