Rogue Voltage

This game has one of the most unique and interesting combat systems I've seen in a while. Where in many other turn-based games, you can basically just spam the same things every turn until a meter or whatever charges up, in this one you *have* to switch up what you're doing ever turn because of the way the different modules interact and their cooldowns. Combine that and the need to adapt to what the enemy is doing, and you're constantly having to think about what you need to do. The story... exists. It's decent, it's functional, and a bit funny at times. This is definitely more of a gameplay game than a story one. The meta upgrades in the game, your base camp, are helpful but don't really make you overpowered. They're more about making your runs more consistent rather than strong.

The game design, the sound design, the cohesion in the art style. This game is was made with passion and it really shows. I've been playing it every night that I've had free since I got it. It's great. The tutorial definitely has a learning curve, but the full tutorial is available in the demo so you can really see if this game is for you. (Also, I'm really glad this had a demo! The demo got me off the fence and sold me the game!) Hats off to the developer, this one is great!

No joke, this game literally gave me nightmares last night. I played it just before bed. Despite the creepy foreboding atmosphere, it is not "scary," but I kept waking up thinking I was playing the game and losing. Overall, has solid mechanics pulled from a variety of genres. It resembles a deck builder, but you combine modules to build machines to do battle.

The game is very well designed and beautiful. You engineer your own abilities rotations, it's very clever and captivating.

I took a risk because it looked interesting, and [b]I'm glad i did.[/b] This game is kind-of a mashup between Lonestar and Backpack Hero - in the right ways. 9/10 Some turns, you will have it wired how you want and simply hit the on switch. Other turns, you will move connections around to activate different things, or maybe hold a button that lets you pick each module to activate - so you can make some crazy combo based on the order happen. There are lots of sensors that react to things happening, storage modules, color changing, combining or splitting, guns, slow rays, speed boosters, etc. And fights have an active display for turn order, where you can do things like make an enemy's turn land on a volcano fissure (or speed or slow yourself so you don't). Most important factor: runs are fun and interesting. It advertises as a rogue-like, but starts out as a rogue-lite (my preference), that I can see will finish out around early-mid game to become a pure rogue-like. Very approachable on beginner difficulty, you can make mistakes, survive and remedy the situation, and expect to win if you don't severely mess up. And you can minor power fantasy if things go well. Higher difficulties test your risk/reward strategy / survival vs efficiency for better rewards. Each run starts with you selecting a team of 2 characters, each with their unique mechanics. New characters unlock rapidly and each has a short exp bar that unlocks a few new modules for playing with them for a few runs. The creativity of the character mechanics really shines. When you 1st look at them, some of them seem more like a penalty - yet they are all crafted to make for interesting and rewarding builds, where intentionally penalizing yourself at the right times gives strategic advantages. Runs don't overstay their welcome, with each of 3 biomes leading to a boss fight, then camp or run end that rewards you based on how well you did with more town (meta/persistent) upgrades. At a nice casual pace, runs will last around 1.5hrs +/- depending on build complexity, player skill, and difficulty. Persistent upgrades are helpful, but not grind/slog artificial slowdown. eg more reward options after finishing a fight vs (more damage or hp to artificially hold you back). Saving: there are both a turn rewinds and save and continue a run later. I think I saves to the beginning of a fight, not individual turns (need to experiment). ...in fact, my first play session really highlights this in a good experience: I played the tutorial run (nicely blends into your 1st real run) then a real run... got to the last biome with a really satisfying op build. ...Then someone hit a power pole and took out all the power for the block! I was dreading turning on the game again, expecting to have lost all my progress and good run - but I didn't! With the power cut unexpectedly mid-run, the game had kept all my progress and only forgot a single fight for me to redo. Bravo!

I don't write game reviews often but this game and developer deserve a shout out. Its a clever take on a familiar genre. The gameplay balance is great requiring enough strategy to keep me engaged but never overwhelmed. If you enjoy logic puzzles and the vibe of classic 90's rpgs check it out.

Spaßig, immer wieder schön exploits zu finden.

It's a deckbuilder except your deck is a rack of the weirdest modular synth patches. Rogue Voltage is a really weird fish, but there's a gem of a game here waiting to be found. It can feel finicky at first, and late into a run when your rack gets full of esoteric modules that daisy-chain combos across different racks, it can look overwhelming, but once you learn to read the rack, it's fabulous.