Guildmaster: Gratuitous Subtitle

Game is not what I expected, but in a bad way. This RPG plays in "Missions" meaning you have a Guildmaster Hud you'd start at, select the Quest given to you (or whatever is available), then approach said mission. Somewhat X-com related, but there's no depth when selecting a specific Quest. You simply pick one and go about your business and move forward. Nothing story related is progressed and from what I can gather, there's only a total of 14 quests (with some repeating themselves). Making this a very short game. Even the Guildmaster Hud itself, there's nothing to maintain other than to purchase equipment which acts as very basic stats buffs more than actual stat modifiers. On that note, the gameplay is VERY basic. I was expecting some bootleg DnD ruleset. Instead, the game is played on a very elementary math. I did 2 damage, I healed for 4, something did minus 50%, that's basically it. There's almost no depth to be found in the combat here since everything here is so basic. It's not that it's barebones, it just felt like the devs were afraid of any type of equation that wasn't addition or subtraction and this is the end result. This effects the equipment as well, since the stats option are just as basic. What's also puzzling is the lack of hotkeys. There's none. You would have 3 abilities, and instead of having them listed to 1, 2, and 3 on your keyboard to select them, you would have to manually select said skill every time. Even skipping your turn has no hotkey. Why? Even when you've wasted all your actions, instead of the game just moving forward with the Enemy's turn, it tells you to manually click on End Turn.

A fun, accessible, and hilarious tactical combat game. I haven't had this much fun talking to NPCs since Earthbound. The action is very much like XCOM or Shining Force, and many of the same strategies from those games will help you succeed here, but that's nothing to complain about. An impressive gameplay balance has been struck here, and it's just a joy to play and even relax with after a hard day's work. You'll love the dialogue, I promise you.

Indie RPG with humor and fun. It gives you the classic RPG feel. If you like well-made games that are full of character and spilling with the creators love in every corner, then look no further. Here is the first 30 minutes of game play. https://youtu.be/c_xWGAIPuWQ [table] [tr] [th]If you enjoyed my review join our steam group. [url=https://steamcommunity.com/groups/MatureMindedGamers#curation][b][h1]Mature Minded Gamers [/h1] [/b][/url] [/th] [/tr] [/table]

Wow this is a great fun fantasy strategy game with a distinct, quirky, and super entertaining sense of humor. I'm a newbie to strategy games like this so I played on easy mode (there are three available difficulty settings which adjust enemy hit points) but I just beat the game and had fun from start to finish, and only wiped a few times. The strategy is interesting and fun to play and if it had been strictly a strategy game it would still be great but the developer hired a brilliant youtube comedian to write the dialogue and that humor shines bright and makes every intermission between levels a pleasure. The party progression is cool being based on a few statistics and the equipping of gear in your party and one of the coolest quality of life features is the awesome 'auto-equip' function which completely smooths over the process of inventory management while still allowing for customization and allows the main focus to remain on the combat and the entertaining dialogue. The quirky and hilarious dialogue is primarily presented in the form of conversations between the guildmaster and their guild between quests. After every quest you will see that some of your guild members have something to say and when you talk to them about the previous mission they have a hilarious conversation of some sort every time. The creativity of the humor and story doesn't wane as the game progresses the dialogue maintains solid high quality entertainment all the way through (even through the ending). I love how as I progress the guild is starting to fill out with people. I love seeing more and more people in my home base and it reminds me of the game Suikoden which I loved. The developer is a cool and approachable person and he is active on twitch (where he streams twice a week), youtube (where he has been making videos for about 10yrs), and twitter as @jimplaysgames and on his own website at jimmakesgames.com. One last nice touch that shows the attention to detail in this game: I love how even though the game is grid based, when one player is in a tight corridor and you want another player to get past them they kind of scoot around them like would happen in real life. The developer didn't have to do this and could have just made them overlap but that would have been clumsy but they went the extra mile to polish up little things like this. Thanks Jim!

+Fun combat mechanics +Good character stats/weapons/skills system +Addicting "just one more turn (quest)" +Funny dialogues +Athmospheric music

The whole game is about 10 hours of game play. I enjoyed every minute. I feel like games in this genre can get monotonous and ridiculously hard. This one was perfect. Also, I don't usually go for humor in my fantasy RPG's but this one was just genuinely funny. All that and a surprise ending that really surprised me. Really, It scores high marks from me in every category. 10 out of 10.

