Majestic Trials Reviews

A retro indie game with some nice features and familiar feel for those who have played older games. The maps have had some thought put into them and I've enjoyed playing it so far. Only complaints as such would be that it would be nice to have a difficulty setting and some of the sounds are a bit harsh. I've not played it for long so far but I'm sure I will play more.

Awful control scheme where you lose selection of your character/unit if you click on any square/tile that you can't move to or don't have enough action/movement points. Half the time you don't know if you misclicked or are just out of action points. Especially since important stats such as action/movement points and health are in the corner of the screen instead of having some indicator next to your character. Would work much better and gameplay would be faster with typical rogue-like tile by tile movement instead of being turn based. Or at least have unlimited action points until an enemy is sighted. Also, attack animations are needless too long.

There are very few men whose work I will buy sight unseen based on their earlier work. Ash is one of them. If this looks like something you might like, you almost certainly will. I'll revise this to be a more helpful review as I get a chance to play more, but already the nostalgia is hitting pretty hard.

[Edit:2023 06] there seems the game having many changes since my last review. sadly i don't have time to check again. so readers, pls consider my review till year 2018 was based on early access state. [Edit 2018 01 20] after some discussion with devs, i decided re-purchase. and starting to check things more even with odd melee rule. the price increased by about 3 dollars according to update version 0.96-x 1. there is no long running campaign. 2. game/progress is limited to skirmish on a relatively huge fixed map. (enemies either) 3. default key bindings is kinda accustomed one. and can be changed easily in option. 4. music and sound are ok. (i don't care) but the graphic is hand-drawn with own style. its hormy and funny. i like it. 5. all in all, option covers everything needed. 6. you can make your avatar with a lot of choice. (parameters and spell choice) but this part is still on the way. (might be changed dramatically) game could be played only with keyboard, its good thing in itself, but again in odd fashion and sometimes it becomes very cumbersome. for that reason, i can't play for enough long time to have a taste of this game yet. might become better for seeing dev's active effort. this impressed me a good hope. but when taken in practical way, if you had enough patience (or forgiveness), could wait for future updates, and were a lover of old-fashioned TBS IGO UGO game, then this game could be your thing. otherwise, i can't recommend this game for 15 dollars. its a bit too ambitious. [Edit 2018 01 14] it doesn't matter forced move of melee getting changed to have JUST a chance of automated defense from RNG or getting even terrain effect of enemy occupying grid. not changing my negative review yet. but dev is very responsive and the game seems to be getting update so often. i would re-purchase in near future. for those who want to know more detail, please go to forum thread from the link in the dev's post. [Edit 2018 01 01] devs talk about combat system. so there could be possible changes in the future. if the changes could evaluate downside of forced move, total experience of this game should change dramatically. but until then, my conclusion in original review never changes. [Original Review 2017 11 24] basically, moving and any action are separated. that is, every action needs AP. this means player needs to care for AP to get better position. but when killing mobs, player char moves to the grid of the mob with no AP use. if player had to enter into enemy's grid when combat like chess (and it has no AP), this makes sense. but player can do melee attack only from adjacent grid. while ranged attack works with keeping current position. this odd rule not only breaks tactical meaning of position, but also means forced suicidal advance in any condition. this made me feel so stupid.

AlphaAsh is an absolute rock solid pillar of the Stellaris modding scene. The modding communities are the ones that keep the games alive for years after release. I picked this game up because I liked the modding work so much I knew that the mechanics would be deep and interesting. If the art style turns you off I implore you to try the game out anyways. The style actually helps give the game such a charming, cozy and nostalgic feel. It's hard to put my finger on it! I feel like there's a lot of good to come with this game in the time i've played it. But either way getting this game is supporting the modding titans that I feel are one of the most important parts of modern gaming.

Using a limited set of memorized spells your wizard is dropped into a hostile environment and must survive long enough to complete their objective and extract from the battlefield. Your wizard is your fragile mobile command center. Your only arsenal are the spells that you bring with you and the consumables that you loot in the arena. Do you bring thunder and lighting and attempt to smite your foes from a distance? Do you attempt to befriend your weaker-minded foes and get them to do your bidding? Or do you summon an army to scour the land before you? There's a real diamond hidden in the mechanics of this game and its action economy. Without investing experience into unlocking additional spell slots, you start with 16 available spells. Furthermore each summon spell has a maximum amount of copies you can bring with you. Most summons are more than physically capable of putting a hurt on an enemy wizard, but there are so many threats in the arena and you don't start off knowing where those enemy wizards are. Let's examine Summon Giant Bat, you get to memorize three of these to deploy. They behave like flying camera drones made of balsa wood with amazing line of sight and about 3 hp, but hey it's fine right? You can just perch them on the corners of buildings like the Larry, Curly, and Moe of gargoyles... Hey, wait a sec... Where's Moe going? You click on Moe to discover that Erik your target in this Trial has befriended Moe (that backstabbing [i]bat[/i]-stard). Well you'll show Erik! You've brought some befriend spells of your own, but is it worth spending one to keep Moe's loyalty? Alternatively, you could befriend that assassin that's hiding one alley over and use him to eliminate Moe once and for all. And back to looting every nook and crevice, it's hard to find time to do appropriate amounts of cardio in between eldritch rituals and magical bloodsport. Not to mention it really isn't worth threatening every peasant that didn't clear out when the Purge alarm went off with a Fireball just so you can get access to their valuables. So let me extol the virtues of the Goblin. These little bandits will strip a city block of everything shiny that isn't bolted to the ground. They don't fear peasants and [i]*slaps goblin's back*[/i] these babies can carry so many consumables. Just send 'em in there and have em --- there was an assassin in that house. F's in chat boys. But hey, at least you can befriend another assassin. (or as I like to call them goblins 2.0)