Battle Chasers Nightwar - From the paper to the screen

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Hello everyone! Boy time surely flies… It seems it was just yesterday when the new year started, and we are already all the way into February… Anyway, for the first (rather late) entry of this new year I bring you a shot of pure “neoretro” gaming. The game is called Battle Chasers Nightwar. Have you ever wonder how it would be to mix the dungeons and looting of Diablo with the turn-based combats of traditional JRPG games? If so, keep reading, for I might just have the perfect game for you.

Published in 2017, Battle Chasers Nightwar is a classic style RPG that, as I just mentioned before, combines elements from classic JRPG games with elements of western RPG and dungeon games such as Diablo. The game has been developed by Airship Syndicate, a small team made up of ex-Vigil Games members, creators of the awesome Darksiders series, who decided to start a crowdfunding campaign that allowed them to start their first project in their new beginning as a indie team after the unfortunate closure of Vigil games due to the bankruptcy of THQ, who were the owners of Vigil Games. For those that still don’t know it, Battle Chasers is a action and adventure comic created by Joe Madureira a.k.a. Joe Mad, a name that will surely ring a bell to all the superheroes comic readers, for Joe has worked for some of the most prestigious companies of the comic industry such as Marvel, where he collaborated in classic series such as the X-Men, Deadpool, Spider-Man or Wolverine, before founding Vigil Games to begin a new career in the video game industry, as video games had always being one of his great passions together with comics. So, as many of you might have already guessed, Battle Chasers Nightwar is a video game based on Madureira’s homonymous comic series, and so they share the same steampunk world full of muscled warriors, sensual red-haired rogues, powerful grumpy wizards, giant robots and all kinds of magical items. However, it won’t be necessary to read the comics in order to understand the game’s story, for even if the characters and world setting are the same, the story will take place in a completely new place never shown before in the comics, and although it is true that reading the comics will give us a better insight on some of the characters, the team has included loads of information that will help us to understand better the complex and rich world of Battle Chasers.

Regarding the gameplay, Battle Chasers Nightwar is divided in three different main parts: world map exploration, dungeon exploration and combats against the enemies. Regarding the world exploration, Battle Chasers Nitghwar utilizes a world map that we will be able to explore with certain freedom by following the different predefined roads interconnected by nods that will lead us to the different settlements and dungeons spread across the geography of the world of Battle Chasers Nightwar. However, the world exploration won´t be completely linear, as we will find several crossroads along the way that will give us the option to choose different paths, and exploring them will allow us to find all kinds of treasures. Other of the key points of Battle Chasers Nightwar will be the dungeon exploration, and in this case, we will have complete and absolute freedom to explore them at will while we rejoice ourselves in their beautiful and detailed environments full of secret paths that will lead us to all kind of treasures waiting for us to be discovered. Finally, we have the combats, which it probably is Battle Chasers’ most fun feature, even if they use the loved by some and hated by many turn-based system. Yes, that’s right, I said TURN-BASED system, but WAIT, don’t run away yet, for as dreadful as it might sound to some of you, I can guarantee you that Joe and his team did their very best to make them as deep and dynamic as possible, and I personally think they did a hell of a job. When we start our adventure, we will only have two characters in our team, but soon after four more will join us, each of them with their own unique skills that we will have to master if we are to be successful in our quest. The characters are:

Garrison 

A powerful warrior who wields a magical sword. Garrison is a character focused on inflicting damage on our enemies.  

Gully 

Gully is the daughter of Aramus, a legendary hero and the mentor of Garrison, who one day suddenly disappeared without leaving any trace except for a couple of powerful magical gauntlets that Gully will use to fight all those that stand on her way as she looks for her missing father. Gully is a well-balanced all-round character.  

Calibretto 

An enormous and ancient war golem, the last one of his kind after the order of destroying all the war golems was given. Despite its imposing size, Calibretto is peaceful and friendly. He established a strong friendship with Gully, who he will always protect at all costs. As contradictory as it might seem, Calibretto will be in fact the healer of the group.  

