Northmark: Hour of the Wolf

Loved this game.

Fun deck builder you can knock out in a couple of hours

A, more-or-less linear, card game that focuses on story and brings some unique mechanics to the table. The only game mode is the campaign, where you move to unlocked locations to advance the story, fight some battles and buy new cards. You cannot freely move around the map, only to the locations the main story or side quests have unlocked. Although you can go back to any of these unlocked locations later, there is usually no reason to other then to visit a shop or arena. The story itself, although well written, offers no agency and is comprised of just listening to some text to get your next objective. So, the main campaign is a very casual experience, with the real meat being the card battles. The card game portion is where things get more interesting. You have a deck, like all card games, but you also have up to 3 companions with you, who all have a kind of static mini-deck (which work on cooldowns). The opponent has the same setup. Every turn is one of these 6 companions turns (just goes in order and alternates from yours to the enemies), and they can cast one of the cards from their mini-deck, or your main deck. There is no energy or mana, if a card is available, you can cast it. Your actual main hero never gets a turn. All attacks come from the character who turn it is, and uses their stats (plus your heroes) and targets opponent companions with the goal of eliminating all opponent companions. All buffs/debuffs go directly on a companion and there are no truly global effects or anything. The card choice is a bit limited, but there is enough variety to be mostly interesting for the length of the short campaign (though beginning is a bit too limited and by the end I am mostly just doing the same rotations). The best aspects of the game are the card mechanics. It is a unique system which is fun once you get the hang of it, even if it is lacking much tactical depth. It also has issues with there being too many samey attack cards and overall, just not enough cards, synergies and variety. It is more of an interesting system with potential, rather than it being great or anything. It works with the short campaign, if just barely, but would never be something that would carry repeated playthroughs, at least in its current form. Beyond that, the campaign, even if it is casual with little agency, is still fun and has an engaging story. Perfect for the short game that it is really. The worst thing about the game is that it was obviously cut-short. There are mechanics that are basically not used in the game, such as fire resistance and special attacks against demons. Those are not in the main story at all, though they did add a town that just has all the unused content in it. It is completely optional though, and I believe the game never tells you it is there and I almost missed it. Even with that though, they wrapped things up well enough but will leave you feeling like you finished the end of season 1 instead of the finally of the series. Some other more minor problems, are bad tutorials that left me confused early in the game, early cards are super bland and you will likely have them for some time, and a handful of cards just not telling you enough info. Like most cards will says Attack: 4, Magic: 1 (4 physical, 1 magic damage) but an area spell just says it hits all enemies with no mention of damage or damage type. Overall, a minor recommend that fills a spot for a game you can play for 30 minutes, relax and not think too hard. It is very short, mostly average, but unique enough to feel new. Maybe get it on sale if you are interested in a game like this.

A really nice and cozy inde card RPG. With a high fantasy story and humorous side quests. Can be finished in 3 hours. Which i take as a big plus.

With how big the map was, I expected a game longer than 3 hours. Still, had quite a bit of fun with it, even if it was a simple card battler. Be aware of price to dollar ratio here, there's not much to do after beating the game - thankfully I got the game for $0.60 on sale.

Fantastic card game, it was really enjoyable. At the start it was a bit slow trying to push through the enemy's defence, but once you build up a better deck of cards and have good creatures like the Bear and Golem, it becomes much easier. There's about 4-5 hours of game play, and the achievements can all be done fairly easily.