Tags: Blackguards; Daedalic Entertainment
Blackguards is an upcoming turn-based RPG from Daedalic Entertainment, a German developer whose only titles so far have been adventure games. The game means to provide an oldschool tactical experience, with a "dark narrative" different from that of most other RPGs out there. Instead of the usual goody-two-shoes heroic adventurers, you will be in command of a bunch of criminals as they escape from the law all over The Dark Eye's world of Aventuria.
Our previewers, Felipepepe and Darth Roxor, have played through many versions of the game starting from the early beta, and now they have gone through the press preview build (kindly supplied by Daedalic) as well as the Early Access edition currently available on Steam. Here's a snippet from their impressions:
Read the full preview: RPG Codex Preview: Blackguards
Blackguards is an upcoming turn-based RPG from Daedalic Entertainment, a German developer whose only titles so far have been adventure games. The game means to provide an oldschool tactical experience, with a "dark narrative" different from that of most other RPGs out there. Instead of the usual goody-two-shoes heroic adventurers, you will be in command of a bunch of criminals as they escape from the law all over The Dark Eye's world of Aventuria.
Our previewers, Felipepepe and Darth Roxor, have played through many versions of the game starting from the early beta, and now they have gone through the press preview build (kindly supplied by Daedalic) as well as the Early Access edition currently available on Steam. Here's a snippet from their impressions:
Darth Roxor: Blackguards' combat impressed me greatly when I played the beta/early access versions of the game. There were two reasons for that:
1. The fact that the combat was any good, because I totally expected the whole game to suffer from the typical “non-RPG company’s first RPG!” syndrome, where the biggest focus would be placed on aspects such as the narrative, while largely ignoring or streamlining the combat system to near-minigame status.
2. The fact that the combat was so damn good. There aren't many games out there where almost every fight feels unique, challenging and genuinely fun, and Blackguards manages to actually fit into this category. [...]
Felipe: I’d say it’s precisely Daedalic's adventure game background that allows for such fresh and unorthodox battle design, adding puzzle-like elements such as the previously mentioned crocodile trap, moving cranes, mazes and other such things to the game's battles. Hell, I had to capture a rampaging gorilla with a cage on a crane during a rather amusing side-quest. The inclusion of a gladiator arena in Chapter 2 seems tailor-made for allowing for more “creative” battlefields without clashing with the setting, and I was glad to see that Chapter 3 provided extra optional fights in the arena for even more challenging fun. [...]
Roxor: Blackguards surprised me many times when I played it. In fact, the game was the complete opposite of what I expected – I assumed it would have been at best an RPG-lite, more of an adventure game with stats, with plenty of dialogue, puzzle-solving and a very advanced narrative. Instead, the combat system turned out to be great, but the narrative part disappointed me, or at least the parts of the narrative that I saw. The main plot seems to be an unexciting mess, the way it progresses makes little sense, and the whole “bunch of criminals” aspect is underplayed.
Felipe: True, it strikes me as odd how the game is constantly being marketed as a “dark story”, in which you play as a convicted murder, testing your moral compass and all that. The first 10 minutes of the game have you being unjustly arrested, and after a short while your group of fugitives is acting just like any other RPG party, helping out random people, and even attacking slavers without any really good reason besides “slavers are bad”. Some of your party members (especially Takate) seem to have no reason to even follow you other than the fact that you’re the main character in a game.
Roxor: This is a shame, because at this point in development “fixing” any combat and mechanics flaws is the only possible thing Daedalic can do, as the narrative is pretty much set in stone. But to be honest? I don’t care. I swear, I haven’t had this much fun whacking enemies in turn-based combat since Knights of the Chalice, and while it would obviously be ideal for this RPG to cover all the bases, I’d much rather see one with a combat system that actually puts some classics to shame while sacrificing the story, than another drop in the ocean of pseudo-choice oriented storyfag LARP simulators.
1. The fact that the combat was any good, because I totally expected the whole game to suffer from the typical “non-RPG company’s first RPG!” syndrome, where the biggest focus would be placed on aspects such as the narrative, while largely ignoring or streamlining the combat system to near-minigame status.
2. The fact that the combat was so damn good. There aren't many games out there where almost every fight feels unique, challenging and genuinely fun, and Blackguards manages to actually fit into this category. [...]
Felipe: I’d say it’s precisely Daedalic's adventure game background that allows for such fresh and unorthodox battle design, adding puzzle-like elements such as the previously mentioned crocodile trap, moving cranes, mazes and other such things to the game's battles. Hell, I had to capture a rampaging gorilla with a cage on a crane during a rather amusing side-quest. The inclusion of a gladiator arena in Chapter 2 seems tailor-made for allowing for more “creative” battlefields without clashing with the setting, and I was glad to see that Chapter 3 provided extra optional fights in the arena for even more challenging fun. [...]
Roxor: Blackguards surprised me many times when I played it. In fact, the game was the complete opposite of what I expected – I assumed it would have been at best an RPG-lite, more of an adventure game with stats, with plenty of dialogue, puzzle-solving and a very advanced narrative. Instead, the combat system turned out to be great, but the narrative part disappointed me, or at least the parts of the narrative that I saw. The main plot seems to be an unexciting mess, the way it progresses makes little sense, and the whole “bunch of criminals” aspect is underplayed.
Felipe: True, it strikes me as odd how the game is constantly being marketed as a “dark story”, in which you play as a convicted murder, testing your moral compass and all that. The first 10 minutes of the game have you being unjustly arrested, and after a short while your group of fugitives is acting just like any other RPG party, helping out random people, and even attacking slavers without any really good reason besides “slavers are bad”. Some of your party members (especially Takate) seem to have no reason to even follow you other than the fact that you’re the main character in a game.
Roxor: This is a shame, because at this point in development “fixing” any combat and mechanics flaws is the only possible thing Daedalic can do, as the narrative is pretty much set in stone. But to be honest? I don’t care. I swear, I haven’t had this much fun whacking enemies in turn-based combat since Knights of the Chalice, and while it would obviously be ideal for this RPG to cover all the bases, I’d much rather see one with a combat system that actually puts some classics to shame while sacrificing the story, than another drop in the ocean of pseudo-choice oriented storyfag LARP simulators.
Read the full preview: RPG Codex Preview: Blackguards
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