So anyway, most of you are probably wondering what this Runespell game is. Runespell is an indie game I found on steam that really wouldn't be all that worth mentioning for any reason save one. But before I mention why it is worth bringing up I wanna talk about everything else quickly that I feel should be in a review.
Runespell is an rpg. You play the character in the above picture named changeling. The story, so far as I've been able to discern, is that some time back your daddy was a bad dude. Your daddy was some sort of evil king who more or less enslaved a large region or people and routine raped the women there in. Some time along a hero showed up and murdered him. The hero then built a castle way the hell away from where he murdered your daddy. Your fate as one of the changelings is to go and avenge your sick and twisted daddy. I do like the fact that when this is revealed to the character you are allowed to point out that this essentially make you the bad guy.
The art of the game is really nothing impressive. Almost everything in the game is static images, the only moving things I've found are the characters in battle and even then only when they perform an attack. The game seems rather lacking on the content side, enemies are routinely recycled to avoid having to draw new ones. Movement is done through a map screen and no area aside from the camps can be gone into. So most of the game is spent looking at the map and looking a the generic combat screen, only maybe 15% of which varies based upon the area, but then again everywhere I've been has been different areas of a snowy mountain so if that 15% of the screen has changed I cant recall noticing it. There's no voice acting to speak of other than possibly during what I hesitantly call a movie scene. I really can't even recall if there is some sort of narrator or not.
So I seem to be talking about a lot of smack about this game but not really hate filled. So this isn't an angry don't buy this piece of garbage. And it isn't a recommendation, at least not yet. Why am I writing this then? Just to talk about a mediocre game? Well if you don't have brain damage you should remember I mentioned that there was one thing that made this game worth talking about. None of the things I've said have sounded at all worth mentioning you say. I agree. The astute among you might realize I mentioned there was combat but didn't talk about how it works. There's only two reasons I would do that. Reason 1: the combat is extremely simplistic and obviously copy-cating another game and is devoid of any finesse and utterly unworthy of mentioning. Reason 2: The combat is worth mentioning and I was waiting on doing so. This is a case of reason 2.
So the combat in Runespell is done by playing poker. No I didn't mess that up. You play poker to fight. Well you sort of play poker. You play a card game that uses the same card combinations as poker. Each player sets out their cards in a fashion similar to solitaire such that there are eight face up cards stacked on face down cards. Each player is then allowed three action points per turn. Action points are used to attack, use spells, or move cards. Cards must be formed into sets of five before they can be used. The set of five cards becomes an attack with power depending upon how good of a hand it is. Thusly a pair with three garbage cards (Because a hand must always consist of five cards) is the weakest attack that can be used and a royal flush (Which I've never yet manged to pull off) is the most powerful attack. One thing that is really cool is you are in fact allowed to steal cards from your opponents so long as those cards are not yet part of a set. However the corollary is also true ie. your opponents can steal your cards as well. I do feel like sometimes the game is somewhat unfair as more than once I have started a battle in which the opponent got to go first and in their first turn they created a four of a kind which is a reasonably powerful attack.
So all in all, it's a mediocre game with a really neat way of doing combat that I really would like to be able to recommend more than I feel I really can. I got it at 75% for $2.50. I feel like I've got my money's worth out of it, and I probably will play it at least enough to beat it. However, 75% for $2.50 means the game is normally $10. I think that is somewhat over priced for the content you get here. If it was just five dollars and the gimmick sounded cool to you then I'd feel comfortable saying sure drop five bucks and give it a look. However, it is kind of an old game so it is on sale from time to time and there is a demo so you can try it for free before putting out money to get it.
5.5 stolen cards out of 10
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