Incline Troubleshooter: Abandoned Children - isometric tactical Korean SRPG

[Haplo]

Oh boy, the "ani-sniper training" mission is annoying.
So, they say they want to practice combat vs enemy snipers... and make you play a single one (with a sidekick and just a few suppressors), while assaulting you with your own elite troops and an overwhelming wave of VHPD.

Edit: What's annoying is that in a mission like violent 46 Magenta Street North you're constantly assaulted by 3-4 out-of-reach (why you cannot Wind-walk there?) snipers assist firing after every enemy attack (also off each other).
Now that's sniper power.
Here they give you 1 sniper, 1 support guy/gal and a few (nearly) useless toons and confront you with overwhelming forces.

That's one of the few missions that seems unbalanced. I had to nerf my own guys and take ultra defensive positions on the bottom left side of the map.

Yep, I also needed to disable the masteries on allies to stand a chance.
Too bad the game forces lenghty cutscenes and another mini-mission afterwards - that fortunately doesn't seem to be possible to fail. Yet fighting with a nerfed character still sucks.

 

[Haplo]

Smoke grenades are your friend. Headshot immunity and greatly increased miss chance for all those pesky snipers.

Actually, Sion in cover seems my best friend. His Lightning Veil negates ALL responsive attacks - all Fire Supports too.

Problem is becoming overwhelmed by ~5 bosses with all Elite lackeys closing in on you from all directions in similar time frame WHILE you're being pummeled by all those Fire Supports from snipers.
Ah, well, I guess end game is fun here.
The violent Draki cave was pretty easy, though.

 

[Haplo]

Am I the only one who loves the 'anti-sniper training' mission? For me, this mission is a pure pleasure. Choose Heixing ranger with fire support mastery set, gather everyone on the central tower, and try not to die from laughing)

Hmm, maybe I need to try Ranger Heixing. Though spamming his enormous cone attack as a Sweeper has been kinda addictive.

 

[WhiteShark]

I'm on chapter 2 and I just got my first non-perfect ranking for a mission. Does mission rank affect anything, like rewards?

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Does mission rank affect anything

Only the regard of your ancestors.

 

[NJClaw]

ERYFKRAD did you really play a game where you can only unlock the barbarian class after approximately 100 hours?

 

[ERYFKRAD]

ERYFKRAD did you really play a game where you can only unlock the barbarian class after approximately 100 hours?

As long as it's there. Honestly I am waiting for these dudes to finish all their updating and all to resume.

 

[Haplo]

Well, at least she's guest starring in 2 missions, including one very early.

 

[Jermu]

New main mission

https://store.steampowered.com/news...=103582791461136257&emgid=2975172642534920505

Spoiler

Very easy compared to previous crab missions

 

[WhiteShark]

Finished the main campaign (episode 1?) a couple days ago. Excellent game. I'd say it's a bit on the easy side even on cruel/challenge mode, but there were a few violent cases I had to retry a couple times. Right now I'm catching up on all the crafting/beast taming/drone building I was ignoring and finishing up the various normal missions that I had skipped over. I don't really like the randomness with evolution masteries or the grind to level and unlock everything for them, but I do appreciate that they are technically the most customizable character slots since you have a variety of beasts and drones to choose from. I haven't really had to grind for materials yet since I have tons lying around from the main campaign, but I imagine I probably will give up on crafting once that becomes a necessity.

Sion was king for the first half of the game. He got up and running quickly with masteries and became the AoE one shot machine. Later on Giselle became the star of the show with 15 range and One Shot One Kill. She can mow down whole groups of mobs one attack a time provided they don't have a mastery that caps the amount of damage they can take at once. She also seems to have the best class bonuses/masteries for reducing enemy block chance, which is a big deal later on in the game.

