Backpack Hero

dead game

Overall a solid 8.75/10 or 9/10 game. The good parts of this game consistently end up being pretty great with there only being a few bad parts that REALLY drag down the game [mostly in story mode though, quick run pretty much invalidates all of the problems that came up for me bar one character out of the playable options feeling really bad to play]. I recommend this game to anybody who just wants a nice, casual roguelite where you can min-max at your own pace. Additionally; This game often goes on sale for around 50% off pretty often, so if the price scares you off you can wait for that.

[h1]Griddy[/h1] TL;DR: A fun turn-based RPG roguelite with a lot of cool ideas, some half-baked implementation, and a slew of annoying-but-minor bugs.[hr][/hr] I received a free copy of this game from a friend who got an extra as a Kickstarter perk. Are you one of those weirdos that actually derives pleasure from the age-old game mechanic of shifting a million items around a grid-based inventory trying to find the perfect way to fit everything in an orderly fashion? [i]Backpack Hero[/i] takes that to the next level, with inventory management forming the framework for all of this turn-based RPG roguelite’s mechanics. It’s a pretty brilliant concept, and is well-thought-out here with a lot of different builds and playstyles to tinker with. I had a great time with the game for around sixty hours, but there are a few frustrating design choices, undercooked systems, and unresolved bugs that mar the experience. Purse, our aspiring hero, is set on exploring the dungeons under the ruins of her town in search of her lost mother. As far as plot, that’s pretty much all there is to it. Emboldened by the magical backpack she’s found she sets off, and though her father begs her to stay above ground, he understands that, like her mother, she’s too intrepid to be stopped. Her forays into the vast system of caverns are the focus of gameplay, and in typical roguelike fashion, the dungeons are procedurally-generated. The game presents each floor as a hand-drawn map complete with doodles in the margins. While you will eventually explore a number of different underground biomes full of randomized battles and events, there’s not much to distinguish them visually; the presentation is simple and most floors feel disappointingly same-y. Backpack Hero relies on its unique combat and character-building systems to save the day, and while your mileage may vary, I found it engaging enough not to be bothered by the monotony of the dungeons. When you start a run, you’ll be given a standard set of starting gear (with minor variations if you’re on a specific quest), usually a weapon, shield, and a consumable. You’ll arrange these into your backpack, which starts as only a 3-by-3 grid. You’ll find more gear in chests and after battles, and have to make careful decisions about which items to keep and how to expand your bag as you level up. Gear comes in a variety of types: armor provides passive bonuses, weapons let you use energy to damage opponents, while shields trade energy for block value, etc. Where it gets interesting is in how items interact based on their placement within your inventory. Helmets provide more armor for every row below them, bows fire all arrows in front of them when used, and the arrows do damage based on the number of empty spaces in front of them. They’ve done a good job giving the player a lot of different systems to work with, and later on you can unlock other characters with completely different mechanics, which helps keep things fresh over the many runs you’ll be making to progress the story. The combat is varied and satisfying, and while finding fun, broken builds is part of the appeal in a roguelike, I did have a few minor gripes. Status effects felt too overpowered, and overall the difficulty was a little on the easy side. Between dungeon-diving missions Purse and her friends will haul their acquired loot back to town. Most of the equipment you bring back will be sold for resources used to rebuild the town, with new buildings providing quests that require specific equipment to be brought back for turn-in. This is the primary method of unlocking new items (which will then appear randomly in future runs), but also provides gentle encouragement to try new builds. It’s a fun idea, but the quests are all concentrated in just a few buildings, and the town-building winds up feeling shallow. You’ll be swimming in resources with no further use by about the midpoint of the game, and it feels as though the developers didn’t fully commit to making its enclosure worthwhile, which is a shame since the feeling of rebuilding a broken world can be very satisfying when executed well. There are also still a lot of annoying bugs for a game that has been out as long as this one, which makes me suspect the devs have moved on. Some of them will cause you to lose a little progress on the current run, but most involve problems with items being hidden by UI elements or pop-up info boxes for unrelated items getting stuck open. They didn’t ruin the game, but they felt like minor things that should have been fixed by now. In the end, Backpack Hero is a fairly niche title, but one with a lot of fun to offer if you happen to enjoy the core idea. The combat is inventive and weaves in inventory manipulation in a lot of creative ways. I didn’t enjoy all of the different characters’ mechanics, but I appreciate the variety and imagination on display, and though I would’ve appreciated a more refined graphical style, the sprites get the job done in a cutesy way. Pick it up on sale if you're on the fence, but it is worth experiencing.

The actual game of doing the backpack management stuff isn't bad, I dare say that I even had fun with it to an extent, the problem is that is only half the game. The other half of the game is some super tedious town mobile game non-sense that feels like an entirely different game / genre than the backpack one It sucks the fun out of the game when I'm forced to do the town stuff just to actually do the dungeons. I wanted to like this game but I can't recommend it as it's two vastly different genre of games mashed together and they don't work together

I feel like it is kinda hard to progress in the story mode, which if the game is not showing me making progress = me sad

I enjoyed the general premise of the combat - managing inventory for optimal damage - but I eventually stopped for a couple of reasons. For one, progression is so slow. I played for almost 14 hours, only unlocked one additional character, and the two that I had didn't seem to have much variety in their own builds, so I felt like I was doing the same thing every run. On top of that, the town management system wasn't doing it for me. Getting back from a run and just not being able to do anything meaningful because I didn't accumulate enough resources didn't help with the "doing the same thing every run" feeling. It's a really neat concept, but unfortunately based on other reviews it seems like the game has been abandoned, Can't really recommend it at that point.

Schönes Spiel für zwischendurch, man packt seinen Rucksack und kombiniert Gegenstände in unterschiedlichen Schwierigkeitsstufen. Der Story-Mode vervollständigt das Ganze. Nun haben die Runden, die man durch Dungeons dreht auch einen Langzeit-Faktor. Man kann Gegenstände aus dem Dungeon mitnehmen und baut außerhalb die kleine Stadt Havermill wieder auf, die zerstört wurde. Hierbei erhält man Quests die teilweise sehr interessante und lustige Builds fordern. Nach und nach wächst die Stadt und die Bewohner nehmen einen beim Wiederaufbau an die Hand. Die kleinen Geschichten der Einwohner sind simpel aber nicht nervig lang, im Gegenteil, es macht sogar Spaß mit den kleinen putzigen Figürchen zu plaudern. Die 20 Euro ist es vielleicht nicht wert, außer man mag die Entwickler unterstützen, im Sale für 10 aber stimmen Preis/Leistung sehr wohl überein :)

日を開けつつぼちぼちやりながら、最近クリアしました。ストーリーモードをやりきるまでであればゲームバランスは甘めながらも楽しく遊べました。 トップレビューではテキスト化けやバグが指摘されていましたが、それらのレビュー投稿後にもバグ修正が何度か来ており概ね無くなっている印象。深刻なバグにはプレイ中遭遇しませんでした（ただ日本語訳は相変わらす粗い）。 インベントリ管理とアイテムのシナジーを考えながら遊ぶ部分は唯一無二なので、デッキ構築ローグライク好きは一度遊んでみて欲しいです。