Very cool game. A relatively simple, but ultimately deep tactical RPG gameplay. The battles are really well balanced - they provide a challenge, but do not require you to try countless times or hope for luck. Some classes are definitely stronger than others, but not a single character is broken in any way. The length of the game is ok - not the longest, but thanks to that it doesn't overstay its welcome. A sequel with more gameplay systems to play with could be longer, but the ones that are in place allow the game to have the exact length that it has. The plot is ok - not serious at all, [spoiler] with one or two very cool plot twists and an EPIC ending [/spoiler]. Overall, this game deserves more attention, it is very well done, with original plot and gameplay systems. Two thumbs up.

Full disclosure: I've watched the dev on YT for years (though rarely of late) and give a couple bucks to his patreon monthly. Had some fun with this game. First off, a lot of indie games out there are going for procedural generation, endless play, and for me that's not really appealing. I don't have a lot of time to play games so I like to play a game, finish it, then move onto the next game. In that respect, Guildmaster fits the bill. This is a tactical strategy game. The mechanics have some meat to them. Characters have varying health, armor, evasion, energy, movement etcetera- and each weapon gives a different group of attacks which can have additional effects. Effect like damage over time, energy drain, stun, forced movement etcetera. You also have magical attacks, single target, AOE, or can give buffs or debuffs. Some characters also have a special ability that only they have. You buy and sell gear in the guild. You can't save in mission, there are checkpoints but they're lost if you close the program. But if you fail a mission, you can sell your unused gear for full price and outfit you heroes another way. Items only decrease in gold value when used in a successful mission. You also have leader-bought global spells and can get some general party buffs with enchantments. There are not a huge amount of missions. Didn't count them myself but I believe it's about 14 which I finished in about the same number of hours on hard difficulty. That doesn't sound like a lot, but for me it was fine. The missions don't have a lot of scripting or special events until near the end, but each mission does feature a new enemy type. Each hero also has post-mission dialogue that is unique to them and the mission. So it's a decent length game and there really isn't any padding. The dialogue and story is aimed at humour and a fair amount of the content is interacting with the characters and reading that dialogue. Similarly some re-playability would come from reading dialogue of other characters, though- tracking which ones you took to which missions would be hard in and of itself. It's a fairly significant part of the content so, if it has no interest for you- that's a good chunk of content you're going to miss. Overall I had fun, it was challenging at times but not too stressful. The graphics are of another time, but it's a very small dev team so- that's up to personal preference. The animation is fairly limited but there's a lot of it and each hero and enemy has their own artwork. I think for criticisms, I'd say the game could be more efficient with its content. I'd prefer to see more dialogue in mission, like character barks, and less outside of it. Instead of unique dialogue to each mission, each character could have a dialogue tree that unlocks over time- so less conversations, but experiencing a greater percentage of the content. The combat could be pushed a bit more, would have liked to see more support enemies (like ones that grant buffs), more special abilities, or enemies that required more specific approach. Also the game could use a little padding I think just to extend it a bit, not every mission needs a new enemy, but would also like to see a bit more scripting or special events in mission. AND would have also liked to have use more items, I found there were so many weapons I never bought because there's only four heroes and often I'm selling old gear to get new stuff so sometimes I would skip over entire tiers of weapons. Overall, it's a bit of fun. Good length. And also a decent foundation if the dev wants to add more content or build off the framework down the road.

A nice turn-based tactical strategy with a decent variety of quest locations: it's all about dungeons :)

Decent, starts off as fun, becomes almost impossible later on...or is impossible. Ahh another game that could do with a 'MAYBE' recommendation. I did laugh at some of the conversations. Quite witty. Overall its Cute, Fun, bit of strategy involved...maybe a bit too simplistic, but on medium, much too hard in the later levels. I'm at the Goblin/Elemental Mission. 8 or 9 I think it is. With 14+ enemies all attacking you at the end, its hopeless. I thought I was careful and bought the right weapons with your tiny allowance but they make little difference with so many enemies. Perhaps I have my Mage/healer chosen wrong and should have had a separate mage and healer for that mission. The team was Elven Bow, Crossbow/Blunt guy and Swordmaster/Alchemist. If I cant complete this level with the wrong team, and have no idea who the right team would be, then this is infuriating. Games should not be impossible, simple as that. OK PEEPS, Editting my review now. Decided to give it another go, was it really that difficult or did I need to work on strategy? Nope, after the latest mission intro, IM onto destroying 2 red Stones in a forest. blah blah '37', few more lines of dialogue and then when its supposed to start and I begin, nothing. Cant move, cant get the option to attack. NOthing. I can use the mouse to click on things but I cant actually move or right. Cheap game that doesnt work.