The Hundred Years’ Bore – Bladestorm: Nightmare Review

<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; left&semi;">My experience with tactical games like <em>Bladestorm&colon; Nightmare <&sol;em>is minimal at best&period;  I’ve dabbled in similar games like <em>Dynasty Warriors<&sol;em>&comma; but I went into <em>Bladestorm <&sol;em>with absolutely no predisposition or opinion&period;  Perhaps I’d find a new genre that I could get into&comma; a new game series to find all entries&comma; past and present&comma; and devour them voraciously&period;  Perhaps I could find some thrills in the one-two punch of the Hundred Years War campaign&comma; followed up by the alternate history Nightmare campaign&quest;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Perhaps not&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><em>Bladestorm&colon; Nightmare <&sol;em>is a remastering&sol;sequel of <em>Bladestorm&colon; The Hundred Years War<&sol;em>&comma; a tactical game from Tecmo Koei that paints the bloody war between England and France in broad&comma; Japanese-flavored strokes&period;  You play as a mercenary working both sides of the conflict&comma; helping either England or France overpower their enemies&comma; claim bases&comma; and turn the tides of war&period;  You do this in a semi-direct fashion&comma; with your mercenary commanding different squads of troops &lpar;swordsmen&comma; archers&comma; etc&period;&rpar; as a perfectly synchronized phalanx&comma; taking down entire armies in a matter of seconds&period;  It’s empowering in theory&comma; but stunningly boring in practice&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;03&sol;05012526&sol;BN3&period;jpg"><img class&equals;" size-large wp-image-80177 aligncenter" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;03&sol;05012526&sol;BN3-1024x576&period;jpg" alt&equals;"BN3" width&equals;"620" height&equals;"349" &sol;><&sol;a><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Each mission gives you exactly 10 minutes to try and complete your objectives &lpar;capturing enemy bases being the most prevalent&rpar;&comma; so you simply run to the nearest group of soldiers&comma; take command&comma; and then start running towards the nearest group of soldiers flying the opposite color&period;  There’s little to no strategy to speak of&comma; although there is a gentle rock-paper-scissors system to encourage one unit type against another&period;  Sadly&comma; it has virtually no impact on strategy or difficulty&comma; as even units that were supposedly at a disadvantage felled their opponents without any real discomfort&period;  There are some moments that make the game slightly more interesting at times &lpar;the introduction of Joan of Arc&comma; for example&rpar;&comma; but it’s the same clunky&comma; uninspired gameplay ad nauseam&period;  There’s no real depth here&comma; just a game that plays out like dozens of tiny Capture the Flag matches without any real challenge or strategy&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>There are also some RPG elements at play&comma; with between-mission visits to a pub &lpar;overseen by the worst accented Frenchman this reviewer has ever heard&rpar; allowing you to swap out armor or level up your command skills over certain units through the use of books&period;  However&comma; this takes the already unchallenging game and makes it offensively easy&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;03&sol;05012542&sol;BN2&period;jpg"><img class&equals;"aligncenter size-large wp-image-80176" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;03&sol;05012542&sol;BN2-1024x576&period;jpg" alt&equals;"BN2" width&equals;"620" height&equals;"349" &sol;><&sol;a><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The Nightmare campaign tries in vain to spice up the historical aspects by suddenly bringing goblins&comma; skeletons&comma; and other fantasy tropes into the mix &lpar;all led by an evil and apparently quite bosomy Joan of Arc&rpar;&comma; but it’s still more of the same&period;  It’s like a smear of margarine on a slice of white bread&colon; it’s a teensy bit more palatable&comma; but it’s still bland&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Visually&comma; the game definitely wears its 2007 vintage on its sleeve&colon; character models are pleasant enough&comma; but nothing spectacular&comma; and sometimes the skirmishes become incomprehensible jumbles of flesh and cloth&comma; making enemy units hard to differentiate&period;  There’s the potential argument that this more successfully emulates the chaos of war&comma; but it throws the game’s already lean strategy right out the window&period;  Some of these issues are reduced in the Nightmare campaign&comma; where non-humanoid characters are easier to pick out from a throng of European men&comma; but it doesn’t help <em>that <&sol;em>much&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><em>Bladestorm&colon; Nightmare <&sol;em>is simply not fun to play&period;  It’s not even awful&comma; it’s just so overbearingly bland and repetitive that it becomes remarkably unremarkable&period;  The fantasy elements injected into the Nightmare campaign are amusing &lpar;seriously&comma; Joan of Arc looks like a cross between the Goblin Queen and Ivy Valentine&rpar;&comma; but it’s definitely not one for the history books&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;