
Highlands is a hand-drawn turn-based strategy game with unique characters, resource management and RPG elements where the focus is directed toward decision-making.
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All-time low is the lowest price we've recorded for this game since we started tracking it.
Languages: English**languages with full audio support
Engagement
Reviews
Themes across 50 recent reviews and how positive each mention is. A keyword signal, not full sentiment analysis.
Reviews
This is a hidden gem in Steam's library. Highlands is a turn based strategy game of resource management. Each turn you allocate your forces around a node-based map, setting them to various tasks and utilizing various special abilities. When you're satisfied, you execute, time rolls forward, and you see the results of your actions. These results are often very predictable, if you're doing things right. Your enemy isn't chance, its your own planning skills. If you fail its probably no one's fault but your own. At standard difficulty I've found it challenging enough that, were I to make an actual, serious mistake, I would probably lose. But the game is comprehensible enough that I've been able to reason my way through logically. This isn't XCOM where no matter what you do, sometimes you fail a 99% chance. This is more like a logic puzzle, where, if you fail, its on the merits. If I had to criticize, I suppose I would note that there is a bit of a mismatch in art direction. The characters in game are very happy and cartoonish- plucky lady engineers, gentle and wise academics, can-do soldiers with a positive attitude- but the story and between level artwork is often grim. I won't spoil any of the story, but it really can be a jolting difference if you're reading along. That said, I didn't find that it ruined the experience in any way, and at $5 this is really worth it if you've got any sort of interest in strict but fair strategy games.
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Concurrent players on Steam, sampled daily since tracking started.
Hours played at review time, across 50 reviews with recorded playtime.
positive critical· bar length = how often the theme comes up
My review is negative not because the game is bad, rather because it wasn't good enough to actively recommend. To get a few things out of the way: Higlands is a boardgame, with a story-presentation of a visual novel, and RPG depth of a puddle. It is boardgame because there is no AI to play against - every enemy behaviour is strictly scripted, they always try to attack your neighbouring region, and warlords move towards you. That's all. The story is told through kind of cutscenes - the art is vibrant and nice, but absolutely static at the same time, the characters barely have any personality (basically their highest stat is their personality - the builder boy, the healer mom, the leader-fighter daughter) and the story is the thousand-year old cliché of "kingdom taken, take it back". The "RPG " element is that you can equip two stat-boosting item on every character, and you sometimes get a pop-up event where your decision can mean that you gain/or some resource, item or stat. This is not an RPG by any stretch of imagination. The gameplay itself is 95% over a "board" of a map, each being a mission; about taking over regions, and deal with the threat of stationary enemies and an ocassional warband, every unit indicated with a round token (see why I called it a boardgame?) The gameplay is just... boring, in a tedious sense. You can get some strategy out of building walls vs manning the region with muscles, but many important, secondary ability uses resources - resources that are "farmed" from activated regions. But you can not change neither the type, nor the amount of it - +2 food is +2 food forever. And this really sucks to be honest. The game is extremely similar IMO to Rebuild 3 with it's "everyone counts" personality characters, events, items, regions, but even that game has researchable bonuses both active and passive, defensive and offensive. Being able to transform regions/tiles/districts by engineer characters would be such an additional depth to strategy. In Highlands you just wait - and the lack of options still have to have mean the game is just slower than it should be. Like in the 3rd(?) chapter enemies always spawn at your home base, meaning every 4th or so turn you have to back and fight, losing some hp, healing it back, then go on conquering, then back, then heal, then... it's not a challenge, just an annoying pattern. And then as an extra, the UI fights against the player. You don't have a list where it's easy to see who has what item equipped (every item has a circular-token form, why not just show them at their name?), you have to cycle through your 10-15-20 character rooster. You can not set repeat at workshops. When too many characters are on a tile their avatars became smaller, then growing when pointing at them, making it even harder to accurately pick one out (most of the fonts are horribly small even in 1366*768) - the characters have no logical order. Action buttons only appear if ALL selected units have that ability, so if you conquer a region you need to pick your 3-4 leaders to rally, 2-3 builders to fortify, healer to heal, instead of just using a generic "all leaders rally, all builders build" or so button prompt. Also no way of grouping units that won't mix up as soon as anyone else is on the same tile. This is also confusing as heck, as the game was made for computers with actual keyboard, not for touchscreens - no reason not to have more keyboard options. Or even a button on screen, ffs. I'm pretty sure I could list a few more illogical or unfun things, but I wrote enough. The game is not bad, and you may enjoy it a lot more than I was, but I can't help it. It's a beautiful thing that has little - not enough - from various genres, and at the same time it's stuck on so, so many UI/UX issues. If there is a Highlands 2 in the works I'll keep an eye out, by getting over these problems it could be an excellent game.
