Telepath Tactics

Telepath Tactics has a lot more to fofer than a first glance suggests. If you have played Fire Emblem, you can consider this a PC tribute to the series that is well executed and has extra features too. If you haven't played Fire Emblem, here are the basic selling points: - It is a turn based strategy RPG - Combat is tricky. You will need to think out your moves. If you are too reckless, you'll lose characters and suffer later on. - Your warband evolves with you throughout the game, from battle to battle. Each unit has their own abilities and they will level up through combat to grow stronger, earn new abilities and spells, and eventually evolve into elite units. However, if they die... they're gone for good, which can lead to tricky decision making. (You can play on casual mode to disable permadeath) - Each battle will have several things drawing you off to explore - distant treasure chests, neutral units to talk to and recruit, potential allies to save, items to loot etc. - You can interact with the environment. Characters can smash down doors, or learn abilities to lay traps, push, pull enemies etc. - There is an ongoing storyline between battles and your actions in battle can influence future events (like whether or not you saved a character will affect whether they join you after the battle, and they may be able to have special interactions later). ONE BIG POINT: The graphics interface looks quite quaint and basic, but don't let this turn you off. There is fun to be had and more functionality than it suggests. Have fun!

I want to love this game so badly. Just because I love the genre and there are so few games that do it well. The short answer of why I can't recommend this game is that it is simply a case of a single developer trying to accomplish what desperately needed to be done by at least a small team. The writing is decent; there's at least an attempt at making each character unique and interesting, although some characters' personalities essentially rely on one-sided quirks like, "This character likes puns!!" There's also some inconsistency in the feel of the dialogue; some characters seem to speak in a high fantasy poetic prose, while others speak like teenagers talking about Vine videos. And the sequences of lizard people speaking gibberish is more annoying than engrossing. However, overall 10/10 for including tons of female characters and several PoC and not making a big deal out of it, and props for putting a multiracial lesbian relationship front and center. (I didn't finish the game; I don't know where it goes past its formation.) The battles are decent, but I wasn't blown away by them. It's partly the fault of the poor visuals, but the battlefields simply don't look interesting and do not include enough tactically relevent terrain. The destructible environments felt like a gimmick and didn't seem to really spice up the gameplay at all. They are surprisingly challenging, which is good, except that you can't save mid-battle and sometimes it makes you do two battles in a row so you have to play for one very long sitting and that gets irritating. The music is actually surprisingly really, really good. I know the developer had some help with the aesthetics and I don't know how much or from whom, but I have zero complaints about the music. The visuals are... Quite honestly, in my opinion, almost unforgivably bad. There's a difference between retro and sloppy. The character profiles are lifeless and flat. The in-battle character sprites are meh. The terrain looks awful. And the UI is so irritating that it is actually what finally made me rage-quit. All the weird windows that show up in the wrong places and the lack of keyboard shortcuts and the glitchiness and lack of user-friendly, intuitive controls... You have to be very patient to get past all that. Overall, I'm very happy that this game exists, but I do not enjoy playing it. This type of game is simply too big a project requiring too many skills for one developer to pull off.

This game has neat ideas but isn't executed well. For starters, every sprite looks the same (this makes it hard to talk and befriend a former enemy because they look the same as all the other archers/fighters/etc unless you right click on everyone to see their name/stats) which leads to confusion, the game gets incredibly slow at times...I'm talking you see every single frame--It's not object limit--it's probably memory leaks or something because the more enemies I took out the slower the game became. The explanations of the skills in the game are kind of poor, it would be nice if it would tell you if you still get an extra turn or not afterwards (pushing/pulling takes a full turn but casting 'sprint' or building barracks doesn't). As far as I could tell, it doesn't show what the attack range is for enemies just where they can move. The "instant" setting for enemies moving isn't really instant, it's just a faster version of them moving. If you surrender you have to read the dialogue all over again (a retry would probably be better where you just start with where you position your units). I think if a lot of these problems were cleared it would be worth playing (the memory leak slows especially), but I can't recommend this to anyone who likes these types of games.

