Couchpotato spotted a trailer for Band of Crusaders:

Band of Crusaders - GOG Reveal Trailer

Next stop Rozafir:

Poll votes are in!

CYOA Results: to Rozafir!

Thanks to all the players in the community who cast their vote into the CYOA of this Early Access. For Update 2.0 we will head southeast to Rozafir for more than just drinking with the locals, for treachery and trouble lurks below and above the surface of this farming settlement.

More content to come with 1.5 soon!

Stay tuned for the next poll as we carve through the map and all the shroomers within.

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The strategy RPG Broken Alliance will be released into Early Access on October 24 - the Turn Based Lovers checked it out:

Retro-Inspired Heroes Of Might And Magic-Like Broken Alliance – Overview

A New HoMM-Like Strategy Game Ready To Debut This Month

The game I’m introducing aims to offer a gameplay style reminiscent of Heroes of Might and Magic, featuring exploration, city-building, and tactical combat. However, it introduces a unique twist: a deck-building mechanic. Players draw cards to perform attacks, move units, and use special skills. It’s called Broken Alliance and is an upcoming indie turn-based strategy RPG set for release in early access on October 24, 2024.

Developed by Placeholder Gameworks, it draws inspiration from classic titles like Heroes of Might and Magic, Age of Wonders, and Master of Magic, while introducing a fresh twist with deck-building mechanics. It combines tactical gameplay, rich storytelling, and deep world-building as you fight to save a dying world devastated by the overuse of magic. Players align with one of four factions—Anchorage, Phobos, Paradise, or Forge—each offering unique perspectives, gameplay mechanics, and moral dilemmas.

[...]

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Mortismal Gaming checked out Banquet for Fools:

Check Out: Banquet For Fools

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The tactical RPG Hidden Path has been announced for February 4, 2025:

Hidden Pass is a Tactical Turn-Based RPG inspired by Divinity OS 2 and Wartales.

Hidden Pass is a Tactical Turn-Based RPG inspired by Divinity OS 2 and Wartales with arena-like combat, square grid system and initiative order. Build a team of skyfaring heroes, wield techno-magical devices and construct automatons as you explore sky-islands rich in secrets and Elyrium crystals.

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Matt talked with Joseph and Hannah Williams about Banquet for Fools:

MC540: Joseph and Hannah Williams on Banquet for Fools

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The Early Access title Alvara got a lot of new features - a demo is available:

Alvara

Story

Immerse yourself in Alvara, a forgotten land at the heart of the Vat, the infinite universe. This RPG with mechanics inspired by the classics of the genre offers an innovative narrative experience and an immersive system of choices. Every decision you make will shape Alvara's destiny and influence her story.

Forge your own adventure in this rich, captivating world, where every choice has real, tangible consequences. Explore varied environments, meet fascinating characters and make crucial decisions that will determine Alvara's fate.

You are Zoltae, an orphaned warrior from Bazzya. Your tormented past and uncertain future plunge you into an epic quest where every choice will determine the fate of Alvara, the lost land. Will you save Alvara from the darkness that threatens it, or doom its inhabitants to a bleak future?

Discover how your past and future are intimately linked to the history of Alvara, and influence the world in which you live.

Choose
Make your own choices, where each decision will have irreversible consequences for Alvara and its inhabitants. Write a unique story where your quest for truth and justice may well lead to the destruction of everything you love.

Recruit
Meet colorful characters with unique motivations and personalities. Convince them to join you and form a formidable team to face the dangers of Alvara. Take advantage of their skills and strength to overcome the obstacles that stand in your way.

Fight
Master tactical turn-based combat where strategy is your ultimate weapon. The unique Synergy system lets you unleash devastating attacks if your allies trust you, but will leave you exhausted afterwards.
Make crucial choices: will you fight alongside the most powerful warriors who despise you, or will you prefer the cunning thief who faithfully follows you? Each ally has its strengths and weaknesses, so exploit them wisely to triumph.

Exploration
Explore the vast expanses of Alvara, especially the continent of Occilargia. Wander through richly varied landscapes and discover ancient ruins that hold the secrets of the past. Understand the history of the world and your place in it. But will you be ready to accept the truth, even if it challenges everything you believe?

