Sometimes, some games out of nowhere, which we do not necessarily expect a great experience, surprise us with an unexpected dose of fun. When I arrived in front of ORX, just driven by a curiosity about the product, I had this feeling, of not knowing what it was worth, suddenly... I relaxed, and I played for give you this little glimpse out from behind the bundles. This game, currently on Steam in early access, is developed by johnbell and published by Critical Reflex.
Graphics & atmosphere
Far from being in the absolute top graphically speaking, this game has a rather nice and rural touch which fits perfectly with the atmosphere of the title. The different biomes are well represented, and the enemies correctly designated. The atmosphere is clearly the same as what one would expect, so it's screams and arrows mixed with fighting, for a homogeneous and coherent whole. Moreover, something quite interesting, the game offers us a day/night cycle, for more fidelity... even if I don't know if that impacts the gameplay.
Gameplay
The game is a deck-builder mixed with tower defense. You choose your faction and the cards that will go with it and will determine your style of play. Pretty quickly, you can build roads, farms, inns... but it will be better to start building castles that will be the base of your defence. The castles will be two pieces that will be glued together, or several pieces if you are lucky and the cards with you (you start to believe in the soul of the cards and the music of Yu-Gi-Oh ?), you will be able to build strong defenses, and set up militias responsible for slowing down the enemy.
Quests giving you fabulous boosts/treasures will be unlocked as long as you go to the buildings that offer them. Having done this, you will thus acquire an advantage during the battles that will take place, after the countdown that will be on the edge of the screen indicating the direction of the enemies. Once they are defeated, the next wave will come, and the next, and the next...until the end of the level. Having not been able to play until then, I did not have the chance to do so, or even to go to one of the upper levels which contain one of the four bosses of the game, quite difficult to beat . It will therefore be fashionable to use the runes and artefacts in your possession to boost your castles which will be able to gain life, attack speed and many other things.
From what I was told during the presentation, there are about thirty different enemies with their own characteristics and some have quite annoying skills that can get us in trouble. The campaign will increase the difficulty more and more violently, and the roadmap promises us new cards to complete your decks, new game modes, new factions, achievements, etc... a project already well filled and well plot for this really nice game.
Summary
I was surprised to say that it was a good game and that I would like to play it longer. But at gamescom... unfortunately, you can't play as much as you want, time being limited so that everyone can make up their own mind and opinion. In any case, if you're looking for a nice little game that casually requires a bit of strategy and that won't take you too far with hair-tearing concepts, this is what you need. I highly recommend ORX, a really cool game that will hopefully give you as good a time as mine.
