Battlepaths

Battlepaths is an RPG, very similar to Dungeons of Dredmor. The movement is turn-based, so moving a square causes the enemies to move too. This game takes the characters speed into account, so enemies may get 2 turns when you move.

The graphics are functional. The basic graphics work for what the game is trying to achieve, but the disappointment is that your character doesn't change when you equip weapons and armour. He did seem to change when reaching a certain threshold in the Strength stat. It doesn't affect the gameplay, but it loses that customisation aspect.

When you level up, you get to choose a stat to boost: Strength, Dexterity, Endurance, Speed and Willpower which gives you the opportunity to develop a character to your liking. I initially focussed on Endurance to create a 'Tank' character, but there were moments in the game where I realised the other stats were very important, so tried to keep things slightly more balanced. There's plenty of loot to find, and you can find tokens that assign the item a random effect. This can be something like boosting a stat by 1 point, or give you resistances.

Special abilities are given every 5 levels which are usually focussed around the stats. I chose the Healing abilities which are based on Endurance.

I felt the tactics were very limited. You have a mêlée attack and can use potions to do ranged damage, or summon a creature to assist you/cause a distraction. You can utilise choke points to ensure you are battling 1 vs 1 when you aren't against ranged creatures. I felt it often came down to who was strongest/do you have enough health to survive.

There were many creatures that seemed to have a very low chance of me hitting them which slowed the combat down and become frustrating. You need to ensure you have good Dexterity/good Attack Rating to prevent this.

On the normal difficulty, when you die, you can choose to respawn at a cost of some XP and money. You can also choose to quit and reload, but you will be placed back at the starting town. There are teleports to find to make transportation quicker though, but otherwise you will have to go back through the same areas, and find that the enemies have respawned.

The game has three maps with a several quests to solve in each before progressing. There's a mixture of large open areas, and dungeons to explore. The game will last several hours which is a bit too long; given the appeal of a game like this is to replay with a different type of character.

Just like Dungeons of Dredmor, I felt my character was ready for the final area, only to get to the boss and find he was way too powerful. It also seemed like there was far too much work to get to the boss, should you fail and want to try again after reloading.

I thought Dungeons Of Dredmor was quite cool but had its flaws. I think Battlepaths is very much inspired by that game, but is more simplified, and therefore is more dull.