Mastery board customization is definitely the high point of this game. I've spent hours fiddling with my boards trying to come up with the strongest combination or trying out new strategies. Sometimes unlocking a single new mastery is enough to send me on another customization spree across all my characters. Unlocking the mastery sets is also quite addicting, but I don't actually know if I support that as a design choice. It takes a lot of time to equip and unequip all the possibilities to unlock each mastery set even with the hints the game gives you.

I'm looking forward to what Dandylion comes up with in the future. I just started the DLC missions but I'm given to understand that the DLC isn't actually finished yet, which is a bit disappointing but I'm already in too deep now to just stop wait for its completion.

 

[Zumbabul]

I'd say it's a bit on the easy side even on cruel/challenge mode, but there were a few violent cases I had to retry a couple times.

After finishing the game three times, I came to the conclusion that cruel/challenge actually makes the game easier. Depending on the mission, cruel adds approximately 50%-100% more enemies, which means 50-100% more exp. Furthermore, it makes all enemies at least elite, which is another approximately 20-30% more exp. As a result, you are leveling faster, and challenge mode increases enemies' level. But higher levels mean even more exp. We have a positive feedback loop, and by chapter 3 you will be outleveling content by at least 10 levels. Challenge mode compensates for the difference in stats due to levels, but it does not upgrade enemies' equipment. It gives them more masteries, but they are random without any synergy. The enemy can get a completely useless mastery, while you can min/max yours. 10 extra training points is an extra 2-3 mastery sets. While cruel is absolutely essential (more enemies and better AI), in the long run, it slowly self balances its difficulty.

In my current run, as one of the home rules, I use an artificial level cap. I limit the number of training points and my equipment by the recommended level of the mission. With this limitation, the game fights back and punishes me for my mistakes (even with my experience from previous playthroughs). I think that the devs should have included some form of level cap, similar, to how HoMM games do. Without a level cap, the game kind of loses some of its taste.

Overall, I agree with you. There are several difficulty spikes in the game (where you may probably start to shit bricks), but the overall difficulty is comfortable.

 

[WhiteShark]

What you said about outlevelling everything on higher difficulties makes sense. There's also the experience boosting masteries you can equip and the scholar set for the engineer girl.

I think that the devs should have included some form of level cap, similar, to how HoMM games do. Without a level cap, the game kind of loses some of its taste.

That's a good idea. Have you suggested it to the devs? They seem to be fairly responsive on the steam forums.

 

[Endemic]

Seems like they could with reducing experience gain or smoothing out the power curve a bit. I like the idea of giving enemies synergistic skillsets rather than just buffing stats etc.

 

[WhiteShark]

Seems like they could with reducing experience gain or smoothing out the power curve a bit. I like the idea of giving enemies synergistic skillsets rather than just buffing stats etc.

It would probably be a lot of extra work but I suppose they could plan out the skills of each mob all the way to the level cap just in case. Enemies do have synergistic skills up until they get scaled by challenge mode.

 

[Zumbabul]

That's a good idea. Have you suggested it to the devs? They seem to be fairly responsive on the steam forums.

Now, I did)

It would probably be a lot of extra work but I suppose they could plan out the skills of each mob all the way to the level cap just in case. Enemies do have synergistic skills up until they get scaled by challenge mode.

The devs did a similar thing for the police backup: they have a planned build that scales with your level. However, in my opinion, this will be harder to pull off with enemies. The important element of the mastery system is how you get them. Some of the masteries a gated by the story progression. For example, catharsis drops only from Darius (if we don't count Bianca at ramjist plasa), and iron wall only from Berke (if we don't count Leton at ramjist plasa). Some elementalist masteries are only available from leveling Bianca. Some masteries are only available from taming and leveling beasts. Some masteries are locked behind achievements. This is a well-thought system that should not be disrupted.

So, in order to make a planned build for enemies, we need to keep track of which masteries we can use for each enemy. Although this is absolutely possible, this would definitely require a lot of work. And probably, devs should better spend their time on finishing the DLC than this feature.

