Arco

It really has a vibe to it and is a beautiful game. The story is moving, the world is cool, the gameplay is wholly unique. I just can't recommend it as it wasn't for me. I am not sure why it says I've played .1hrs because that is NOT true, I'm well over halfway through this game. The skill tree menu is a slog to navigate, maybe there should be preset builds. Overall the game is really hard and after trying a battle 10+ times it just is not fun. Have put it down, reinstalled after a while, tried again, banged my head against the wall, uninstalled more times than I can count. Would love to finish the game and maybe next reinstall I'll see if there are difficulty options. Many disagree with me but I play video games to have fun and if a game is too difficult in an unenjoyable way: it is not fun for me.

Ухх...какая вкуснятина)

Pretty good idea of what this game will be after about 30 minutes. It's three stories that go, "bleeeeh colonialism bad, feel guilty, oillll, they bad colonizers. kill the colonizers..." Deadass, we have a brand new world of magic and these ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ could only come up with oil from the start. A RPG game where you continually have two choices Continue the game or say no and just realize you have no other choices and then choose to continue the game. Reminiscent of Fallout 4. another thing... it's weird to have an RPG game where you make dialogue choices that aren't what you actually say. Another thing reminiscent of Fallout 4. No way to change options in game?

Absolute masterpiece of indie gaming. 10/10 emotional story with great writing and a killer pixel aesthetic. The core gameplay loop is also well executed. It reminds me of Tactical Breach Wizards, Shogun Showdown, Let's! Revolution!, or Into the Breach a bit. It's faster and maybe a bit simpler than those but maintains a turn based tactical feel. The story though, so good! Relatively simple western revenge tale but masterfully paced and delivered. I'm tempted to go back in and get the alternate endings. I played it all on the Steam Deck with no performance issues and it seems like I'm a bit slower than most because I also had a few hours in the demo that weren't counted and it took me around 20 hours for a single playthrough.

A very unique game experience that you can tell was crafted with love. If you're looking for a easy to learn game, with an interesting story and charm, you should give it a try. The difficulty spikes aren't too hard to navigate, but the team included options to make combat easier if you desire. Also, you can play the game entirely with just a mouse, which is excellent for disabled gamers or people who are intimidated by lots of controls and key bindings. The soundtrack is really good as well. It's hard to rate a game like this. How do you compare this to a game like Half-Life 2/Elden Ring/Zelda: BOTW, etc on a scale? It's impossible. But in the sphere of smaller indie games, this is a gem.

I struggle to write a review that completely encapsulates everything I felt while playing this. It was more than a game to me. It was living, breathing cinematic experience. The first thing that got me was the art. Every pixel used in every environmental scene was used to great effect. Having lived in the such places before, the art really immerses you in the sense of a desert as an endlessly, free space that invites reflection, both internally and to infinite possibility. Every other scene, I would just stop and let myself be absorbed into the art and feel fully present in it. I have even just taken screenshots of scenes just to look at them as art, independent of its purpose in the game. The second is the combat itself. Having gotten used to turn-based JRPGs, this game really surprised me. It is a dynamic, bullet-hell type combat where positioning really matters. I normally hate grinding fights but with this combat, it became addictive. The skill tree is very detailed and encourages a lot of experimentation. The game can be difficult at times, but not unfair, and you will pick it up within a few tries. Once you do that, you can enter a real flow state where, when your hits land as you intended, feel phenomenal. Note that you can reload failed fights and trying different tactics, but if you've spent XP on abilities that aren't ideal for the fight, you will have a frustrating time. The third is the music and sound design. Every song sets the scene for the different environments you'll find yourself in, and really gives the art (which was already immaculate) an even deeper breath of life. Songs played throughout fights and in environmental scenes really do make you feel like you are the star of a Western movie or a tragic lone warrior out for justice. Other songs played after certain scenes will hit you with devastation like a train. The sound design throughout the game is also just very satisfying, even something as simple as just buying or losing items. And then the fourth is the world itself. The world building is complex, taking inspiration from multiple cultures and environments to create something that is both cohesive and something not yet seen before. It's extremely refreshing to get an RPG with excellent gameplay mechanics that look towards precolonial cultures for inspiration. I found myself just wanting to learn more and more about this world and its lore. Now as to the story, it is a Western, but it is also so much more than that. I will say taking one of the games' routes gives you more world-building to engage with than the other. I truly wished it as longer, but I would rather have a shorter thematically cohesive story vs. one that overstays its welcome and drags on. To me, it is a perfect piece of art and will stay long in my memory. For any critiques I have, they're extremely minor. I did have one moment where the audio went completely berserk mid-fighting, and I could not click on anything, so had to reload a save. But that was one moment in a roughly 16 hours of active play. Additionally, the game reminds me at times of Oregon Trail, where you will go from settlement to settlement and you can purchase different items to use or trade. Because there is such a variety of items, and coins are a limited resource, you will not know which items are or aren't important until you've finished the game once. Also because the game is short, you will definitely be holding on to way too many of a particular item. On top of this, sometimes it's not clear that you can or can't do certain things. For example, I did not notice I had gained an ability until I happened to be looking at one part of the screen. You will not have these problems upon a second playthrough (which you should absolutely do as you will be presented with multiple one-way choices). The fact that I learned about Arco 2 years after its release is criminal. This game should have WAY more attention than it currently does and I hope this review encourages you to experience it for yourself. To the creators - thank you for such a beautiful experience!

Great little game. well written dialogue, engaging story lines, great OST. and fun mechanics on the turn based combat. well worth under a tenner. look forward to another game from devs

the narrative and atmosphere of this game are a masterpiece. 10/10