Before I start a story about love and hatred in Russian Gamdev, I will tell a little backstory.
It is worth starting with the fact that I did not have any hopes regarding the game immortal. Tales of Old Rus’ . I am very far from the Papsuyev universe, and I missed the early access from the game, so I didn’t really care. But everything changed after I visited Red Expo. There were constantly many people at the stand of the game, and they were clearly passionate about the process. I looked at pleasant arts, imbued with the atmosphere and even blown a beautiful poster. And then, by a happy coincidence, the key to the game fell into my hands. And unexpectedly for myself, I fell in love.
I started to enjoy the first minutes of starting. I did not have time to look around, for two gunshots he played for 6 hours, although it seemed that he only turned on the computer. But this is more likely the merit of the original: Slay the Spire dragged out like a drug. While she was on my phone, I could not do anything else except playing it. Damned game … So the authors of the immortal did not break what worked so well, and the main mechanics carefully migrated to the SSR.
What we have? This is a pleasant card of cuckold. There are four heroes with attacks of attack, defense and unique skills around which their tactics are being built. Each hero has his own small plot: find a sister, take revenge on the old enemy and … something else. The plots do not represent particular value and are not going to compete with novels. I have already forgotten some parts, and this is not the main thing – because the ultimate goal of the game is to defeat Koshchei (this is not a spoiler, his name is literally in the name). The main thing is that it is nice to play. The cycle “started the game, pumped the character, lost/won, opened new cards” pulls on.
Even with a quick look, you can see that this is a hybrid Slay The Spire and The Darkest Dungeon. The authors took a lot, but did not forget to add unique features. I will not disassemble them in details – there is cool material about this from Katerina Krasnopolskaya. I was conquered by the setting.
The surroundings of the Old Russian fairy tales are very native and pleasant. Colorful characters and monsters delight the eye. Items familiar from children’s fairy tales cause warm feelings, and how glorious to play for the beloved hero – Dobrynya! True, evil spirits sometimes leaves much from the traditional Slavic folklore and turns into the product of Kthulhuistics, then into an element of Gothic fantasy.
Backdrops of a video of forests, fields, swamps and other places of folklore battles, along with a wonderful soundtrack from the author of Pathfinder, did not leave me a chance not to fall in love with this game.
I spent 23 hours in the game and was determined to write something praise. Tell about the minuses, but bring to the reader that the game is cool! Of course, during this time I noticed and shortcomings.
Whatever the character you play, you will have the same tactics. Yes, Barbara knows how to move opponents around the field and drag them to his side; Dobrynya, like a real hero, can hang unlawed slap and wrap himself in the armor so that he will not even break through a shot from a cannon; Vasilisa has fairies-mammi who are charged from played cards and can fie down both with fire and protect against misfortunes, alternating with unthinkable buff; And Alyosha (local Geralt) has a unique mechanics of overheating of a wooden pistol … which multiplies its damage. It seems to sound that each hero is unique, and so it is, only the sense of this uniqueness is not enough.
To a lesser extent, https://nogamstop-casinos.co.uk/anonymous-casinos-no-verification/ it all depends on which cards you will collect on a trip or which of the three options will be chosen at a classic fabulous crossroads. The main role is played by local wonders – artifacts with passive skills that can be obtained as a reward for battle or buy in a store. You can assemble a great set of cards, but get useless artifacts and hardly break through the second boss from four. But you can collect such an "imb" that you can easily demolish even the last boss. And for each hero this rule is the same.
In fact, each race is the same. You see at the crossroads of the Kulon icon and go there in the hope that something good will fall out. But this did not spoil me the pleasure of the game.
Did not spoil it and confusing the description of the effects of cards. There could be such a situation: cards impose a unit of “bleeding”, “burning” or “dizziness”. Attention, experts, try to guess what each of these effects does? The correct answer is one and the same. All of them cause damage equal to the number of effects of effect. And I still did not understand what is the difference between the “strengthening”, “initial armor” and “strength”, or between “finishing” and “crushing”. There is a difference, but minimal.
But each skill has a positive, negative, each gift, the skills of the boss and condition – have a small icon. Some icons are unique for certain mobs. And the further you advance, the more effects you put on yourself, and the more difficult the opponents become. As a result, on the final boss, the screen can be littered with two dozen such icons.
The screen is not mine, but the picture is visual. These yellow, green and blue icons are small from what can be on the screen.
And it is hard to navigate this. At the average level of complexity, you just put positive effects on yourself and negative on evil spirits. All this works until the final boss – Koshchei. But on it my patience burst.
Attention here is for this picture.
It depicts the paths of heroes. You need to go through a small chain of tasks to unlock Koshchei. And I am exclusively at the desire to defeat the enemy and see how the story ends, dragged on and went through the same cycle of rays over and over again. And so, when after 20 hours I got to the main evil, the game politely told me-“And go through you play 4 more times. Yes, not just go through, but for each hero several times ". And from such spitting up the final stage, my patience burst. How many times I still have to do the same thing that the unfortunate final credits show me?!
And you might think that you just need to assemble the build, but to demolish the boss, but no. The game has a limiter. If you have not defeated for every hero of each final boss, then Koschey is so imbias that you have all the wonders of the old Rus’, you will not live and its tenth attack.
And I decided to count, but how many identical races should be done to defeat the game. A minute of entertaining mathematics!
Each hero has 5 compulsory points. You can’t make them in one race. Even if you fulfilled the conditions at the very beginning of the journey, the next stage on the next race.
4 heroes in 5 stages – 20 races. Ideal, provided that you did not lose, did not miss the task and successfully finished the wounds. The error of success in my case was approximately 25%. T.e. to open the opportunity to fight with Koshchey, I made at least 25 identical sorties. And if you take into account that at first I just learned to play, the number is a little more.
But let’s dwell on 25. 25 identical games and boss are open for your helpless attempts. Final battle and game is over. But no. Now, be kind, make 2-3 more sorties for each of the heroes to collect the final bosses and more or less normal build. That is, another 8-12 attempts + 3 error.
Total Game wants me to pass it at least 40 times. At the same time, all content ends at the twelfth attempt. There are no new mobs in the game, there are no modifiers, there are no bosses, there are no skills. Just, be kind, repeat until you go crazy or patience will not end.
My patience ended and I safely deleted the game. Perhaps someday I will return and try to defeat the immortal. But for now, this is the most mediocre and impudent stretching of the time that I have seen recently.
Yes, this is not a post of analysts, but an ordinary nagging of a person who was upset in the game. At the beginning of the passage, I sincerely wanted everything to end as rosy as it began. But everything crashed either about the inexperience of the developers, or about the bad balance, which makes the final boss impassable even at the most imbuld build.
I am happy to buy artbook and soundtrack to support the developers, because their project still has more advantages than minuses. And I really love the Slavic setting, so I cannot be indifferent to projects that sings close to me folklore.
Have you played immortal. Tales of Old Rus’? Tell us about your path. Maybe it’s just me so mad, and the game is actually very light and fast.
