Iratus: Lord of the Dead

I wasnt sure about this until i played it.. Awesome game ! + the intro, the presentation, the tutorial, very very cool. + the graphics, the animations are pretty slick ! + the sound is quite good. + the mechanics, the upgrades, the stats, the variety of good and evil.. great ! The price is not that bad, especially with the discount on GOG. Thanks developers for putting your game on GOG, that shows you respect your players ! Thanks for making me a better Darkest Dungeon (that is not a dumb clone at all) ! I guess i can give this title a 5/5 and i hope the final (i hope you update it with more content after) release will arrive sooner ;-)

Impressions based on beating most of the current game. - Like Darkest Dungeon, units attack with positioning dependent skills. Rather than upgrading skills linearly multiple times, however, each ability upgrades only once but has diverging upgrade options, HOMM 4-style. The 6 skills that units get are all unlocked straight away and can all be used together, so no having to select which ones you'll use before battle like in DD. - Progression of the game is a Slay of Sire style pick your route, until you reach the boss of that layer. For the in development version there are 3 layers available to go through, with the fourth and final layers slated to be added upon release. The Slay the Spire style layout and movement also means that the game is more fast-paced than DD. This is to its advantage, as it keeps the game from getting grindy, which can be a problem with DD. - Most of your units are gradually unlocked as you play and they stay unlocked between playthroughs. Getting them doesn't take long, as I was able to get most of them over the course of my first playthrough. Units themselves can be tweaked through using different component parts and upgrade items. Not all of them are equally useful, but there's time for this to be tweaked. - You get a simplified HOMM hero and town. Town doesn't produce units, but looks like a HOMM town and has buildings that you upgrade to get different benefits, such as finding more items after battle. Hero character doesn't have any stats, but can interact with combat through casting spells, can equip artefacts and level up to gain different skills. Spending talents to gain skills is where you plan out your build. -Higher difficulty levels aren't just +damage and +health to the enemies and the fast pace means that you're not burned out on the game by the time that you feel like giving them a try. All in all, a solid game. Mostly needs tweaking and more content. Worth giving a go already if you're into what it's offering.

Go get it. Is good game. Will scratch your tactical and strategical evil itch -If you liked darkest dungeon, than you will like this game too. But if you liked darkest dungeon, yet you hardly ever started it, because 1) just the thought of the endless grind, 2) the bottomless pit of micromanaging your party and 3) the constant fear of RNG fucking you over so you go back to 1) resulting to 4) never get the feeling of making any progress ... is giving you a headache, then I have excellent news for you: you will love Iratus! So this is why Iratus is simple and why this is a good thing: Micromangement is very basic, item effects are straight forward - you dont need a MSc in applied Mathematics to know what you're doing. And best of all: You make a decision and you actually get timely feedback if it was good or not! In one Sentence: YOUR DECISIONS MATTER, YOU'RE IN CONTROL OF THINGS AND IT FEELS SO GOOD! That being said, you take full responsibility of your actions. This game is unforgiving - your mistakes can and will snowball into desaster and there is no one else to blame but you. And even worse: you can't just start over again by grinding your fresh recruits into shape. Your recources are limited in Iratus and you better use them wisely or your campaign will come to a premature stop - which brings us back to the point, that your decisions matter. Lastly: there is no point 4) (see aboce) - you either progress or you lose.

Wot I liked - Tactical combat is fun due to numerous team compositions, buffs, spells and consumables. - Tons (20+?) of different minions provide so many opportunities to create your perfect team; - There're 6 abilities for each minion + 2 alternative upgrades for each ability; - Unlocking new minions is kinda fun and challenging; - Equipment for Iratus and his minions; - Spells & Pots provide additional buffing, debuffing and dealing damage options; - There're 4 skill trees to enhance your Iratus; - You can cheat (save'n'load) if you want; - You are EVIIIIIIL! Wot I disliked - I don't like that you can only move backwards in the dungeon; - The game needs some QoL upgrades: ability doubletap should autotarget you, give us Wait hotkey, give us customizable controls; - There's no endgame endless dungeon of any kind. The game would only benefit from one; - Stances are underpowered imho. To sum it all up, I liked ILotD way more than its counterpart - DD (a good game in its own right). I would rather compare it to 2d Disciples though. Let's hope for a sequel!