 

Knolan 

A powerful wizard who is more than 500 years old. Knolan is the travel partner of Calibretto and just like the giant golem, he has also sworn to protect Gully from anyone who tries to harm her. Knolan is your typical attack mage.  

Red Monika

Voluptuous and sexy Red Monika is a bounty hunter and the sword master of Garrison. She’s your typical trickster, so all her skills will focus and weakening the enemies (and pleasing our eyes…)


 

 Alumon 

This is the only character that does not appear in the original comic, as it was created specifically for this game. Alumon is a powerful demonhunter and wizard. Just like Knolan, he is also an attack mange.







As I was saying before, it will be extremely important to master all and each of the skills of our unique group of heroes in order to form a well-balanced group, as we will only be able to use three characters during the combats, and the enemies won’t precisely go easy on us (specially the bosses). One of the key elements of the combat system will be the mana overcharge system, which will allow us to push the limits of our characters. The mana overcharge system will allow us to obtain extra many points during the combats every time we perform a normal attack, which will come very handy, as mana will be scarce and difficult to replenish, and the dungeons are large and mean, so mastering the mana overcharge system will be essential to our success. The mana overcharge will allow us to use the extra mana points to unleash the characters’ special attacks without using spending our base mana points, thus boosting considerable the amount of mana points at our disposal during the combats. It’s a very clever mechanic that adds a whole new level of strategy to the combats, as many times it will force us to consider whether we should use normal attacks in order to store mana so that we can unleash the special attack we need in the right moment, allowing us to win a combat that seemed to be lost.

Of course, Battle Chasers Nightwar is much more than just its exploration and combat, for the game also includes a series of features that help to enrich the game experience, such as certain special skills that the characters will able to use while we explore the dungeons and that will allow us to do things such as avoid enemies or hidden traps, puzzles that we will have to complete in order to be able to keep advancing, or minigames that will allow us to obtain all kinds of useful rewards, like an interesting fishing minigame. On top of all this, the game also includes many elements typical of the RPG genre, such as the possibility of creating or improving items, or secondary missions, turning Battle Chasers Nightwar in a gratifying and challenging RPG experience.


Other of the aspects that really stands out in Battle Chasers Nightwar is its extremely polished presentation, in which Joe has worked in person. The first that is worthy to mention is the slick character and enemy models, especially during the combats, which seem to have come out straight from the comics, as well as its smooth and elaborated animations. As for the backgrounds, they all have a great design and amount of detail, which benefits from a vivid color palette that reminds that of the comics. And talking about comics, it is also worthy to mention the comic-like scenes used to narrate certain points of the story, as well as the portraits of the characters displayed during the conversations, all which helps to convey the feeling of being playing some kind of interactive comic.

Battle Chasers Nightwar does not invent anything, in fact, it is just the opposite, it is a tribute to all those classic RPG games that many of us grew up playing with during the 16/32-bit generation, and that is precisely where its magic resides, for despite no inventing anything, it definitely does a good job in everything it attempts, delivering a pretty solid game experience, especially for a low budget indie game, and all nicely wrapped up in Madureira’s striking art. Battle Chasers Nightwar is another clear example of how love and passion for what you do can overcome the biggest of the budgets, proving that this kind of game can be just as fun as any of the modern productions. If you like classic RPG games, Battle Chasers Nightwar is a game you definitely should be trying, for I’m pretty sure that its solid gameplay and artistic style will surely make you fall in love with it right from the very beginning. The game is available on physical and downloadable format for PS4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch, and just on digital format on PC via Steam.


Thank you very much to all those who followed my blog during the last year, I hope to see you around this year too to talk about those little gaming gems that some of us love so much, but not many talk about. Have fun!


GAMEPLAY VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-LibVd3-KYg