Reverie Knights Tactics (PC) Review

Set in a fantasy world, players of Reverie Knights Tactics will take a small squad of characters through different battles, slowly levelling up stats and getting a few new moves along the way. Following a story of revenge after a group of goblins have killed off a bunch of humans, players take the role of an ice mage girl who is leading the charge against them.

The smaller budget is obvious from the beginning, with cutscenes relying on still-frame or sliding characters; but despite this, the opening scene is one of the better parts of the experience. Setting the stage of a tale of revenge and double-revenge actually was engaging. Initially, some goblins were murdered, their group then built up strength to kill off a bunch of people in retaliation, after which it's the Forces of Lights' time to go kill the goblins again. In some ways though, this sets a bar that is never again surpassed throughout the course of the game.

Reverie Knights Tactics is a tactical JRPG that plays like any other with very little difference. In that regard it already has a tough row to hoe, but the game does little to try to stand out, or to even be good. Off the bat the game throws players into a battle as a sort of introduction, negatively though, it is a battle that cannot be won. It sets a very bad opening. There is no problem with 'scripted loss' battles, provided that on some level they are obvious, and/or quick. Here, they gleefully run through 'move here, attack there', only to eventually leave the group murdered one after another in a 10-15 minutes 'tutorial'.

From here, it moves on to the main plot, where an ice mage named 'Aurora', having woken up from her bad dream, is selected as the scout to go against the goblin hordes. A few problems are present right away in this game. Firstly, the character design is absolutely awful in some cases. The main character has to be one of the worst, uninspired designs this reviewer has ever witnessed, and apparently even the developers know this as the launch icon for the game is an entirely different character instead. What is crazy though, is that some of the characters look good, from the goblins to the pirate captain, it's just unfortunate it's so inconsistent.

Secondly, and perhaps far more egregious, the story and pacing could best be described as glacial. Admittedly, the opening scene was pretty interesting about this back and forth genocide, but then it gets shoved to the side. This is only interesting for those who enjoy endless stupid banter about partying or a cook who makes only candy. The thing about this banter though is that it lacks any feeling of soul, humour or pretty much anything else that would make players not want to just click through as fast as they can.

Combat is the one redeemable part of the game. It plays like every other isometric, tactical strategy RPG game; moving the characters with limited actions trying to kill the enemy, then the enemy's turn. Rinse and repeat. Each map has various challenges to do for extra points such as not getting hit, moving enemies around and so on. It is completely serviceable, if nothing special. The only negative is many of the conditions are very, very RNG-dependent, if the AI moves one way or another they become impossible to achieve.

It is not like this game is terrible, it just can't be recommended. The story goes nowhere, and the combat is not anything special, a good story should be sought elsewhere, in fact, a fun game should be sought elsewhere. It's not easy to say this, as it can be seen they put some effort into the game, but as a gamer with limited time this shouldn't be one to pick up.