Recently I found a bit of time to play one of the myriads of games I bought or crowdfunded in the last score of months.
Honestly, I was only able to play for exactly 99 minutes, then death struck my avatar down, and I realized it was already very late in the night.
As you can see, I was totally spellbound by the story and the game mechanics of the game.
The game I am talking about is called Tainted Grail Digital. Digital because it is based on a board game by Awaken Realms, a Polish company that makes board games with extraordinary miniatures.
Tainted Grail: The Fall of Avalon is one of the games I crowdfunded, and now that I was able to play the Alpha version of its digital spawn, I cannot wait to get it in my hands.
But now back to Tainted Grail Digital.
Tainted Grail is a dark fantasy open-world RPG with turn-based exploration and combat, which the developers describe themselves as “fresh.” I do not know if “fresh” is the best adjective to describe it, as they have thrown into the combat mechanic something that most players know from digital card games already.
Though, how they incorporated this into the combat system and further enhanced it with a dual power rune mechanic to alter the combat skills in a unique way could only be called, fascinating.
Like in one of those good old-school RPGs, you meet your adversaries in a round-based fight, but instead of choosing your actions from a list of skills, you get every round a new set of cards, from which you can select your actions.
Red cards are more aggressive, while blue cards are more defensive in nature.
The crux is to make the best combination of your skills, so you can smash down your opponents before they beat you to a bloody pulp.
The game is hard and unforgiving, but fitting to the dark theme that fuels the spellbinding story, written by Krzysztof Piskorski, about the dying lands of Avalon, long after King Arthur’s demise.
The game manages to give you a great deal of respect for the Wyrdness, that surrounds your ever-shrinking village and threatens it continuously. Weird things are happening inside it, and it will rob you of your sanity if you go into it unprepared for exploration.
And woe to whom being out in the Wyrdness, lighting up his last Wyrd-candle far from a safe haven.
I will go soon back into the Wyrdness of Avalon to explore the lore-rich setting, so stay tuned for more.
Sincerely
yours,
AbyssalEros