Gales of Nayeli

The gameplay is awesome, there is a wide variety of characters with different abilities and skills that makes each of them feel unique, and the game doesn't shy away from having options that are usually not seen in this kind of game (a chicken! a naga! harpies!). While I'm only about a third through the main campaign, I can't wait to see what the class promotions of the units I've settled on as my "main" team will be like. As of now, the story feels a little flat, but I'm not too fussed about it, as the focus for me is in the gameplay. Sure, I would have liked a little more exposition and worldbuilding outside of character-to-character conversations, but the storytelling works well enough for what it is. I may be impressed later by what direction the story takes. I think adding a world map with a bit of narration as cutscenes would have done a lot of good in that aspect, as it would help the player understand where they are and where they're going, and feeling more present in that world. I will say the game lacks a little polish, and I believe part of it comes from the engine the game uses and its limitations. For example, controller support is a bit middling, and it doesn't support higher resolutions too well. Despite this, I think it's a worthwhile tradeoff so the game could see the light of day, and I would encourage you to check it out if you like fire-emblem-like strategy RPGs.

As one or two others have noted, this game lacks any resolution options and has an extremely buggy fullscreen mode, making it impossible to play while doing anything (even letting a video play) on my other monitor. Ultimately not worth it to have to fight!

Good: * Decent story (I'm about halfway) * Good Fire Emblem Like game * Good additions to the formula (grindstones, held items, combat arts) * Veteran is a decent difficulty level, but since I'm only doing 1 playthrough decided for normal Bad: * Some control issues: PS4 controller not working with Steam Input and wonky mouse movement on full screen * No scaleable resolution * Some crashes * Some details are hard to get good information on

I was an early backer for Gales of Nayeli and I am highly pleased with my choice. As a Fire Emblem fan this game hit all the boxes I wanted, interesting and unique characters, strategic and tactical choices, classic gameplay with refined twists, and a bit of matchmaking. Gales of Nayeli has plenty of gameplay options and choices for replayability but even a single playthrough is satisfying enough to warrant a purchase. The game is a little constrained by its engine in terms of performance but it is largely ignorable when any issues do occur. I highly recommend this game for anyone who enjoys the type of gameplay Fire Emblem offers and is looking for a new experience.

Fullscreen not working properly. Since I do not want to play while squinting, refunded until his is fixed. Too bad, seems promising.

[h1] This has good bones but needs some work to stand out. [/h1] The core is obviously [b] heavily [/b] inspired by Fire Emblem and I can see the direction they are/were going or striving for, The characters are [i] mostly [/i] memorable designs and the art is passable. Gameplay is okay for what it is, and replayability hinges heavily on the customizable main character and relationship growth. Would be nice if it was Fire Emblem: Awakening levels of depth, but it is probably too late to implement anything to that degree what with the next game on the horizon. That's okay though and is definitely not a deal-breaker. Where could they improve? Simple and definitely doable! Definitely don't need to make the Esc button run you straight to exiting the game, rather opening the menu. Unless I missed the memo and this is supposed to be a game with something to hide should someone walk in on you playing. The color palette needs to be fixed. It is far too dull and boring. Vibrancy needs to be implemented to the battle maps and colors need to pop. When you have a map like this, it needs to be pleasant to look at since 95% of your gameplay is on the battle map. You are far too zoomed out. The game would be better played with a closer camera and the physical need to pan across larger maps. It adds to the dull color palette of having to look at a bunch of assets that aren't particularly appealing. The custom character. The custom character looks terrible in most cases. Having a balaclava-wearing character with ill-suited sunglasses was a bad decision. It would be better to give us some element of a character under the mask. Eyes with a changeable eye color and skin color for the nose bridge and exposed skin, or have a few selections of character for talking scenes where the face covering would be lifted. Optional: I think having the ability to toggle weapon durability should exist. Sometimes that is a level of maintenance a certain playerbase would prefer not to have. You could fix this with a filthy rich mode. At the end of the day, I am not sure if the development has stopped on this game, but I genuinely think these changes would elevate it to another level. And it seems the level of artistic talent in the game is better than expressed on the cover art. It could stand for a facelift. I recommend it on sale as-is.

Really solid SRPG. Difficulty felt about right (I played on Veteran) and maps were well designed outside of some minor issues with reinforcements being a bit too frequent on some of them. Characters feel distinct mechanically and interesting from a design and writing standpoint. Lots of weird synergies between units and weapons if you're the kind of person who likes looking for those, as well as plenty of straightforward units if you aren't. Most of my major issues with it feel like they are were SRPG Studio problems (Stuff like controller support and fullscreen being a bit janky and a few weird UI bugs) and many of the remaining problems I had were actually fixed in a patch that came out in the middle of my playthrough. If you like Fire Emblem this game will be well worth picking up. Highly recomend it.

Fun game so far, control scheme is very poor though.