Features

• Combat: Immerse yourself in battles offering an immersive or strategic experience, with the option of choosing your angle of view.
• Menu: Enjoy an ergonomic menu that lets you navigate freely between the map, equipment and your missions.
• Interaction: Interact with hundreds of objects, explore the world, harvest its riches and discover its secrets.
• Dungeons: Put your wits to the test by solving puzzles to understand the world and find your way.
• Exploration: Enjoy an immersive camera that moves closer when you walk and farther when you run, for a better gameplay experience.
• Quests and Merchanting: Take part in quests and vary prices according to your relationship with merchants, adding a social dimension to your transactions.
• Blacksmithing and alchemy: Master the art of crafting and alchemy to forge or craft anything you desire.
• Exploration: Discover interactive maps and, if you find them, use them to travel quickly to the places you've discovered.
• Unique events: Unique events linked to the calendar will be present throughout Alvara, to create a more dynamic gameplay that will have a direct impact on it.
• Skills: Develop your character and those of your team, with your skill points.

About Early Access:
Currently, early access allows you to explore Alvara up to the Bazzya Road (end). After that, although the game is fully playable, updates have not yet been implemented. However, you should know that they are weekly, and that embarking on the Alvara adventure will keep you captivated for many hours!

The J-RPG Zerra's Adventure has been announced for 2025; the Turn Based Lovers checked it out:

Colorful Dynamic Turn-Based JRPG Zerra’s Adventures – Overview

Zerra’s Adventure, developed by Foca Productions, offers a refreshing twist on the classic turn-based RPG formula, where there’s no need to worry about random encounters. Instead, this game is all about intentional exploration, quirky humor, and dynamic combat. Traverse whimsical landscapes—from frog-filled forests to infernal deserts and spider-infested caves—each one teeming with treasures, dangers, and peculiar enemies.

In this colorful world, you’ll face an array of strange foes, including armed rabbits, giant penguins, and even hyper-muscular gym-goers. Battles are fast-paced and tactical, requiring careful use of each character’s unique abilities.

[...]

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Couchpotato spotted a trailer for Sea of Legends (-> Kickstarter):

Sea of Legends | Official Reveal Trailer

Couchpotato spotted a new update for Wartales:

Community Update 4 Out Now!

Hello Mercenaries!

It is now time for the fourth Wartales Community Update.
On top of adding a new Champion and a new place of interest, we worked hard to bring you the option of joining and leaving a coop game.

We also spent quite some time rebalancing the classes as well as certain skills to ensure a more diverse array of options when starting a fight.
We will keep close attention to your feedback on those changes, so feel free to let us know what you think in the comments or on our Social Media channels.

Now let’s have a closer look at this update in details below:

New champion and place of interest
Arthes has been expanded to the south. A new place of interest, a secret passage and a champion have been added in the new area.

It seems a monster has moved into the mountains in the south of the County. The farmers are offering a reward to anyone who can slay it.

Drop-in/Drop-out Coop
You can now join a singleplayer game and convert it into multiplayer. You also have the option to start in multiplayer and continue in singleplayer, switching seamlessly between the two modes to suit your preferences.

To Join a Singleplayer Game in Multiplayer Mode

1. Navigate to the Multiplayer menu and select "Load Singleplayer Game."
2. In the lobby, add player slots and invite friends to join.
3. Once everything is set up, launch the game. It will automatically convert your save into a multiplayer session on the next save.

To Continue a Multiplayer Game as Singleplayer

1. Load your multiplayer game to open the lobby.
2. Remove other players from the save.
3. Launch the game to continue in singleplayer.

[...]

The Turn Based Lovers checked out Frameland: A Binary Tale:

Robots, Humans And Everything In Between in Old-School JRPG Frameland: A Binary Tale

Until now, I hadn’t encountered or heard anything about Frameland: A Binary Tale. This JRPG takes clear inspiration from the classics of the past and immerses you in a world where humanity fights for survival after an event that causes machines and robots to go rogue, taking over what remains of the planet.