Dont like strat games where you have key characters that cant die else you lose.
The setting and style are fine. The story is not bad, but nothing special. The mechanics is all right, but shallow - there’s not much to explore in terms of developing your characters or your districts. It’s not a bad game, but it has little new to offer and it gets repeptitive too quickly. It reminds me of Rebuild: Gangs of Deadsville, with somewhat more stylish graphics and story.
The Lore, graphics etc are nice, but the combat and strategy is just too simplified. It's ok, but I wouldn't recommend you use your time on it.
7.5/10 99 บาท ไม่ใช่ราคาที่แพงเลย สำหรับ Highlands (เข้าใจว่าตอนเราซื้อน่าจะแพงกว่า...) เป็นเกมแนว turn base แบบที่ minimal หน่อยๆ และมีการใช้ rng (ระบบทอยลูกเต๋า) มาเป็นกิมมิคอยู่บ้าง แต่ไม่ถึงขนาดน่ารำคาญ หรือเป็น rng ขนาดที่ลบล้างความเป็นเกมวางแผนไปจนหมดเหมือนกับบางเกมที่เลือกจะเน้นโชคซะจนไม่เหลือความเป็นเกมวางแผน + ค่อนข้างชอบความเป็น minimal เรียนรู้ง่าย ระบบไม่ยุ่งยาก + กราฟฟิค/ลายเส้นเกมสวย + ผลาญเวลาได้อยู่ เล่นได้ยาวๆ one more turn แบบ CIV เลย + การเก็บแอคชีฟเม้นท์ เป็นความยากที่ท้าทาย ไม่ยากไป ไม่ง่ายไป + บทพูดตัวละครโอเค - พล็อตเกม/ตัวละครไม่มีอะไรน่าจดจำมาก (เนื้อเรื่องสั้น) - Replay value ถ้าไม่นับเก็บ แอคชีพเม้นท์ก็..เป็น 0 เล่นจบแล้วจบกัน ไม่อยากเล่นซ้ำเหมือนบางเกม เนื่องด้วยความที่มันเป็น minimal ไม่ได้มีกิมมิคอะไรให้เรียนรู้เยอะแยะหรือพลิกแพลงวิธีเล่นได้ เนื้อเรื่องก็ไม่ได้มีอะไรให้ค้นหาต้องกลับไปเล่นเก็บรายละเอียด สรุป 99 บาท สำหรับเรากับเกมแบบนี้ เราเต็มใจจ่าย
Super Strategiespiel mit einem relaxten rundenbasiertem Gameplay und schöner Grafik. Immer wieder gerne und absolut empfehlenswert, vor allem für den geringen Preis von 5,-€. (8/10)
I have beaten this game 2 times - on Casual (1) and Brutal (4) difficulties. During Casual run i was learning the mechanics, did all possible achievements and enjoyed the plot, art and music in general, during Brutal - checked what kind of a challenge this game has to offer. Both run were pretty fast and enjoyable, game really shines on max difficulty - you actually have to use all available tactics, skills, craft not only permanent items but consumables as well. Have to say devs nailed the game design in a way, that no classes, no items feels useless, bot early and late game balanced well, transition between them on every map is very satisfying. Regarding crashes - experienced only 1 during 17+ hours of gameplay, i don't think that you should be worried about that at all. To cut a long story short - i would definetely recommend this game to playes who like RISK-like tactics and for TBS fans in general.
There is no reason this simple of a game should be this much fun and very challenging. I have gone back to this game a few times. I hope the developer makes more. The visuals are appealing, the game is relaxing, but the difficultly comes in the late game. You will think you can master it in the beginning but you will be surprised. Enjoy.
