The Iron Oath Reviews

I 100%'d this game around December 2024 though i did not write a review until now for really no good reason at all. This game is really fun though it can be a bit annoying at times from my experience. Certain enemy types like to almost cheese a lot imo (those flipping bandits with falcons- yes i have a personal vendetta against those lol) but in general this game is well balanced and fun to play, even if one were to spend essentially 5000 ingame days doing sidequests and occassionally the main story. In game days go by really quickly ingame but don't affect the story itself, except for the massive dragon that tries to burn down a town every iirc 1000 days. This might count as a spoiler but i'm mentioning that dragon so that any new player knows to not ignore the dragon. ALWAYS help out the town it attacks ,even if you have to walk across the entire map (just make sure you are not overencumbered lol), as otherwise the town that is attacked will be practically burnt to the ground, though iirc this is temporary and it slowly but surely will be worth going to again. I do not remember exactly how it works but the only exception to this is 'Wealden', which is connected to a essentially separate story from the main story, and is worth a couple achievements on its own. (Go to the vanguard fort near Wealden (preferably with atleast lvl 15-20 characters, even on the easiest difficult) for that specific story. It's short but fairly challenging imo, even on the easiest difficulty.) I do wish to highlight that i did the entire game on the easiest difficulty, though this was no cakewalk (probably because i am not an expert at games like this one lol) as i lost at least a couple characters during my playthrough. The most devastating loss was when i misclicked my archer into the middle of the enemy formation, when i was intending to attack the enemy instead. This is the sort of thing you remember even months after you complete a game lmao But genuinely, even if you do the easiest difficulty and 100% the game like i did, it is well worth the money and even though many encounters will feel remarkably simple/easy... there will be encounters that are a challenge, especially in the more difficult missions. As for all the other difficulties in the game , i have not tried any of those but i'd imagine they are just as well-balanced as the easiest difficulty. I truly learnt a lot from playing this game and it has made me better at games in general , even though i did by all means go through the entire game on practically baby mode.

The Iron Oath sells the fantasy of consequence and agency while trapping you in predetermined systems. You'll enjoy the first 10 hours before realizing you're just pulling levers in an increasingly transparent Skinner box. Worth playing if you acknowledge you're choosing your own prison—just don't mistake it for freedom.

Still early in the game but this is a fantastic tactical rpg so far with a nice pixel art visual style, strong story and writing, engaging tactical combat and very cool strategic gameplay managing your mercenary company.