Roadwarden reminds me a lot of the best parts of what I loved about Disco Elysium and Citizen Sleeper. The richness and diversity of characterizations in all three games makes their comparatively small game worlds feel deep and alive, filled with tons of uniquely memorable characters, and also notably empathetic without needing to be soft or cozy. Amazingly, Roadwarden pulls this off without even giving visual depictions of its characters, relying entirely on thoughtfully written text instead of the notably cool character portraits that Disco and Sleeper have.

Like those other two games, Roadwarden asks you to read a lot, but I’m glad to read as much in any game with similarly evocative detail and a selective word count; nothing ever feels like filler I’m tempted to skip through.

Beyond its great writing, the sparse acoustic soundtrack is beautiful in many different moods; I particularly loved the emotional impact of hearing an area’s background song change after one of the few transformational plot events occurs. The pixel graphic landscapes are just as smart as the writing in what they choose to include, and I love how exploration offers unfolding blankness as choices are made.

I really wanted to like this game. It seemed like it would be right up my alley. But after getting about 3 hours in, it started to feel like it was nothing but an endless interlinked series of fetch quests, none of which I could do because I was too broke and too low on stats. I looked up some advice for beginners and this was only confirmed. “Try going to X, get a Y, do that for a few in-game days, and hopefully you don’t get ambushed on the road, good luck!” Either that or, “Just try to do a quest that you know you can do right now, and see where it leads you.” Another 3 hours later, I’ve been running around the whole map for days, my in-game time limit is halfway up, and I’m no closer to even being able to START most of the quests.

All this is to say, I can see why people love this game so much, but it did everything in its power to bore and frustrate me. I did appreciate some of its aspects though, such as how merchants will often outright refuse to buy anything from you if they don't need any of it. Makes the world feel more believable.

God what a mood. The only reason this isnt 5 stars is because I'll be honest, if Im reading this much Id rather be reading a novel haha. This isnt tk say Roadwarden is poorely written as what it achieves is great, and the music and atmosphere are sublime. However, at a certain point a visual novel with this degree of RPG type choices will lose its focus a bit. I grew a little bored near the end, but I will be revisiting it as a staunch militaristic religious type in the future because the worldbuilding is remarkably open and locks you off from a ton due to its time constraint and choices you make. My choices were, of course, to be a hippie dippie pagan lol

Con una melodía cautivadora y misteriosa Roadwarden nos da paso a su mundo. Una península ambientada en fantasía oscura medieval, en la que pasaremos los siguientes 40 días. Pero no es su mundo lo que hace peculiar a este título, si no su forma de narrarlo. Con el apoyo visual de un bonito pixel art de la zona donde nos encontramos, todo lo que ocurre en el juego se cuenta a través de texto. Tiene un enfoque digno de novela, con extensas descripciones, pero aprovechando la interactividad que le brinda el medio. Ese enfoque me gusta, me parece una experiencia bastante única dentro del medio, aunque a veces pueda hacerse algo denso.

Tras una introducción en la que defines la clase de tu personaje y su motivación, Roadwarden te da un objetivo principal abstracto: explora su península en 40 días. Con esa idea en mente, te lanzas a descubrir lo que tiene la península para ti. Una península que realmente me ha parecido muy disfrutable de explorar y descubrir los secretos que guarda. Los pueblos y la gente que lo forma son interesantes, constantemente buscaba saber más, mejorar mis relaciones con ellos o ayudarles en diferentes tareas. Consigue muy bien transmitir la sensación de ser un roadwarden como ellos lo definen, un oficio que busca hacer los caminos más seguros y las relaciones entre pueblos más fructíferas. Todo influenciado por tus decisiones. No vas a poder tener a todos los personajes ni pueblos contentos, te tocará decidir de qué lado estás. Y esas decisiones tienen consecuencias, muy bien representadas en su final. Lo único que me ha desagradado de su apartado narrativo es lo densa que me resultaba a ratos su narración. Quizá porque intenta tratar todo con demasiado detalle innecesario, alargando mucho determinadas situaciones hasta el punto de saltarme partes de texto por aburrimiento.

Su apartado RPG y de gestión de recursos me gusta. Aunque he echado de menos que hubiera espacio para más rol, que tu clase importara un poco más en la historia y que pudieras definir más tus respuestas. Más compromiso por el RPG clásico. Por otro lado, hay una mecánica de su sistema de gestión de recursos que me genera debate, y son los 40 días que tienes para explorar. La totalidad de tus recursos como personaje (vida, armadura, apariencia, hambre y dinero) tienen como denominador común el tiempo. Todos se pueden conseguir gastando dicho tiempo, convirtiéndose en la divisa principal del juego. Le da significado a cada una de tus acciones, ya que no quieres quedarte sin tiempo para explorar, pero tienes que gestionar cada uno de tus atributos. Sin él las decisiones en roadwarden perderían sentido, siendo un punto fuerte del título. Sin embargo, llegar al final sin poder descubrir todo lo que te ofrece te deja un regusto amargo. Tras una larga reflexión, creo que esta mecánica es una representación de la vida en sí misma. El tiempo nunca se detiene y tenemos que tomar decisiones porque en algún momento se acabará para nosotros. No siempre podremos hacer todo lo que queramos antes de que se acaben nuestros días.