You play as Ryiu, mysteriously transported to this strange land with no memory of how he got there. Alongside unexpected allies, you’ll uncover secrets about Condorra and fight to return home. The story is told through two intertwining perspectives, delivering an emotional journey filled with mystery, survival, and hope.

The gameplay revolves around turn-based combat, where timing your moves is crucial for maximum impact. Well-timed attacks and blocks can be the difference between victory and defeat, adding a layer of real-time strategy to classic RPG mechanics. Customize your characters with remnants - special artifacts that grant unique abilities—and plan your moves to exploit enemy weaknesses wisely.

With lovingly crafted pixel art, an original 16-bit soundtrack, and a tight 6-8 hours of RPG content, Frameland is a nostalgic journey packed with depth and a heartfelt story. The game launches on PC via Steam on October 30, 2024, and in the meantime, you can try the demo below, an overview, screens, and trailer.

[...]

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Within the Cosmos will be released later in October:

Within the Cosmos Release Date Delayed

Within the Cosmos has been delayed to later this month.

Hey everyone,

It pains me greatly to say that Within the Cosmos will no longer make its intended launch date. While I've been working hard and I've been pouring everything I have in the effort to hit the 4 October release date, I’ve realised that in order to deliver the quality and experience you deserve, I need just a little more time to finish up some key parts of the game.

I'm in contact with Steam in regards to setting a new release date for later this month, and once we can confirm that, I’ll make a follow-up post with the updated launch details. I sincerely apologise to those of you who were excited to play the game today, and I’m sorry for not meeting the goal I had set for myself.

To be completely transparent, the game just needs more polishing. Initially, I had planned to work up until the final moments before the game went live, then submitting an update to fix a couple of things, but really, the best thing for the game is to just give it the few weeks that it needs. I'd rather release the game in a complete and polished state than rush it out now and fix things with a patch.

Apart from the polish and bug fixing that I will do, I also intend to improve on some aspects that I feel need improving prior to release, like the character face models, and voice acting. I’ve contracted additional voice actors to give a more diverse range of voices to the characters, which I believe will greatly enhance the experience. The balance of the game also needs to be tweaked a little. I also want to use this time to let you all have another look at the game, especially since the second planet, Alios, hasn't been covered much yet.

I understand this delay might be disappointing to those of you who have been eagerly waiting, especially since the game has already been delayed (multiple times) before. However, I’m nearly there, and this extra time will allow me to add the final polish, complete some important voice acting, and ensure that Within the Cosmos is the best it can possibly be.

From the bottom of my heart, I want to thank you so much for your continued support, understanding and your patience throughout this journey. This game wouldn’t be where it is without you. I can’t wait for you to experience Within the Cosmos in its best form!

- debdev

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Matt chats with Alan Miranda and Luke Scull about Pathfinder: The Dragon's Demand (on Kickstarter):

MC539: Pathfinder Dragon's Demand with Alan Miranda and Luke Scull

Couchpotato spotted a new trailer for the action RPG Moon Beast:

Moon Beast Teaser HQ 1080

The dungeon crawler Monomyth has been released into Early Access:

MonoMyth

MONOMYTH is an immersive, first-person dungeon-crawling RPG inspired by the genre's late classics. Embark on a journey through a vast and highly interactive game world as you unravel the mysteries hidden beneath the ancient fortress of Lysandria.

Splattercatgaming checked out Banquet For Fools:

A Hidden Gem of a cRPG That Hits All The Right Notes - Banquet For Fools

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Couchpotato spotted that the tactical RPG Shards of the Realm has been released:

"Shards of Realm" is coming to Steam

Immerse yourself in a turn based tactical RPG set in an expansive open world, where you manage a diverse party of heroes and construct formidable fortresses. Strategize in battles, explore vast lands, and lead your team to glory in a dynamic fantasy adventure.

The tactical RPG Scourge of the Reptiles has been announced:

Scourge of the Reptiles - Announcement Trailer

Scourge of the Reptiles is a party-based tactical RPG set in a prehistoric fantasy world. When a meteor strikes the Earth, humans, elves and dinosaurs alike are gifted with magical abilities - abilities that result in war, devastation and forces that stretch far beyond the hero’s quiet home village.

