Tyranny - Standard Edition

So I am an old-school gamer who cut his teeth on these types of games in the '90s. For me, my enjoyment of these games depends on two things: 1) My ability to roleplay my character by making decisions that follow a character's headcanon and backstory. 2) A deep, challenging RPG combat and leveling system that rewards strategic thinking. Tyranny has both of these in spades. While I loved the party system and mechanics in Pillars of Eternity, that game had almost no "role-playing." But Tyranny? Oh man, you can play an upstanding paragon of goodness fighting for social justice, a pragmatic seeker of law & order who is willing to compromise his morals and cross the line, a complete psychotic madman, and anything in between. Amazingly, the dialogue system in this game is so deep that there always seems to be a choice that reflects your chosen backstory. In most other RPGs today, you are lucky to get a single "good," "bad," and "neutral" response, but this game is so well-written that it never feels like you are shoe-horned into those responses. And the writing... Tyranny has an amazing world full of incredibly interesting characters and organizations. The only other RPGs with characters this interesting are arguably those from Bioware. And the story itself, while "short" compared to the bloated playtimes of other RPGs like Pillars of Eternity, FEELS long. Your character can arc over the course of the story (that seeker of law and order may themselves turn into tyrants), and you actually feel the progression of starting as a lowly servant of Kyros who turns into a force of nature all by themselves. When you start the game, you feel like you are walking among gods, but by the end of the story, you feel like you ARE a god. Lastly, the combat mechanics and RPG progression in this game are excellent. I had an amazing time playing through this on the hardest difficulty. Some of the fights were crazy and took many tries, but I did it! All in all, highly recommended. *****

Absolutely flawed, but a neat little romp that will be appreciated by any fan of Baldur's Gate and similar games. There's been a lot of division in the ratings- the honest truth is definitely that this game is good-but-flawed, and how much you'll enjoy it depends on you. Probably get it on sale, and keep expectations in check. You play as an ambassador of The Big Bad who is called Kyros. The Bad Guys are conquering a new land, and you help lead the charge. That's different from the usual, heroes' journey. The whole draw is that there are many factions in this world, including two armies making up the bulk of Kyros' forces. The problem is, the designers clearly have a preferred way for you to interpret the story. I'm not spoiling anything but I have to say- you can't just be in league with the Big Bad. Like you might think, okay I'm Darth Vader working for The Emperor so I'm going to lead the forces of evil to a glorious victory. That sounds amazing, right? Well, you can't do that. Just to give you a little non-spoilery insight, during the whole intro the two armies of the forces of evil bicker like spoiled children. This never ends through the whole game, and is kind of lame to me. How did they ever get this far to begin with if they're so bad at working together? So the concept is great and worth exploring, but the execution is flawed. I beat the game in three sittings, let's say 9-12 hours total? This was doing all the side quests in the first act, half in the second act, and only the main story in the third act. There's plenty more playtime to be had, but given that the game won't let me play my way I'm not eager to revisit all of it. I got the game on sale, so that's okay. Combat is dead slow, but decently balanced for most playstyles. Writing is generally solid, Lantry especially stands out as a neat character. Cool concept, plenty to explore. Great bargain game, not an all-time classic, not worried about a sequel.

If you're like, you play Obsidian games for the branching plot lines, interesting characters, and dynamic faction systems. Tyranny delivers all of that, and it's wrapped in a refreshingly and authentically evil premise. The game took me through the most interesting mediation on the nature of power since "War and Peace." If that sounds exaggerated or pretentious, it's just that I reallly can't describe any other way. For a setting, the game eschews standard medieval fantasy land for a more bronze-age aesthetic, which I appreciated. On the mechanical side, I personally did not care for the combat system in this game. It runs in real time while allowing plauses, but in no way benefits from its real time component, and relies heavily on pressing ability buttons constantly. Not my cup of tea, but you may like it. Despite the combat, the game's story and role-playing elements impressed me so much that I count this as one of the best modern RPGs.

Launched for while, crashed after mere minutes. Unloaded, Reinstalled. More than once. Now it won't even launch after a new install. If you read the reviews, you will see many, many too similar experiences over a long period of time without it being "fixed".

I really enjoyed the game. I was little irritated by limited choices because of relation to the faction. Your character should be above it... Also, rare items should be rare, not laying in every pile of junk... :)