Battle Chasers: Nightwar - Review @Gaming Trend

Gaming Trend reviewed Battle Chasers: Nightwar.

It’s no secret that I’m a big fan of Battle Chasers, both in game and comic form. While I was excited to sing the praises of the Battle Chasers: Nightwar PC release in October of last year, I did so while harboring a no small bit of disappointment that the Switch release was beyond my grasp. Fans waited eagerly month after month slipped away without the announcement of a Switch release date, like evenings spent by the fireside at the Harm’s Way Inn. The wait is finally over and, at last, Battle Chasers: Nightwar has arrived on the Switch… and it is glorious.

One of my biggest gripes about the original release was how much grinding was necessary, especially early on. I generally don’t mind grinding; I actually quite enjoy the occasional battle-binge in order to power up my crew, but I felt this game initially took it a bit too far. After defeating a dungeon, I’d head back to town to heal up, then, instead of heading to the next story point, I’d immediately head right back to that same dungeon and beat it again, maybe even twice more, just so I could be strong enough to survive wherever I was supposed to head next. Replaying dungeons may be an important and valuable part of the game, but I felt that the constant need to immediately backtrack disrupted the flow of the game and story.

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One of my biggest gripes about the original release was how much grinding was necessary, especially early on

That kills any interest I may have for the game. Necessary grind is the one thing that immediately kills a game for me.

I played this game several months ago, and I don't recall doing any extra grinding between missions/quests. You'll get enough bonus experience simply on re-killing all the enemies that rise back up, periodically. It also serves as a pretty effective way of healing your squad at times.

Originally Posted by Carnifex
… re-killing all the enemies that rise back up, periodically.

So, grinding.

Most of the creatures that re-appear are optional combatants, you can simply avoid them if you choose.

What’s the general consensus on this one? It looks interesting, is it worth giving a shot? Wait for sale?

I enjoyed it for the first few dungeons, then kinda bounced off it. Whilst it is true that the updates have rebalanced things and reduce the need to grind, the game design rewards re-running dungeons (if memory serves, beating a dungeon unlocks "legendary" difficulty for it which isn't that much harder, but gives substantially better [for the level] loot).

As such, if you're after the better loot, it is worth re-running the dungeon before you "outgrow" it.

This isn't actually as bad as it sounds. The dungeons are randomly (no, don't run away, it's actually OK!) constructed from a pool of scripted/hand-crafted event rooms. There are more of these than rooms in the dungeon, so you won't see everything a dungeon has to offer on your first pass.

This worked surprisingly well. The dungeon rooms/encounters/events still feel like they are properly scripted and designed, and if someone didn't tell you they were selected randomly, you probably wouldn't know, until you revisited. There's none of the "bland, random corridors" that you often get.

The turn based combat is pretty well done, with quite a lot of depth in the various battle mechanics, giving a variety of different ways to tackle things. That being said, many will gavitate to the "easy" option of "buff tank, taunt with tank, then dps", although that isn't always a guaranteed win. Some mobs hit hard, and you'll need to come up with tactics to beat them when you first encoutner them.

My only real complaint was that I'd have liked a bit more varied loot early on.

Very nice graphics solutions, but horribly botched trainwreck GUI and badly designed gameplay dynamics. Also putting all combatants in front of each other takes away the mighty fun of terrain-usage strategy. Blackguards 1-2 at least gave us some terrain features that we could have fun with. Not Battle Chasers, or should I say perdition-chasers?

It certainly wasn't a perfect game by any means, but I enjoyed the thirty or so hours that it kept me entertained, and I'm sure I'll revisit this game someday.

Thanks for the feedback everyone! I’ve added it to my wishlist and will probably pick it up at some point if it goes on sale. Sounds like something I might like but doesn’t seem like something I need to prioritize on my playlist.