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The strategy RPG Tenebris: Terra Incognita has been released into Early Access:

Tenebris: Terra Incognita in Early Access!

Greetings, space troopers! The day has finally come!

Today, having fought his way through an army of bugs, Colonel Grom loudly announces the release of Tenebris into Early Access!

When we decided to begin development on Tenebris: Terra Incognita, we drew on Darkest Dungeon, but decided to change a number of mechanics, make the game more fair to the player, and at the same time keep the difficulty fairly high. Misses and failed odds on effects remain, but we set out to create a system where the outcome is up to the player, and mistakes can actually teach you something rather than making you hope for a different dice roll result.

We are fans of Star Troopers, so the action of the game takes place in the distant future. Brave soldiers with huge guns and the favorite smell of burning bugs in the morning - that's the atmosphere of our setting!

[...]

6 Eyes Studio explains the current state of Pathbreakers: Roaming Blades:

The current state of Pathbreakers

Hello everyone!

Now that Pathbreakers: Roaming Blades has been officially announced, we've received questions about our plans and timelines and such, so here's what we have so far.

Release Date
We don't currently have a clear idea of the release date, and there's still a lot of work to be done. It's an ambitious project, and as usual, we're not willing to compromise on quality to get it out the door faster. We believe sometime in 2026 for the final release is probably likely.

That being said, we are strongly considering an Early Access on Steam. We were very happy with the amount and quality of feedback we got for our previous game, Fell Seal, during its Early Access, and we're hoping for a similar result with Pathbreakers. As such, an Early Access sometime in 2025 is likely.

General flow of the game
Pathbreakers: Roaming Blades is going to be a less "well defined" genre than Fell Seal was. It has more varied systems and gameplay mechanics and is, in essence, more "multi-dimensional" than Fell Seal in terms of gameplay.

When the game starts, you'll get to select one of many origin stories. An origin story has a protagonist, with their backstory, goals, and starting situation. There'll be an option to create a custom one as well.

From there, you'll start somewhere on the Stormtossed Isle, a large island populated by multiple factions, some friendly, some hostile. You'll be controlling a troop of mercenaries, with a general goal defined by your origin story. The game is meant to be very open-ended and you can pretty much do whatever you want for the most part. Each origin story character has their own story and goal, but you could put it on hold and focus on exploring the world instead. Think of something somewhat like Skyrim on that front.

As time passes, you have take care of your expenses: salaries, food supplies, new gear, recovering from battle injuries, etc., so you'll need some income. You can focus on contracts for your company, trading across the various cities, or exploring the wild island in search of grand discoveries. Or you could do all of those things, or even resort to banditry (which won't exactly give your company a sterling reputation, but it'll pay the bills).

Map exploration takes place on a large world map, filled with roaming enemies and populated with cities, dungeons, and lairs to discover. Lairs contain hostile faction leaders, often barricaded and enjoying favorable terrain. Battling them will yield rich spoils, but it'll be dangerous. Dungeons will have your protagonist walk around in dark and dangerous environments, filled with traps, patrolling enemies, and hidden passages. But dungeons can be as rewarding as they are dangerous, and unique riches can be found at their heart, including legendary equipment and holy statues that will bestow powerful traits upon your company.

As you progress through the game, your overall goal is to amass worthy mercenaries and equipment. Mold them up into glorious combatants through your selection of advanced classes, stats, abilities, passives and traits. Only in this way will you truly be ready for whatever awaits you at the end of your origin story.

Inspirations
I think the closest match to what Pathbreakers is, would be a hybrid between Uncharted Waters: New Horizon (or Horizon's Gate) and Battle Brothers, which one could say are the 3 main inspirations for the game.

Pathbreakers has the same focus on exploration, trading, and combat as Uncharted Waters and Horizon's Gate, but with a combat system and contracts system more akin to Battle Brothers. The overall feel is closest to Battle Brothers, but with a significantly more complex trading system, a dungeon exploration system, and battles with more diverse options, through a system of classes and abilities. Each unit, at max level, will have access to 5 active abilities to use in combat, on top of the basic attack option and their equipped items. This leads to a lot more options on the battlefield and a more fantasy feel overall.