 

[Shaki]

I nearly overlooked this game, because it looks like weeb shit, and I don't like weeb shit. Probably would never try it if my good friend wouldn't keep convincing me that's it's the best SRPG ever.

After playing for ~50 hours in the last week, it's indeed the best SRPG I've ever played, and one of the best games overall. The ambition and passion that went into creating it, reminds me a lot of Troika, last game that gave me that feeling of playing a true gem that can happen once in a generation, was Arcanum. Except troubleshooter somehow managed to be insanely ambitious and boundary pushing in certain aspects, without also being a buggy mess and sacrificing other parts of the game. Just insane how good it is.

Really a shame that there are probably thousands of people out there, who would probably love it, but they are morons like I was, and will never even try it because of its weeb aesthetics. Outside of how it looks, it actually doesn't even have anything in common with typical weeb games, idk why it's even hidden in a weeb section on Codex, would never find the thread if I wouldn't start specifically looking for it after I played the game.

Anyway, I'm gonna be sending some copies to my friends as gifts, and hope more people will do the same, because if those guys will go bankrupt, my heart is going to break. This game deserves to be a commercial success, more than anything created in the last decade.

 

[gurugeorge]

I nearly overlooked this game, because it looks like weeb shit, and I don't like weeb shit. Probably would never try it if my good friend wouldn't keep convincing me that's it's the best SRPG ever.

After playing for ~50 hours in the last week, it's indeed the best SRPG I've ever played, and one of the best games overall. The ambition and passion that went into creating it, reminds me a lot of Troika, last game that gave me that feeling of playing a true gem that can happen once in a generation, was Arcanum. Except troubleshooter somehow managed to be insanely ambitious and boundary pushing in certain aspects, without also being a buggy mess and sacrificing other parts of the game. Just insane how good it is.

Really a shame that there are probably thousands of people out there, who would probably love it, but they are morons like I was, and will never even try it because of its weeb aesthetics. Outside of how it looks, it actually doesn't even have anything in common with typical weeb games, idk why it's even hidden in a weeb section on Codex, would never find the thread if I wouldn't start specifically looking for it after I played the game.

Anyway, I'm gonna be sending some copies to my friends as gifts, and hope more people will do the same, because if those guys will go bankrupt, my heart is going to break. This game deserves to be a commercial success, more than anything created in the last decade.

A journey a lot of us here have been through brother

 

[Zumbabul]

I nearly overlooked this game, because it looks like weeb shit, and I don't like weeb shit. Probably would never try it if my good friend wouldn't keep convincing me that's it's the best SRPG ever.

After playing for ~50 hours in the last week, it's indeed the best SRPG I've ever played, and one of the best games overall. The ambition and passion that went into creating it, reminds me a lot of Troika, last game that gave me that feeling of playing a true gem that can happen once in a generation, was Arcanum. Except troubleshooter somehow managed to be insanely ambitious and boundary pushing in certain aspects, without also being a buggy mess and sacrificing other parts of the game. Just insane how good it is.

Really a shame that there are probably thousands of people out there, who would probably love it, but they are morons like I was, and will never even try it because of its weeb aesthetics. Outside of how it looks, it actually doesn't even have anything in common with typical weeb games, idk why it's even hidden in a weeb section on Codex, would never find the thread if I wouldn't start specifically looking for it after I played the game.

Anyway, I'm gonna be sending some copies to my friends as gifts, and hope more people will do the same, because if those guys will go bankrupt, my heart is going to break. This game deserves to be a commercial success, more than anything created in the last decade.

I agree with every word you wrote. If it was not for the codex warm reception, I would never even tried this game. The steam page looks like shit. The game itself looks like a piece of Asian shit, but in reality, it is a piece of Asian art. I completely fell in love with this game. And I agree with you. This game deserves the honor to be compared to Arcanum. I only hope that the devs will not end like Troika.

