I love Root!
Baldurs Gate hold up well, they are huge stories and classic D&D.
I like playing on slightly lower difficulty
Steam EA starts today:
Approximately how long will this game be in Early Access?
Likely a few weeks, as we work to align cross-platform releases on Steam and mobile.
So, shouldnāt be too long of a wait before it appears on mobile? 11 days left in August!
Yes, they are quite a big time sink. The work well on mobile as long as you are wise enough to make constant use of the pause button to issue orders, but I would recommend that on PC as well, so it isnāt really a mobile issue. If youāve. It played them or are less familiar with classic CRPGs know that they are much more story-driven and have a lot less action than the action RPGs that they superficially resemble. They also use an older D&D version so some stats/rolls are a little less intuitive than the modern rules, especially considering armor.
This is all just nitpicking, though.
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Iām always excited for new board games, but Iāve really soured on this developer and their complete lack of post-launch support. Shards of Infinity desperately needs the expansion, which we now know we will never get, and last I checked Race for the Galaxy does not have working notifications, unless someone can tell me otherwise. Iāll have to watch some gameplay or something for this one.
Fully agreed. This app is pretty well done and I donāt think it has an expansion? Even if it does, the base is pretty good on its own.
If you like Race, youāll probably like Roll. Same concept; basically, think of using the dice instead of cards as the currency, and what you roll determines what you and your opponent do on your turns. Thereās way more to it than that, obv; my biggest complaint vs cardboard is that you donāt get to play with ALL THE LITTLE DICE THEYāRE SO CUTE!
And thereās a lot more downtime in the async app than irl, obv - lots of logging in for a turn only to wait for your opponent(s) to roll.
It certainly gets points for being asynchronous at least. Iām looking for the next asynchronous game to push on my buddies. Unfortunately for roll, Scythe could come out soon considering it soft launched a month or more ago, Terraforming Mars may be fixed (who knows?) with the update that is in beta, and Root is supposedly coming soon. I think Root may be the next one I try to sink my teeth deep in to.
Did it not sell well?
Iād have to dig around to find it, but we have a small discussion somewhere on this site. Apparently the developers said it isnāt worth their time and money to work on expansions (or, I presume, update their apps) and their goals moving forward are to make new games instead of expanding their existing ones.
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Iāll take the counterpoint to this. Maybe I didnāt put the effort in to understand Roll, but I felt like I would just assign dice to whatever cards I ended up with in Explore/Develop, and didnāt really feel like I had much choice of what to build. I also didnāt feel like what I was building had any real impact on any sort of engine.
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I love Baldurās Gate I and IIātheyāre some of my favorite games of all time. Iāve played through both numerous times over the years, but only on pc. Iāve bought the ios versions and tried them, but itās a bit harder to actually play. You have an easier time with the controls when you have a keyboard. And there are settings in the pc version that automatically pause the game anytime you encounter an enemy, anytime your main character takes damage, etc, so you can essentially use the settings and the pause button to make it feel turn based.
The other advantage to pc is that thereās a huge modding community that has created some really useful and quality stuff over the years. As far as I know you canāt mod the ios version (or the Switch version, which I rate higher than the ios version in terms of adjusting settings and intuitive UI).
I havenāt answered your question! Theyāre a huge time sinkābut in a good way : ) Theyāve got great characters and a strong story (and lots of side stories for many of the NPCs you add to your team). Tons of customization and lots of replayability; there are so many NPCs you can get in your party, youād never use them all on a single play-through. If you decide to go the pc route, gog has sales on them pretty regularly.
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Iād have to go back and double check but I thought the iOS versions also had all the auto pause options.
The iOS versions of BG do have the auto pause options.
I think it needs to be mentioned that playing either BG on anything smaller than a max size phone isnāt ideal due to UI size. Itās playable, but just be mindful of UI size if playing on a smaller phone.
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Thanks for all the feedback. Iām going to give Planescape Torment another go before I try dipping into BG.
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tell this to a tournament level player and he will have a good laugh.
itās a bit like saying TS is ānothing else than a crazy dice and card luckfest.ā
reigning Ascension world champion Turtler7 is a dedicated RollftG player too and i was happy to learn tricks and strategies in matches against him.
tricky decisions and dilemmas.
very good timing is needed in the endgame.
when to shift from development rush to produce/shipping?
explorations can be painful as you can get to see up to 6 cards with only 3 explorers or up to 10 cards with 4, but which to hold on to and which to discard in the process?
and how important are reassign powers exactly in which situation?
i really like RaceftG but sometimes you just drawā¦shitty cards and youāre done.
dice are more flexible and can be manipulated and reassigned in Roll. of course there is always a good deal of luck involved when it comes down to cards/tiles and dice.
but itās challenging to make the best of it in Roll.
and i have experienced some remarkable turnarounds.
in Race i often have the feeling to know the winner in a very early stage.
but in the end itās just a matter of personal taste again.
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Letās change that āmaybeā into āI definitely didnāt put the effort into understanding Rollāā¦
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Imperial Settlers Roll & Write is currently half off. Probably worth it for $2 if you like the genre.
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Cartographers is out on iOS. I donāt know when it was released not do I know much about it, but every tabletop game released on my phone is always newsworthy, at the very least.
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Iād be curious for anyoneās thoughts on Cartographers too. Iāve heard good things about the physical game but I havenāt played it. I think the app was released today.
I may pick it up on a whim and Iāll share impressions if I do. I think it is made by the same developer as made Ganz Shoen Clever, Friday, Coffee Roaster, etc., so Iām honestly expecting it to be a little rough around the edges but also likely addicting.
I grabbed Cartographers but havenāt played yet. Iāll share impressions if/when I get a chance.
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