Turn-Based Tactics The Lamplighters League - turn-based tactics in pulp 1930s setting from Harebrained Schemes

[Oropay]

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All agents must survive

Generic and boring

 

[lycanwarrior]

 

[Morgoth]

Morty isn't very impressed.

Neither was I with the demo. Shockingly bad framerate, and half-baked gameplay. This game needs to cook another year in the oven.

 

[Lemming42]

Honestly the best thing they could do would be to focus in on the real-time aspect. The two modes of gameplay don't really work in tandem so it'd be best to leave the XCOM stuff as a fail state and have the game mostly be about the stealth infiltration stuff.

Remove or rethink the ability limits, give each chracter a couple more abilities (distraction or whatever), tune up enemy detection AI and the game would probably be more or less fine.

Though I can't believe they're charging £41 for it. Even with inflation that's just fucking silly for something that looks and plays like a mobile game.

 

[Lord_Potato]

Though I can't believe they're charging £41 for it. Even with inflation that's just fucking silly for something that looks and plays like a mobile game.

well, it worked fine with Shadowrun games. Why change what works?

 

[Infinitron]

Recycling clips from the announcement trailer cinematic is kind of lame.

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1167750/view/3720593210590156657

Welcome to the launch of the Lamplighters League!

It goes without saying, maybe, but this is a special day for us, and we are so excited to be sharing this game with you. Games like this take a long time to bring to life from the first pitches to the final product you can finally play today. At each stage there are unique challenges—especially when bringing to life a brand new game world and working out new twists for an established and complex genre like turn-based tactics. It can be grueling, especially when the build isn’t feeling fun, or a production deadline is looming. Or, worse, when those two things are happening at once.

It can also be incredibly rewarding. There was a moment during development where we were, in fact, facing down the fact that infiltration just wasn’t fun and there was a big deadline coming up fast. We needed to rethink things, and we needed to do it quickly. Under that pressure the team prototyped and implemented the real time takedowns in just a few weeks. I jumped up in the air the first time I saw the shock from a mine travel through the water on the ground to take out an unaware enemy. It was a big victory right when we needed it as a team.

The thing is through all of that, the ups and the downs, we were thinking of you. Well, not you, of course, in all likelihood we’ve never met, but you, the player. Would this ability work? Is this still approachable? Are we rewarding high-skill play? Is Marteau smarmy enough? Would you think this moment was funny or that that one was touching?

This is the longest we’ve gone at HBS without getting to meet our audience, our community. Thanks to Kickstarter, we were often developing with you, working on beloved franchises like Shadowrun and BATTLETECH. We had trusted community members that could offer feedback and share their enthusiasm as we went.

That was not the case with The Lamplighters League—until now.

Back when we first started work on The Lamplighters League, we had some big ideas. We wanted a game that was approachable but that maintained a tactical challenge. We set out to create a game that was wry and fun, but never crossed over into camp or silliness. Above it all we wanted to send you an adventure, an adventure where you command characters, not units.

Did we pull it off? That’s up to you to decide.

Welcome aboard, it’s nice to meet you, and we hope you have rip-roaring great time.

Chris Rogers

Game Director

 

[Parsimonious cook]

Though I can't believe they're charging £41 for it. Even with inflation that's just fucking silly for something that looks and plays like a mobile game.

well, it worked fine with Shadowrun games. Why change what works?

Shadowrun games were going for 15-20 bucks, which was OK to no small part thanks to the whole "oh shit, this is a Shadowrun game" factor. I guess that one of the main reasons for the bloated price here is the full voice acting - the devs once more forgetting that they should make a decent game first and waste money on stuff like this only afterwards.

This is still a 20 bucks game at best, being marketed for nearly three times more... p. ridiculous tbh fam.

 

[agris]

this being mediocre was obvious from the day it was announced.

what has happened to hbs is sad; they've clearly declined. and it isn't like they were starting from some crazy high perch to begin with.

 

[Infinitron]

Set aside the narratives of decline. What stands out about Harebrained Schemes is how they made a strategic (and in retrospect rather puzzling) decision not to make RPGs any more. They just threw away whatever experience they'd accumulated making the Shadowrun games. It'd be interesting to learn what went on behind the scenes in reaching that decision.

Because no matter how good your game is, it's always going to be hard to stand out making yet another quirky-themed tactics game™. Why?

 

[Roguey]

This game needs to cook another year in the oven.

Battletech was released in 2018 and the last DLC was released for it four years ago. I'm sure Paradox isn't happy that this took so long.

