Game 14 of 2024: Skald: Against the Black Priory

Skald: Against the Black Priory

Developer: High North Studios AS
Publisher: Raw Fury
Platform: PC
Genre: RPG

Difficulty: Medium
Hours: 18

Finished: Yes
Final Rating: 9.2/10

Hell yeah.

I've been waiting for this one. As a card-carrying old guy, I cut my teeth on CRPGs like Ultima, Baldur's Gate, and the Gold Box games. I checked out the Skald demo a year or two ago and was hooked.

And I'm happy to say I was not disappointed!

Everything from the crisp pixel art, the soundtrack composed on a Yamaha YM2413 sound chip, and the sword-and-sorcery cosmic horror story comes together beautifully to create an end product that is a worthy homage to the classics while being mindful of a modern audience.

You can pet the dog! And also cats.

Skald starts off the old fantasy classic: a shipwreck leaves you and your crew stranded on The Outer Isles, an Imperial backwater that has been experiencing strange events lately. You're tasked by Lord Berryn, a friend of your father's, to find Embra, his daughter. Embra's gone missing, and Lord Berryn thinks she was headed to the Outer Isles.

That one-eyed guy in your party is Roland. He carried me through this game.

Your custom player character has to explore the Outer Isles looking for clues to Embla's disappearance while helping the locals and putting together a ragtag crew. 

Hell yeah, Ibn! Let's, uh, shit on that!

Combat is turn based and tactical. You get the chance to deploy your party when you get jumped which helps to get your melee guys into range and your tanks to protect your casters. You get a variety of weapons, armor, and spells, but honestly, I didn't use magic other than healing all that much. The sword was mightier than the pen in my playthrough at least, as some combat spells just seemed a little underwhelming. When you do need magic users, though, make sure you have plenty of attunement potions to keep up their magic points; they can barely make it through one fight let alone many.

I ran into a few minor bugs, nothing I really cared about. Sometimes while shopping I would accidentally click on a character's portrait twice, which would immediately take me out of the shopping window and into the inventory screen. Not really a big deal.

The story is pretty standard sword-and-sorcery fare, and for the most part I really liked it. I could have used a little more background on the side characters, but for the most part it was enough that we faced supernatural horrors together to make me attached to them.

My playthrough came in at just under 20 hours, and I felt that was about right. I did all (I think) of the side quests and thoroughly explored the Outer Isles.

RPG fans, buy this game! It's pretty great!

Game 8 of 2024: Moonring

Moonring

Developer: Fluttermind LLC
Publisher: Fluttermind LLC
Platform: PC
Genre: RPG

Difficulty: Pretty Hard
Hours: 6 and counting

Finished: Not yet
Final Rating: 8.3/10

If you love old-school RPGs like Ultima and Pool of Radiance, Moonring is for you.

If you love actually typing in what you say to NPCs hoping to find hidden topics, Moonring is for you.

If you love being out in the wilderness, surrounded by monsters, out of food, wondering what you're going to do to survive, Moonring is for you.

If you like seeing screens like this over and over again, Moonring is for you.

Everything kicks your ass in this game

You're not a hero in Moonring, you're an adventurer. You'd be well advised to remember that on your journey to find the gods' relics and become the Archon. They say discretion is the better part of valor, and in Moonring, that was my mantra. Moonring doesn't care what your stats are; if you're in the mountains, you're going to encounter scary mountain shit. Make sure you save those pennies for good weapons and armor, because you're going to need them.

These goddamn hornets can fuck all the way off.

You'll also need to manage your hunger and avoid disease. Alchemy ingredients are aplenty, so make sure you stock up so you're prepared when the inevitable rot, madness, or poisoning happens.

Moonring isn't for everyone, but for those who give it a shot, they will find a surprising deep game with an interesting world filled with secrets. At the low, low price of $free, what do you have to lose?