Visual style
Anyone familiar with Fell Seal can easily tell that we've decided on a very different art style for Pathbreakers. We've opted for a more traditional pixelart style for this one. There's always pros and cons to these choices, but all in all, we're hoping this will be a net positive. The biggest upside of the new style is going to be much more detailed and smooth animations across the board for sprites.

Otherwise, just like for Fell Seal, Pathbreakers will be boasting a lot of customization options for your mercenary units and you'll be able to change the colors of various pieces of their attire.

Another style change is going to be on the UI front, where we've decided to design the game from the ground up for keyboard and mouse primarily. It should have a much more PC-style UI, with easy-to-access tooltips and a very mouse/hotkey driven UI. We'll have full gamepad functionality as well (we are targeting consoles as well after all, although nothing is confirmed yet), but the recommended input is going to be mouse and keyboard this time around.

In closing
Remember to follow the Steam Pathbreakers: Roaming Blades page if you want the latest information about the game: we'll be focusing all our announcements right here!

- 6 Eyes Studio team

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The tactical RPG Pathbreakers: Roaming Blades has been announced:

Pathbreakers: Roaming Blades - Announce Trailer

Pathbreakers: Roaming Blades is a turn-based tactical RPG in which you lead a company of mercenaries through the harsh lands of the Stormtossed Isle. Select one of many origin stories, or create your own, and make your mark through the world. Hire your crew, train, and outfit them. How will your company operate? Will you favor the traditional mercenary life, grab contracts and slowly build up your reputation? Will you instead focus on the lucrative trading opportunities to be found on the Isle? Or perhaps you'll don the mantle of a consummate explorer, discover and chart the numerous dungeons and secrets throughout. Then again, why not a mix of it all? One thing is for certain, though: it'll be a dangerous and bloody journey, and you'd better prepare your company for it, and prepare well.

The world of Pathbreakers: Roaming Blades consists of a procedurally generated world map, teeming with enemies, dungeons, towns and secrets to discover. Assemble your company and roam the lands, looking for opportunities, fortune, and bloody combat. Maintaining a mercenary company isn't cheap, so you'll have to earn some coin on the way. Contracts, trading, looting, discovering and pilfering will all serve you well on that front. Battles are a big part of the gameplay and take place on a tactical hex grid, in turn-based mode. Deploy up to 8 units, each with their own class and skill tree, and engage a variety of enemies intent on seeing your crew lie face down in the dirt. Dungeon exploration is another major component in Pathbreakers. Select a small elite force from your crew and delve into a dungeon. Once inside, you'll face traps, hidden paths, vicious enemies and your ever dwindling oil reserves, as you explore the darkness, hoping for treasures and renown.

Build your own Company
Assemble and customize your roster from a selection of 8 classes, each branching to 2 different advanced classes and with their own skill tree. Mercenaries start with background traits and can learn new ones, adding an extra layer of customization.

Multiple Company paths
Your company can amass reputation on 3 different fronts: Mercenary, Trader and Explorer. A high reputation grants new opportunities tied to its field. More contracts, trading options, and special commissions become available to those who have proven themselves.

Never quite the same
The campaign's open world, dungeons, and most battle maps are procedurally generated, making each new game a different experience. Nothing is ever quite the same and it will keep you on your toes.

Multiple origin stories
Select one of many origin stories, or create your own. Each origin character has their own custom plot and story events, with different strengths and weaknesses and different goals and objectives.

Interesting enemies and tough encounters
The game features a large cast of enemies, ranging from opposing mercenaries to a multitude of unique monstrous creatures. Enemies have access to their own classes and abilities and understanding them will be a key difference between victory and a shallow grave.

Dynamic events
Contracts and story events have multiple resolutions and branching outcomes, never being quite the same from playthrough to playthrough. You'll face some hard choices that will influence how your company is perceived.

Modding
Pathbreakers has been designed to be modder friendly. The game features Workshop support, a map editor, a spell editor, and data files relying on easy-to-edit-and-understand json files, which facilitates adding classes, skills, and new languages.

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What's coming next for Phantom Brigade?

