What Section8 said.
Wesnoth is pretty good, it reminds me of the General series way-back-when, and I dig the combat/levelup system they're using. Some nitpicks:
- No artillery, everything can only attack the neighboring hexes. This is fine for most units, but I'd really have liked mages being able to act like typical artillery (slow movement, fragile, can't attack nearby units well, but can lay down the hurt at range)
- Healing seems underpowered. I try to keep a shaman with my forces at all times, but she's WAY too squishy and the healing is minimal (when poison isn't involved, that is). When a troll can hit for 30+ in a single round, 4 hit points aren't too hot. The healing in towns is fine, though.
- As a corollary to the above, levelling up shaman is a pain. Just about the only thing I can do is get some licks in with the entangle attack on a surrounded melee-only combatant.. but if the others don't finish that unit off, he's probably going to severely hurt the shaman.
- This might just be the early levels, but so far I haven't really seen the AI react to the type of units you're building. Elvish archers with melee / rider backup, retreating to the forest after each strike, pretty much demolish all of their units, as most of them don't even have ranged attacks. Then they just build more "paper" units, ignoring that they have 4-5 "scissors" hiding right next to their base. Oh noes!
- This also means knights aren't so hot. For distance recon, elvish cavalry is superior (plus they have ranged attacks for finishing off wounded melee), and vs smaller units that typically have lots of low-damage attacks, attacking them is often suicidal. Then again, heavy armor has't started popping up yet.. still, I assume the higher level archers will be just as effective against 'em.
And really, come on, just because something appears to be anime influenced doesn't necessarily mean it sucks ass. I dislike anime and anime-inspired console "RPG"s (especially crap like the FF series), but you're only screwing yourself if you choose to ignore every game that might have angsty-looking teenager protagonists / characters with oversized heads / tentacles. Well, actually I agree with you about the tentacles..
Slightly more on-topic, Tactics Ogre is/was good, but it's not really 'indie', plus it's a PSX title (*sad face*). It's still relatively unknown, overshadowed by FFT (which is a very much overrated game imo).. it's pretty darn hard too. In fact I'd say it is actually very frustrating if you don't know what makes the game tick (which is basically: 'have everyone in your army at the same level, with at most a 1-level difference,
maybe 2 levels for healers'). It is also one of the few console games where your choices actually matter, both during battles and during the sequences between battles. If you butcher everyone you see, you might end up winning the game, but the people of your new kingdom will hate you and you'll end up getting assassinated soon. Your actions also affect which NPCs will offer to join your army, and which ones will be hostile to you. The biggest choices you make (do you comply with the orders you're given and burn the town, or do you rebel?) lead to completely different scenarios ('chaotic' - 'neutral' - 'lawful') with different battles and story bits taking place at the same locales.
Some screenies I made way-back-when for a review at a hungarian RPG site (they're still up on my temporary storage site, wtf):
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-- Z.