Shadowrun games were going for 15-20 bucks, which was OK to no small part thanks to the whole "oh shit, this is a Shadowrun game" factor. I guess that one of the main reasons for the bloated price here is the full voice acting - the devs once more forgetting that they should make a decent game first and waste money on stuff like this only afterwards.

This is still a 20 bucks game at best, being marketed for nearly three times more... p. ridiculous tbh fam.

I'd blame Paradox. Battletech was $40, this is $10 more. The Swedes want to climb out of the hole they made for themselves.

Edit: the fact that they have an extra companion day-one dlc for $8 is particularly shameful and Extremely Paradox. https://store.steampowered.com/app/2244710/The_Lamplighters_League__Nocturne/

 

[Roguey]

Set aside the narratives of decline. The most notable thing about Harebrained Schemes is that they made a strategic (and in retrospect rather puzzling) decision not to make RPGs any more. Just threw away whatever experience they'd accumulated making the Shadowrun games. It'd be interesting to learn what went on behind the scenes in reaching that decision.

Because no matter how good your game is, it's always going to be hard to stand out making yet another "quirky-themed tactics game™". Why?

On their website they decided to lump in the Shadowruns as "PC games which combined tactical gameplay with nuanced and engaging stories." Battletech became their best-selling game, so apparently they (or Paradox) decided that was their brand from now on.

 

[Lord_Potato]

Set aside the narratives of decline. The most notable thing about Harebrained Schemes is that they made a strategic (and in retrospect rather puzzling) decision not to make RPGs any more.

I see various game journos calling Lamplighters League a tactical or even strategic rpg.

https://www.gamepressure.com/games/the-lamplighters-league/zd6599
https://www.rpgfan.com/game/the-lamplighters-league/

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.digitaltrends.com/gaming/the-lamplighters-league-hands-on-gdc/?amp

 

[toro]

Day 1 DLC with cut content and increased price in a lot of regions

Less than 20k sales on release day. Only 6 reviews on Steam. This game is dead.

 

[VonMiskov]

The controls are something else here. Clearly made with gamepad in mind. Half the time I'm struggling with how many unnecessary buttons and controls there are. Camera focused on one character, slow camera movement. The performance is abysmal too. i9-11900K and 3070Ti and the PC is cooking while delivering subpar fps for how this looks.

A massive decline.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

The controls are something else here. Clearly made with gamepad in mind. Half the time I'm struggling with how many unnecessary buttons and controls there are. Camera focused on one character, slow camera movement. The performance is abysmal too. i9-11900K and 3070Ti and the PC is cooking while delivering subpar fps for how this looks.

A massive decline.

Performance seems consistent with how Battletech was/is.

 

[Grunker]

8 user reviews

 

[Delterius]

I'd blame Paradox. Battletech was $40, this is $10 more.

Gotta say, in Brazilbucks this is more than twice the price of Battletech

Even if I wanted this... it's an insane ask.

 

[Roguey]

8 user reviews

Peak of 773, shaping up to be a flop.

The perk of HBS relying on crowdfunding before is that they could find out right away if they were working on something people actually wanted to buy. Paradox with the anti-Midas touch.

 

[Delterius]

Paradox with the anti-Midas touch.

can we trace this to the purchase of white wolf? we gotta turn the world of darkness curse into a meme. even the TT devs talk about it from time to time.

 

[TwoEdge]

I wonder how much of HBS' decline is due to Weisman leaving the company. Their projects without him seem too scattershot, good games need strong vision.

 

[Roguey]

I wonder how much of HBS' decline is due to Weisman leaving the company. Their projects without him seem too scattershot, good games need strong vision.

Weisman left in late 2022, so it's not like he wasn't part of this from its conception. Perhaps he was unhappy with Paradox's directives.

 

[Lemming42]

They seem to have really gone all-out in paying people to play the game, I've seen like five sponsored reviews on YouTube without even looking.

 

[Immortal]

I'm more concerned that anyone:

A) Thought this was a good idea during the whiteboarding session of "what's next?" at HBS
B) Thought this looked like a good game seeing the trailer

Redfall, Saints Row now this. Are the same 10 college dropout 'idea guys' working at all these companies? Nobody wants to play this quirky hipster slop.

(As of this posting 22 reviews on steam. lmfaoooo)

 

[Delterius]

8 user reviews

22 reviews

near 200% growth!!

 

[Immortal]

8 user reviews

22 reviews

near 200% growth!!

You can be #23.. their game only costs.. wait.. what? Pfbfbf hahahahhahahaa