En definitiva, roadwarden me ha parecido una experiencia chula y peculiar. Su mundo me ha parecido interesante de descubrir, aunque en algunas partes me haya costado seguir por su forma de narración. Sin duda con una de las cosas que me voy a quedar es con su ambientación, lograda con una banda sonora impecable.

Beautiful text adventure game that evokes Witcher feelings while you're on a task to map the peninsula. As the titular Roadwarden, your task is to actually maintain the roads and keep it safe if possible, or confirm if they should be avoided. You're functionally a Google car trying to map the world for your lords. Despite the mundane task, it's in-universe considered difficult to do, because you are on your lonesome with no one to protect you, and thus successful forays of a Roadwarden yield prestige and income... especially if you have the backing of the Merchant's Guild...

Roadwarden is the biggest sleeper hit of 2022. For a game with relatively spartan graphics and no animation to speak of, it does a fantastic job of pulling you into the world. It’s like a Choose Your Own Adventure book on steroids. It’s what I wish every RPG could be – a game in which your choices aren’t just window dressing but actually matter.

Indie team Moral Anxiety Studio have crafted a world that should put bigger studios on notice. What really impresses me is that the factions don’t lean on stereotypes. You know what I’m talking about – most games with factions have the obligatory imperialist city dwellers, the struggling country yokels, the machismo warlords, and so on. The different settlements in Roadwarden, in contrast, all feel authentic. Every village has a history and a reason for being, and the NPCs, far from feeling generic, instead feel natural in their roles and help deepen the player’s connection to the world.

Roadwarden also deftly solves the “chosen one” story trope that’s so common in RPGs. At the outset, you’re sent by a corporation to explore a reclusive peninsula and report back about how it can be exploited for profit. How you go about that is up to you, and the choices you make not only define you character but also affect how your relationships with the locals develop. You can play as a heavy-handed mercenary who simply wants to squeeze the land for profit, or you can take on the role of a rational intermediary who tries to balance the needs of the locals with the wants of the corporation. If that sounds too black and white, however, fear not: there’s plenty of grey – probably more grey than you’ll find in any other game.

Be warned that there is a lot of reading, and if you’re looking for a game that’s heavy on combat this definitely isn’t it. But if you’re itching for a cozy adventure that lets you explore your own way, Roadwarden is absolutely the scratch.

Un'idea interessante ma sfortunatamente non riuscivo a rinteressarmi alla storia dopo aver preso una pausa d'alcuni giorni. M'intristisce perché godevo del gioco mentre giocarci, la scrittura è davvero piacevole e ben fatto -- un traguardo da non trascurare dato che il gioco tratta principalmente di lettura. Sono sicuro di esser in grado di completarlo ma oramai m'è passata la voglia. Raccomando ci provate se v'interessa scoprir un mondo da qualche parte tra quello di Game of Thrones e i Signori Degli Anelli.

Everyone says it so it feels so unoriginal to repeat it, but I gotta. Roadwarden is a better Witcher than the Witcher is. The setting, narrative, the characters. It's all very good low fantasy with critters and swords and quests and lore. Roadwarden's quality is astonishing for a Ren'py game. It's well designed, it's pretty, it's engaging. It's a fantastic visual novel-RPG experience.

It's hard to say much without giving things away. But it's as well written as any fantasy novel I've ever read, it's as engaging as an RPG I've ever played. It's well worth a playthrough or two for any fan of either genre.

Roadwarden is a text-driven RPG that I unfortunately did not vibe with. It is very wordy, especially in its descriptions of environments, roads, animals, all things nature Roadwarden explains to you in a level of nature that could not hold my interest and drowned out any interest I had to dig more into its mechanics.
A shame, as I loved games like Citizen Sleeper and I was a Teenage Exocolonist, which both are very text focused as well, but mostly centered around characters and dialogues, which made all the difference in the world all in all.

Cool game, not very lengthy in part due to its 40 day time limit but well crafted with its descriptive fantasy setting and characters. I’m not really sure if the choices and RPG stats were as meaningful as they could’ve been from what I’ve done in a single playthrough, but it does a strong job keeping you interested in exploring the peninsula with how well it tracks its quests and points of interest. I also liked that it leaves you to piece together what to do at certain points, like having to manually type in specific names or actions

It does lack art for the characters that could’ve helped visualize them better, but the text and pixel backgrounds do a good enough job at that. Overall well worth checking for anyone interested in these type of text adventures