Next on PB: Pilots & Overworld

Hey Brigadiers! We're finally ready to share some details about our next update. We took a step back to review the design of the entire game and decided to focus on improving the two areas that receive the most consistent feedback that we haven’t addressed in updates yet: pilots & the overworld gameplay loop.

PILOT TRAITS & PROGRESSION
We want pilots to be a meaningful part of the game rather than just a name and portrait that you occasionally assign to a mech. In our next update, the pilot system will receive a total overhaul.

Pilots will gain experience and level up based on their experiences in combat. A set of traits will gradually unlock with level progression. Available traits depend on class and differ between pilots. The effects of traits range from simple buffs to new abilities, making different play styles and pilot specialization more rewarding.

On top of progression, pilot states will become more complex. Pilots will gain fatigue from combat, receive injuries and even acquire unique negative traits if you mistreat them. We hope these additions (and more changes we aren't yet ready to detail) will make your campaigns more interesting and would give you a reason to glance away from the shiny mechs, if only for a second! :)

OVERWORLD
We're also improving the gameplay on the world map. Our original approach where the world was generated at the start of the campaign had its benefits, but made it difficult to achieve a balanced campaign experience. You could fight the same kind of an enemy over and over, miss some mission types entirely, run out of enemies during contests, etc. We reconsidered how we approach the world map and switched to a director system that will consider the history of your campaign and spawn missions that are most likely to be fresh and appropriate for the current phase of your quest. You won't be locked to a single option and will continue to have agency over the direction you chart in your campaign, but we feel that the reworked generation will provide a much more varied and interesting experience to every player.

With these changes, we also took the opportunity to rework and improve almost every aspect of the overworld gameplay. You will be able to see all mission details, including potential rewards, right from the world map without entering briefings. Contest mechanics, escalation levels, dialogs, quests, unit repair & pilot healing, resupplying and more have been reworked to create a tighter, more interesting experience.

QUALITY OF LIFE IMPROVEMENTS
Finally, this next update will feature lots of quality of life improvements. Some of them include reworked pilot, briefing, debriefing and dialog screens; a quest system that guides you through the campaign and input hints. A new codex screen will help you remember or learn the myriad of mechanics present in the game without needing to restart your campaign to revisit one-time tutorials (in addition to some interesting lore!). We are also hard at work on adding gamepad support across the entire game.

We’re still a ways off from release, but we ARE gearing up to playtest rough versions of these changes. If you'd like to help shape this update, please join our Discord and sign up for the playtest here! We’re looking for players of all experience levels, from those who’ve never played PB before, to Brigadiers who mod their own mechs - each unique perspective is super valuable to us!

Last but not least, we really want to thank everyone for playing and supporting Phantom Brigade. Our review score has been steadily improving since launch, and it really means the world to us to see our updates be warmly received. We read every bit of feedback we get (special shoutout to players who submit in-game reports, that data is super helpful!) and it continues to shape our plans and work. Thank you Brigadiers!

- The Phantom Brigade Team (Artyom, Dakota, Pavel and Jaymee)

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The dungeoncrawler Underkeep has been announced for 2025:

Underkeep Teaser

Underkeep is a loving tribute to the role-playing classics of the 90s with turn-based combat and grid-based movement, bringing the best of old-school dungeon crawlers to the modern era.

Assemble a party of four adventurers in a dangerous fantasy world and delve deeper into the heart of the Underkeep to discover its long-forgotten secrets and uncover the stories of its inhabitants.

FEATURES
• Choose your own playstyle
Assemble a party of four adventurers with unique abilities and spells. Combine and upgrade their powers to overcome their weaknesses. Create synergies by gearing up with fine equipment with game changing properties.

• Explore, overcome, fight
Explore dungeons, pick items, fight enemies, meet NPCs. Overcome traps and deadly environments and descent deeper into the heart of the Underkeep.

• Turn-based combat
Take as much time as you want to think out your next move. Don't worry when your pizza arrives in the middle of a fight.

• Fluid controls with full controller support
Play either with mouse and keyboard or grab your controller and enjoy the game from the comfort of your couch after a busy day.
The skip animations feature allows you to play at your own pace. No more waiting for tedious animations to finish.

• In-game automap
In-game automap with custom marks so you never get lost.

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