A wonderful amalgamation of several different tactical genres, Unicorn Overlord is an excellent triumph. Combining elements from Fire Emblem, Suikoden, and Ogre Battle, the game manages to slam those ideas together to form a truly unique experience that I did not think I would again anytime soon.
Tactical and real-time with the ability to pause at any second, each map consists of several enemy units to defeat, bases to liberate, and characters to sway to your cause. Fine-turning your squads as they grow in size and strength is the bread and butter of the game, and I've never been more enthralled to dig through menus to see it happen. Equipment loadouts, unit positioning, and mastering how the battle system works is a joy that isn't front-loaded with tutorials and endless chatter, but more of a basic explanation and a willingness to try new combinations out to see what works.
Battles take place automatically, based on initiative speeds, and what attacks or buffs each unit preforms. There is a special kind of thrill to be gained from setting up a unit to preform all their best moves and take minimal damage and watching it play out with perfect success.
Like Suikoden before, there are MANY characters in the game that both join your army automatically or have to be persuaded through your actions. All of them are beautifully unique and fully voiced, making building of your battalions even more exciting. The artwork, both on character models during dialog and battles and on the world map, are both stunning and charming. Vanillaware has always been kings of beautiful character designs and it's absolutely no different here.
The main gripe within the game is the story. It's not that it's bad, it's just that it's boring. It falls into many tropes you've seen play out in film and other video games with elves and beast/human hybrids, a super evil bad guy and his second in command super evil wizard, and other less than stellar story beats. Alain, the protagonist, is likely one of the most vanilla leads I've ever seen, just 100% the nicest guy you'll ever meet and never has a bad thing to say about anyone and everyone loves him 24/7 with little to no complaints. It's a thrill to recruit a new member, but sometimes the people that join you would have killed you ten seconds earlier, but Alain said two sentences about helpin' the little guy and saving the country and suddenly all is forgiven.
You can also build relationships with your entire crew, akin to Fire Emblem, which improves their stats in battle and gives you small scenes between each of them when certain benchmarks are hit. It's a nice addition, especially if you share beautifully drawn meals that always look delicious, but a lot of dialog also falls into a repetitive nature, especially if Alain is involved, as he'll just wax poetic about whatever the other person likes and use flowery language to cover up for somewhat stale storytelling. You can romance people as well, but it amounts to very little unfortunately. It's a nice touch and will somewhat change how you need to approach the final battle, but otherwise it's a bit lacking.
Overall, the gameplay, strategy, and tactical prowess of this entry far outstrips the lackluster story. The difficulty on Normal is a pushover, so cranking it up is highly recommended if you want more of a challenge. This is one of the closest things I've seen to Ogre Battle 64, one of my all-time favorite games, so it has a lot going for it when it comes to the gameplay elements. If a sequel or second game in this style is made, all they need to do is improve the story and I'll sing their praises until I die.
Tactical and real-time with the ability to pause at any second, each map consists of several enemy units to defeat, bases to liberate, and characters to sway to your cause. Fine-turning your squads as they grow in size and strength is the bread and butter of the game, and I've never been more enthralled to dig through menus to see it happen. Equipment loadouts, unit positioning, and mastering how the battle system works is a joy that isn't front-loaded with tutorials and endless chatter, but more of a basic explanation and a willingness to try new combinations out to see what works.
Battles take place automatically, based on initiative speeds, and what attacks or buffs each unit preforms. There is a special kind of thrill to be gained from setting up a unit to preform all their best moves and take minimal damage and watching it play out with perfect success.
Like Suikoden before, there are MANY characters in the game that both join your army automatically or have to be persuaded through your actions. All of them are beautifully unique and fully voiced, making building of your battalions even more exciting. The artwork, both on character models during dialog and battles and on the world map, are both stunning and charming. Vanillaware has always been kings of beautiful character designs and it's absolutely no different here.
The main gripe within the game is the story. It's not that it's bad, it's just that it's boring. It falls into many tropes you've seen play out in film and other video games with elves and beast/human hybrids, a super evil bad guy and his second in command super evil wizard, and other less than stellar story beats. Alain, the protagonist, is likely one of the most vanilla leads I've ever seen, just 100% the nicest guy you'll ever meet and never has a bad thing to say about anyone and everyone loves him 24/7 with little to no complaints. It's a thrill to recruit a new member, but sometimes the people that join you would have killed you ten seconds earlier, but Alain said two sentences about helpin' the little guy and saving the country and suddenly all is forgiven.
You can also build relationships with your entire crew, akin to Fire Emblem, which improves their stats in battle and gives you small scenes between each of them when certain benchmarks are hit. It's a nice addition, especially if you share beautifully drawn meals that always look delicious, but a lot of dialog also falls into a repetitive nature, especially if Alain is involved, as he'll just wax poetic about whatever the other person likes and use flowery language to cover up for somewhat stale storytelling. You can romance people as well, but it amounts to very little unfortunately. It's a nice touch and will somewhat change how you need to approach the final battle, but otherwise it's a bit lacking.
Overall, the gameplay, strategy, and tactical prowess of this entry far outstrips the lackluster story. The difficulty on Normal is a pushover, so cranking it up is highly recommended if you want more of a challenge. This is one of the closest things I've seen to Ogre Battle 64, one of my all-time favorite games, so it has a lot going for it when it comes to the gameplay elements. If a sequel or second game in this style is made, all they need to do is improve the story and I'll sing their praises until I die.