Tyranny Reviews

Great game mechanic to set the stages for the game changing the route and people you will experience based on the beginning questions planning the invasion.

This game is CRIMINALLY underrated. Isometric RPGs are some of my favorite games of all time, and this one delivers a great story and has crazy good world building. You get to be a tyrant (or not). The spell crafting system is really cool. I want more games in this universe. Play this game to support Obsidian, they have the balls to make games that don't need to make AAA money but are in fact AAA quality.

One of the most interesting settings in an RPG out there with an fantastic magic system For Kyros!

Are you tired of seeing the same fantasy tropes recycled in every rpg? Bored of seeing good and evil depicted in a black-and-white manner? Want to play a game that doesn't spell things out for you and actually treats you like the adult you technically are? Then this game is for you! Don't go into this looking for a quick dopamine fix, or your typical (and rather stale) straightforward power fantasy/heroes journey arc. Don't expect to feel warm and fuzzy inside like when you feed an antelope at the zoo (incidentally, there are no antelopes in this world. Sadge). That's what Tyranny is. Or, what it's supposed to be. Sure, this game doesn't quite deliver on the deeply fleshed-out dystopia that it promises, but that's mainly because the last 'act' of the game was rather rushed, and I wish the story was longer. The game seems to end just when things are getting good. If you're looking for gameplay, this game follows a similar ruleset to other pausable real-time tactics CRPGS (only Pillars of Eternity and Pillars of Eternity 2, pretty much). The spell crafting system is unique, and spells are only limited by their cooldown, not by spell slots per day. Magic is king, but there's actually a lot of depth to combat as a whole, even on the purely physical side of things. You can make niche ideas work, such as a warrior who dual-wields throwing knives imbued with poison, or a heavily-armoured frontline spellcaster with a big shield, or a 'commander' who doesn't do much actual fighting, but is able to point to companions who are knocked out and tell them to get back up. Sure, there is a bit of a meta (light armour and deflection is considered stronger than heavy armour, magic is king, melee is kinda ass) but you can make anything work if you understand how recovery/penetration/hit rates/damage types etc. work. People complain that nOt EvErYtHiNg Is VoIcE aCtEd, but who cares, you can piss people off and get them to say "fuck you", and that's part's definitely voice acted. Sirin's singing in combat is just lovely. When your weapon isn't very effective, Verse may remark that they are as useful as nipples on a man. When certain enemies set Sirin on fire, she will flail her arms and scream "PUT ME OUT! PUT ME OUT!" If you still aren't convinced, this RPG lets you be a gigantic dickhead in a completely *believable* way!!! If someone doesn't listen to you, you can smack them around (and get xp at the same time) as a dialogue option, for example. I should stop. Just buy the game, seriously. Okay, it's a bit more expensive now than when I bought it, so maybe wait for a sale, or whatever. There are many games out there with far bigger budgets that aren't half as compelling.

Really interesting world, it felt like your choices actually changed things. I could tell that if I'd made different choices I would have had a very different experience, so I'm looking forward to playing it again someday. It did end abruptly, felt like maybe they were planning for a sequel that sadly didn't get made.

Most of the dialogues are not voiced, so it was a bit hard to keep myself invested in the story but other than that a very good game

Fantastic story with morally gray characters. Surprising alliances. Hard choices and truly a smart examination of playing as an agent of the bad guy. Love it!

While I felt as though I was losing my grip on the story near the end, I really enjoyed this one. This is a fun bite-sized CRPG. It just goes to show that not all of these games need to be massive.

Conceptually very compelling: basically it’s like “what if Baldur’s Gate 2 / Pillars of Eternity, except you are working for the bad guys from The Black Company (or Bungie’s Myth if you prefer).” I got kind of over it mechanically fairly quickly, but the dialogue trees are pretty well executed and the game has a surprising amount of plot reactivity to user choices. Be aware that the amount of actual game here is basically the first ~60% of what you’d expect and the game kind of ends abruptly. But it’s still worth it for the somewhat novel worldbuilding and unusual commitment to “you are a medium-level bureaucrat in an evil army.”

I love setting of Malazan so I naturally also loved the setting of Tyranny. Disfavored faction really reminds me of Bridgeburners. One of the best examples of good writing in the genre. Features interesting characters (both archons and companions), very unique approach to magic system (creating your own spells from sigils) and choices which impact the story. Also music fits really well the theme of the game. People complain that the ending comes too fast - it's true that the 3rd act can be completed in 1-2h. I think the closest thing that can be compared to the last act is The Landsmeet from DA:O. And it might be even better executed in Tyranny. Personally, I wouldn't list it as a negative. There are two negatives for me though - it's obvious that the game was released too fast (missing dialogue lines errors/empty lines, broken formatting of some UI, sound effects being glitchy). Second thing is that all DLCs are basically cut content from the base game, which should have been there in the first place. Made just to get more money and are not really expansions.