Little biased as I'm a Kickstarter backer, but very happy with the game. It's very similar to Fire Emblem (and Final Fantasy Tactics, Advance Wars, etc). You move your squad through the map, defeating enemies along the way and reaching the objective. Units die very easily, even your tanky ones, so it's important to use skills and the terrain strategically to avoid getting hit while killing enemy units. Most of the difficulty comes from the fact that units die forever if they are killed in battle, though you can play on easy mode without permadeath. Telepath Tactics takes advantages of a lot of the small but interesting mechanics in Fire Emblem and expands on some of them, for example: being able to talk to enemies and neutral characters to convert them to your side during battle and destroying/pushing/pulling environmental objects strategically. It also adds a lot of different skills and abilities - magic users have a variety of spells and healing while regular units can have skills such as sprint or motivate. There are also some interesting items (so far I bought the grappling hook, which lets you pull enemies towards you). Overall it feels like a game made with a lot of love and a lot of different things to explore. Obviously the main issue is the graphics, as especially the UI looks pretty ugly. To be honest the in-game maps aren't that bad and the portraits grow on you after a while.

Great game from a series that has come a LONG way. I remember playing Telepath RPG via the Armor Games site years ago, and even then I really liked the originality of the setting and the tactical feel of the combat. Fast forward to this game, and I am really impressed with what the author has done. This game feels very polished and fluid. The world is well-concieved and enjoyable to be a part of. The portraits/graphics are great (for a lower budget indie game), the music is also stellar as well, but what really stands out is the strategy and tactics! It also reminds me a lot of Battle for Wesnoth more so than SSB, but to each their own.

Definitely worth the price for any turn-based over a grid fantasy RPGs lover - where tactics really matters to win the battles. A lot of classes, environment intereactions, very nice mechanics, and an OK story. It's definitely a great tribute to FFT/Vandal Hearts/Tactics Ogre, considering the whole game has been written from a solo developper. Buy it and support the game..so we may get new campaigns ;)

Anyone who knows me will know that RPGs and turn-based strategy are what I like the most and that I primarily go for stuff that is stongly story driven. This game handles both elements very well and it's a testament to its strategic depth that, for once, I can honestly say that the combat is more engrossing than the plot (even though said plot is humorous and well written). I was very sceptical at first due to the recent FLOOD of indie rubbish and that the screenshots don't exactly make you want to rush to buy. Don't be put off by the graphics, the gameplay is SO good that it renders them irrelevant. If you only buy one indie game this year then I would strongly suggest it be this one. *edit* It can be unforgiving too. Only skip it if a strong cerebral challenge is not for you.

I have fond memories of games like Fire Emblem, Ogre Battle, Shining Force, Final Fantasy Tactics. What I loved about those games is that you had to play smart. Telepath Tactics captures that in oodles. This isn't a game you can run into willy-nilly and win. You must carefully command your troops across the battlefield. Using their unique abilites, strengths, weaknesses. All the while countering the enemies movements. With plenty of classes, abilities, and environmental hazards. Telepath Tactics brings plenty to the table. The combat itself is based on positioning and stat based damage. Keenly placing units to flank enemies and do devastating damage is required to win this game. Sadly Telepath Tactics is a very unappealing looking game. The terrain is flat and lifeless, the pixel characters lack personality. The combat animations are underwhelming. The only good thing about the art style are the Fire Emblem-esque avatars. While this isn't necessarily anything to break the game. The battles can take anywhere from 30 to 60 minutes. It would've been nice to have had something pleasant to look at. Also a save and quit feature would've been great too. The game for the most part is designed well. With minor bugs that don't really affect gameplay all too much. With the map editor you've got plenty of replay value. If you find yourself really enjoying the game and want to get more out of it. In all the game is a great homage to TRPG's and Fire Emblem. If you don't mind the graphics and are looking for a deep strategy game. Telepath Tactics is a good choice. I made a video review to show off some of the features and gameplay of this game! https://youtu.be/oocjjnxMdRQ I hope you enjoy! Martyr

Game engine is still broken and dev appears to have given up on it. Avoid.

Can't really reccomend. I'm a big fan of Final Fantasy Tactics, as well as XCom (old and new), but this just didn't click for me. 486-style graphics are an interesting choice, the use of terrain is promising, and the story was actually somewhat competently told. However, with no opportunities to level up betwen missions, it really punishes the slightest imperfection in the first few moments. Just really not doing it for me, which is a pity.