EMPYRE: Lords of the Sea Gates Review – Not A Drop To Drink

<p><em>EMPYRE&colon; Lords of the Sea Gates<&sol;em> is all about water&period; An isometric RPG&comma; set in a steampunk apocalypse&comma; where the world has flooded and the survivors split up into city-states&period; Of course&comma; everything would be fine if the water hadn&&num;8217&semi;t stopped pumping&comma; and all the water surrounding them wasn&&num;8217&semi;t undrinkable&period; Enter you&comma; playing as one of four archetypes&colon; Magpie&comma; Bodyguard&comma; Soldier and Daredevil&comma; sent on a quest to restore water to the people and save the world&excl;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The game’s atmosphere is a mix of <em>Valkyria Chronicles<&sol;em> &lpar;setting&rpar;&comma; <em>Contrast<&sol;em> &lpar;characters&rpar; and <em>Dragon Age&colon; Inquisition<&sol;em> &lpar;combat&rpar;&period; There’s probably a closer comparison&comma; but these are the games which spring to mind&period; Overall&comma; I’ve enjoyed the story and the writing has been quite detailed for an indie game&period; Most characters are fleshed out quickly&comma; and while there are some stereotypes&comma; they are different enough&period; Furthermore&comma; most background characters have some sort of story &lpar;<em>Watch&lowbar;Dogs<&sol;em>-esque&rpar; which can be seen by hovering the mouse over them&period; These include some rather dark stories discussing topics such as abandonment and totalitarian governments&period; You even have some basic choices which influence whether you have to fight or not&period; This means you can avoid combat&comma; which is good&comma; as it’s probably the weakest feature of the game&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;131623" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-131623" style&equals;"width&colon; 1000px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"wp-image-131623 size-full" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2017&sol;11&sol;11141223&sol;EMPYRE-4PNG&period;jpg" alt&equals;"EMPYRE&colon; Lords of the Sea Gates 1" width&equals;"1000" height&equals;"563" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-131623" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;<em>EMPYRE&colon; Lords of the Sea Gates<&sol;em>&comma; Coin Operated Games&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>While I said that <em>Dragon Age&colon; Inquisition<&sol;em> is the closest comparison in gameplay&comma; it’s only in the loosest of sense&period; By that I mean&comma; it’s a real-time RPG&comma; with a tactical mode you can use via pausing&period; This works for something like <em>DA&colon;I<&sol;em> as it has extra freedom granted by the 3<sup>RD<&sol;sup> person perspective&period; For something like <em>Empyre <&sol;em>however&comma; I personally think a system like <em>X-Com <&sol;em>would have been better&period; The current system means you’re constantly reacting to what the enemies doing instead of tactically moving your people&comma; and it more often than not devolves into a numbers game – who has more people attacking the same person&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>This is only added to by the fact that the &OpenCurlyQuote;fog of war’ obscures enemies until you move quite close to them&period; This is fine for a real-time strategy game like <em>Age of Empires<&sol;em>&comma; but for a hybrid like <em>ELSG&comma;<&sol;em> it only frustrates further&period; I’ve run into a room and gotten shot by a machine gun – to resolve this I need to pause the game&comma; remove all commands&comma; re-input the move command to another area and watch the sluggish running away play out&period; If you want me to plan then allow me to plan&semi; otherwise&comma; give me quicker control for my units&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Moving onto the graphics and sound now&period; They&&num;8217&semi;re pretty standard block level layouts&comma; although the detailed environments are nice to look at and it does mean there’s plenty to see&period; The character models and portraits are well made as well and there’s plenty of variation in weapons&period; The music is nice&comma; albeit a tad repetitive&comma; and fits well with the steampunk theme&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;131622" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-131622" style&equals;"width&colon; 1000px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"wp-image-131622 size-full" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2017&sol;11&sol;11141124&sol;EMPYRE-3PNG&period;jpg" alt&equals;"EMPYRE&colon; Lords of the Sea Gates 2" width&equals;"1000" height&equals;"563" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-131622" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;<em>EMPYRE&colon; Lords of the Sea Gates<&sol;em>&comma; Coin Operated Games&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>Some design choices are a bit odd as well&period; For example&comma; I haven’t been able to find a button which allows you to split stacks of items&comma; leaving me frequently with one character with an awful lot of healing items and everyone else with none&period; Another odd decision is the inability for a character to open a door without specific instruction&period; I’ll press a destination somewhere in the distance&comma; wait a while for the people to move and then realize they’ve been blocked by a door&period; Again&comma; this would be fine in a more personal 3<sup>rd<&sol;sup> person perspective environment&comma; but for a tactical RPG&comma; I shouldn’t have to guide everyone every step of the way outside of battles&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Overall&comma; <em>EMPYRE&colon; Lords of the Sea Gates<&sol;em> is fun to play with an above average script and setting&period; However&comma; it is obstructed from greatness by unfriendly UI and some odd design choices&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; center"><strong><em>A review code was provided by Coin Operated Games<&sol;em><&sol;strong><&sol;p>&NewLine;