O jogo se assemelha muito a um jogo de tabuleiro (embora eu não saiba se existe uma versão não online dele) - A lógica do jogo é simples, digamos que em cerca de 2 a 3 horas vocês já sabe exatamente as regras, que se baseiam bem mais na estratégia do que na sorte (embora exista o elemento sorte no rolar dos dados nas batalhas) A princípio poderia parecer com outros jogos "tabletop" estilo D&D ou talvez uma mistura dele com War (Risk) mas na prática é muito, mas muito mais do que isso. Ao invés de ser centrado apenas na guerra, em linhas gerais há 4 funções que cada personagem seu pode assumir (a maior parte deles assume 2 delas, mas alguns recrutados em meio jogo podem ter uma só) - A funções são Poder (Luta) / liderança (serve para transformar os territórios conquistados em realmente "seus" após gastar pontos suficientes de liderança, e somente então usar os seus bonus de produção / Criação (para criar itens que realmente podem fazer toda a diferença no jogo - criar é praticamente a única forma de se conseguir itens, embora as vezes na conquista você consiga um ou outro) e por fim Conhecimento Acadêmico (em especial usado para curar unidades baseado na sua quantidade de comida, embora outras funções podem ser desbloqueaas com o tempo) Até então pode parecer algo complicado (não é) ou talvez simples de mais (também não é) O que torna esse jogo único e incrível ao meu ver são os CENARIOS - eles foram criados com um cuidado incrível para você se sentir dentro da história. Por exemplo, você tem um grupo de 8 artesãos isolados em um canto e eles praticamente não sabem lutar, mas podem ficar sempre reconstruindo barreiras que por sua vez estão sendo atacadas pelo inimigo. E você precisa revesar a função deles de "criação" se reparo da barreira e para produção quando perceber que é possível, para ganhar o máximo de tempo e apoio para a sua tropa principal que está vindo lá do outro lado do tabuleiro para conseguir resgatar esses artesãos. E o jogo é feito para você conseguir vencer a missões no limite (sem precisar refazer muitas vezes caso cometa erros, mas sem dar a noção de você ficar "poderoso de mais" em algum momento. O equilíbrio dos números e a lógica na qual você sente na pele o drama pessoal de seus personagens é incrível. O som é agradável e o gráfico também (gráfico não animado, como se fosse um jogo de tabuleiro) Existe uma história de fundo para a campanha que pode ser bem envolvente até (especialmente depois que ocorre a primeira morte planejada, que não falarei qual é claro, mas você se sente bem em uma cena de Game of Thrones (PS, ela não ocorre de forma automática, assim como nada nesse jogo ocorre de forma automática, mas você é forçado a ir caminhando por decisões que no final você mesmo percebe que certos sacrifícios são necessários) O fato de todo personagem evoluir de nível faz com que mesmo os recrutados aleatórios que você pegue comecem a ter um valor muito sentimental para você uma vez que pegar alguém recém recurtado muitos níveis abaixo pode ser incrivelmente dolorido, além de perder os itens criados para ele com tanto esforço. Ao meu ver, em uma segunda versão do jogo o que poderia ser melhorado é uma narração mais adequada da história com um pouco mais de emoção, foco em personagens, e não somente textos para serem lidos com uma imagem de fundo .... mas mesmo quem não ler muito da história ainda poderá gostar muito do jogo ... é que a história realmente é bem criada o suficiente para valha a pena fazer as pessoas lerem .... por isso deixo a dica em uma segunda versão do jogo e não uma necesidade para se adaptar neste aqui. PS - Apesar de não ser "rogue like" (o que ao meu ver é excelente uma vez que o cuidado de cada parte do tabuleiro é muito bem pensada) ele tem até que boa rejogabilidade, pois a mudança de dificuldade (que não faz nada a não ser mudar a frequencia com a qual os inimigos recebem reforços) podem fazer o jogo tomar ares completamente inesperados na primeira vez que foi jogado. Vale a pena
Momentum
Pace estimated from the game's recent review growth (our daily snapshots) at its own sales-per-review ratio — a momentum signal, not booked sales.
Audience
Estimated from the language of this game's reviews — a proxy for where players are, not official Steam demographics.
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