While I don't put this on a pedestal of the all time greats like HoMM 3 and the Age of Wonders games, it's still one of the better games of the genre. Sure, its visuals are rudimentary, its UI is rough around the edges, and it lacks many QoL features you may be used to. However, the beauty of the game lies in its balance between focused gameplay and mechanics, and strategies that take time to grasp--easy to learn but hard to master, with no feature bloat. The only "downside" is that combat resolution is largely out of your hands, and with a fair bit of RNG involved--though with proper planning and unit composition, losses can be mitigated. I played it a bit when I was younger, but never fully appreciated it until I returned to it later in life. The game doesn't explain much during play, in addition to the rough UI and lack of tooltips. Reading the manual is highly advised for newcomers. It also has odd little quirks like the inability to alt-tab (I get a white screen), but you can minimize through the option in the Disk menu. This is a game that would benefit greatly from mods to add some QoL enhancements, at the very least, but that is outside of my abilities and sadly this game doesn't have the biggest following. Regardless, it's worth a go for fans of this genre.
OoB is a wargame that offers a mid-level complexity experience, and is similar in design to the Panzer series. However, it gives a wider amount of tactical possibilities. Some examples are: standard terrain effects, "efficiency" levels of units (three levels of efficiency, affected by multiple circumstances on the battlefield), a substantial supply system, unit experience, commanders you assign to units, a tech tree to invest in between campaign missions, and more. Repair/reinforcing works similarly to the Panzer games. Yet with all these options, they're implemented in a way that doesn't feel overwhelming. It's advised to read the manual for the game though, as the tutorial, while sufficient, doesn't touch on some of the finer details (like the whole of the supply system, for instance). One issue for me--there is a graphical bug when set to the highest graphical setting: there is an amorphous, semi-transparent "image" that covers the play area. Hardly noticeable, but annoying. As someone in the official forums pointed out, you can fix this by setting the graphics to "good" or lower, then reloading the save and set to "highest" again. But you have to do this every time you load up, or remember to load up on "good" every time--or resign to keep it set to good permanently. Really annoying bug, and apparently it has existed for years without a fix. Unfortunate. Wishlist: -A fully fleshed out random mission generator. They promised this in the Steam forums for the game about 5 years ago, but it never materialized. Not sure if it'll ever happen, which is a huge shame. It would immortalize the game. -"Dynamic" weather effects -Integrated controller options for PC. They've ported this to consoles, so it would make nice to give the option to use controllers on PC without the use of 3rd party apps. -Faster zoom in/out. Fastest setting currently is still too slow.
Surprisingly polished game for an indie title. UI looks sharp, colorful and attractive. The art style is very nice, assuming you can appreciate pixel art. Balancing needs some tweaks, but overall everything functions well. They keep a lid on army size and composition, avoiding annoying doomstacks that was a staple of HoMM games (I like this, actually, some may not). Some extra tactical options during battle, such as Defend, would be nice. But, the game needs more content. More maps, more campaigns, more factions, a random map generator (which is coming). Speaking of factions, two of them are human. Boring. Many other creative options could have been chosen for a fantasy title, and extra factions are low on the roadmap priorities at the moment. Pretty solid game for an early access title, but still needs a bit more time in the oven. If you're hungry for another game of this type, it's a solid recommend. Otherwise, you might want to wait.
King of the TBS hill. It rarely gets better, if at all, though it's not without its flaws. Some of those flaws are alleviated through mods (Horn of the Abyss would be my recommendation). Other design "flaws" that persist are essentially features you'll just have to deal with--no game is literally perfect. Age of Wonders is the only series that comes close to surpassing this, imo. The newly released Songs of Conquest is also a worthy contender. None can quite muster the strength to overcome the master, however. Not even this game's sequels. There's a reason this game is still played my many, decades after its release, and consistently holds a spot on GOG's bestseller listing.
This one has a Battle Brothers vibe going on, but with a heavier CRPG/D&D element to it (character- and combat-wise). Visual elements are a little uneven here and there, probably due to using pre-made assets, which is a shame. More enemy variety would be nice, but with using a limited set of assets, it will always be limited unless they foot the bill for custom content from the original artist. Probably won't happen. The best one could hope for is pallet swaps, "champion" versions, and so on. Not much story here, but it's a sandbox so you shouldn't really expect it. Overworld random generation could use some tweaking, lots of clumped up locales. Also the overworld could be bigger. It's just kind of rough around the edges in general, but there's still fun to be had. Overall, for the price you could sink some time into this one, and hopefully the dev(s) will continue adding and refining the game, it could eventually be great.
