Yggdra Union Reviews

I don't care how well written the story is this game is fucking stupid. The amount of bullshit the developers fling at you for no other reason than sadism is ridiculous. Enemies that can't be killed even when you destroy their entire force, objective changes multiple times in the same map which make your entire positioning and resource management worthless. Enemies that know how best to use everything when you're still learning the system. No way to actually beat enemies that have advantages due to tactics or strategy and just accepting you are going to have losses. Heavily punishing unit losses despite the fact that the game absolutely demands that you are going to lose units. This game has so much going for it but the actual gameplay. How did they mess up this badly. I could accept one or two of these mistakes but all of them, go fuck yourselves.

[h1]Yggdra Union – The correct way to modernize an older game[/h1] [h2][u]Overview[/u][/h2] [i] Yggdra Union: We’ll never fight alone[/i] is a unique strategy RPG that gives some Fire Emblem vibes but it is truly its own thing that I don’t really have any reference for comparison. Note, the original game was on Gameboy Advance and was known for being difficult. This Steam version is a remaster of the PSP version and has a lot of welcome updates including making it more accessible. The options to play it with the same difficulty and restrictions as GBA is still there for those who want it but the game is still plenty challenging (and fun!) even with the accessible options such as infinite equipment durability, autosaves, and turn rewinds. [h2][u]Story[/u][/h2] The story is interesting even if its not the strongest part of the game. It’s maybe the same level of story telling as a Fire Emblem game where it can be a typical fantasy story but nothing to really praise as a much-see. It is still strong though and there is that perfect blend of a strong enough story with much stronger gameplay to keep me interested. It opens with our two protagonists, Yggdra, a princess who fled her Kingdom after an invasion by the Empire, and Milanor, a bandit who crosses her path and rescues her from imperial pursuit. They end up teaming together with the goal to get Yggdra her castle back (Milanor’s reward in the deal is the actual castle itself while Yggdra just wants the kingdom back). During their adventures, they link up with additional allies to aid them. Throughout the story, there will be many doubts about your cause which is interesting writing. It paints the war as more realistic where it’s not so clearly black-and-white, good vs evil. As one can probably tell by the name Yggdra, there is also a healthy dose of Norse mythology influence which is always fun. I will say I do really like all the characters and even grew fond of those on the enemy side and random NPCs. There is a lot of personality in them and the world feels very alive. There is even a bit of subtle story telling in the items you receive or find hidden around. Overall, the story and world intrigued me enough to want to check out the rest of the games set in the same world i.e. Riviera, Knights in the Nightmare, Gungnir (only Riviera is on Steam, sadly). [h2][u]Presentation[/u][/h2] Reminding again that this game was originally released on GBA. As such, it looks extremely good! I think the sprites that are on the map could look a bit better, but the sprites during war and cutscenes are awesome and full of animation, I love them. The art that pops out as portraits during conversations are pretty nice too. Gulcasa is an absolute standout of awesome design. The UI may take a bit of getting used to at first, but once you’re into the game it will probably become second nature. Music is awesome and I find myself humming along all the time or getting hyped for battle. What’s neat is every character has their own battle song! [h2][u]Gameplay[/u][/h2] I hope I can explain it well; it’s actually really fascinating. I haven’t played a tactical RPG that felt quite as tactical as this one. The game rolls out its features slowly introducing tutorials every other battle or so before it really opens up to the full gameplay. If you find the game a bit too slow/simple at first, I recommend to keep playing until you can form “unions” as that is definitely the most fun system in the game. I actually appreciated the slow roll out of features though as the game is actually quite complicated with a lot to think about. By breaking it down into chunks the way it did, it really helped me understand the game much easier in a way where throwing it all at once too early could have been overwhelming. So the game is all about resource management. You have units led by characters (i.e. Yggdra leads a unit of sword soldiers) and each of those units contains a number of troops, health morale, equipment, etc and they do battle with enemy units on the map. Each battle will open with a cutscene and then deployment phase. In the deployment phase you select which units to bring to battle. Yggdra and Milanor are usually required. Sometimes others are as well. During this phase you can also raise morale (sacrifice an item) or equip an item. In easy mode, the items have no durability and will last forever. But in Normal and Hard they have durability and will last a finite number of battles, requiring a strategic layer of item planning. Do you preserve your best equipment (one accessible feature is that you can now unequip items instead of having to wait for them to expire) or use it now? Do you use a consumable and then be without any equipment for the rest of the battle? It’s intriguing and I’m excited to try it out. I wanted to start on easy because I typically hate item durability and wanted to learn the game and know what battles I’d need the best equipment for. So starting easy then playing the game as intended later! But as I alluded to, the game is not a breeze even with this accessibility feature enabled. I still had plenty of times when I got my shit absolutely rocked from bad positioning or a similar mistake. During the actual battle, you are positioned on a grid reminiscent of Fire Emblem. You then select another resource (cards) which dictates how many squares you may move and also the ability and morale damage you will do that turn. You can battle only once per turn so you will want to be strategic in positioning in order to form a “union” and have multiple characters link up to fight in one turn. You can even use this to outnumber the enemy and gang up on them in a 3 v 1. The actual battle is sort of an auto-battle based on your states but also your guidance where you can make your troop more aggressive, or passive to charge an ability, etc. You can even time when to use your ability which leads to some strategic decisions such as using a shield ability right when the enemy is about to use their own ability to deny them the skill (actually a lifesaver in some difficult encounters). [h2][u]Summary[/u][/h2] This is really just scratching the surface, but it’s a fun time. There’s ton of items to grab for completionists (maybe a completionist’s nightmare even, some are very obtuse or dependent on earlier findings). Some are hidden, some you steal or earn from the enemy, etc. It’s kind of addicting in a “gotta collect them all” kind of way while the battles and strategic layer along the way is just as enticing. I’m already planning my next playthrough after finishing Riviera! I really recommend any strategy fan to give this game a try, especially now on PC where you can always revert to an earlier save rather than just have a run end due to misplay. The game is a decent length, especially if you get it on sale - around 40 hours for one playthrough with multiple endings and some branching paths/characters as an excuse to play a second time (at least one character requires a 2nd playthrough to recruit in the first place). Completionists will be at this game a lot longer. Game is still fun even when sitting with a guide to find all the hidden content; it can be played blind but you probably won't 100% it if that's your aim. Some battles in the game are annoying in the same way Fire Emblem annoys you with bad terrain - think deserts and swamps. There's also some levels where you will take unavoidable damage no matter how good you are. At first it annoyed me but I accepted it as yet another strategic layer of learning to prepare for losses and how to mitigate morale loss. Also note while the game may look cute, its looks are deceiving. It's definitely a war story akin to Tactics Ogre that is not shy about the horrors and death in war. And the gameplay will also reflect that with how it's not afraid to kill the player.