 

[NJClaw]

Anyway, I'm gonna be sending some copies to my friends as gifts, and hope more people will do the same, because if those guys will go bankrupt, my heart is going to break. This game deserves to be a commercial success, more than anything created in the last decade.

I know I played it only because Abu Antar, blessed be his soul, gifted it to me. Since then, I've already gifted it to three friends and they all loved it. The plot is a bit too silly at times, but it's impossible to care about such small details when the game is THIS good.

I've been trying to find a way to return the favor to Abu but, according to his Steam account, he already owns half the games in this world (and the other half is in his wishlist).

 

[Saark]

Frankly, with how good the game is, it shouldn't be buried in the jRPG forum, and should've been moved to the strategy one ages ago. It doesn't have very much in common with typical anime weebshit (which i despise) other than the visuals, and I would think that "jRPG" would be about the actual genre, and not visuals, especially on the codex of all places. Crawlers like Strangers of Sword City or sRPGs like Troubleshooter shouldn't be hidden in what is essentially the leper colony of the codex.

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

If this forum were limited to games in the JRPG subgenre of RPGs, it wouldn't exist as a separate forum in the first place, since that would eliminate the majority of discussions.

Instead, it exists for all Japanese-, Chinese-, and Korean-developed games, RPGs or otherwise, except those that instead end up in General Gaming for whatever reason.

 

[True Ukrainian]

I nearly overlooked this game, because it looks like weeb shit, and I don't like weeb shit. Probably would never try it if my good friend wouldn't keep convincing me that's it's the best SRPG ever.

After playing for ~50 hours in the last week, it's indeed the best SRPG I've ever played, and one of the best games overall. The ambition and passion that went into creating it, reminds me a lot of Troika, last game that gave me that feeling of playing a true gem that can happen once in a generation, was Arcanum. Except troubleshooter somehow managed to be insanely ambitious and boundary pushing in certain aspects, without also being a buggy mess and sacrificing other parts of the game. Just insane how good it is.

Really a shame that there are probably thousands of people out there, who would probably love it, but they are morons like I was, and will never even try it because of its weeb aesthetics. Outside of how it looks, it actually doesn't even have anything in common with typical weeb games, idk why it's even hidden in a weeb section on Codex, would never find the thread if I wouldn't start specifically looking for it after I played the game.

Anyway, I'm gonna be sending some copies to my friends as gifts, and hope more people will do the same, because if those guys will go bankrupt, my heart is going to break. This game deserves to be a commercial success, more than anything created in the last decade.

It does operate according to weeb rules though. You can block bullets with a sword and so on. The entire combat system basically embraces anime style battling.

 

[Saark]

Instead, it exists for all Japanese-, Chinese-, and Korean-developed games, RPGs or otherwise, except those that instead end up in General Gaming for whatever reason.

The sad part here is that a lot of codex regulars avoid jRPG like the plague, and usually for good reason. If moving a genuinely good game into another appropriate sub-forum (not like we get a lot of korean developed games anyway, especially not indie titles like this) gives it more exposure, it should be done unless we wanna contribute to the decline of the last 20 years of game development by judging a game on its looks instead of its actual gameplay. Troubleshooter is much more akin to games like Hard West, Xcom, Shadow Tactics, Phantom Doctrine or Phoenix Point which are all in sRPG.
Lobbing everything in here that fits the "developed in asia" standard is a good approach imo, but if a game actually fits the criteria of a more sophisticated sub-forum, it should go there instead. But maybe thats a discussion best had in Site Feedback or Prosperland.

 

[Reinhardt]

Frankly, with how good the game is, it shouldn't be buried in the jRPG forum, and should've been moved to the strategy one ages ago.

so no one will ever see it. At least jrpg subforum is somewhat active.

 

[Reinhardt]

Look at your tacticool gaems subforum - most threads even on first page were last posted in months ago. Codex is sooooooo prestigious.