XCOM with a few Ballista, a Bec de Corbi, and a few minor glitches.
Crown Wars: The Black Prince
Platform:Â PC, also on PlayStation, Xbox
Developer:Â Artefacts Studio
Publisher:Â NACON
Release date:Â May 23rd, 2024
Availability:Â Digital
Price: $39.99 via Steam
Crown Wars: The Black Prince, the most recent project from Artefacts Studio (The Dungeon of Naheulbeuk, Space Hulk Tactics), will elicit two main responses. You should probably wait till there is a significant discount or bundling if you don’t enjoy complex games that fall short of their goals and have a small number of minor annoyances.
However, if you’re the kind of player who can put up with some shoddy voice acting and overlook a few rough edges, then this amazing rendition of the Hundred Years Wars might be worth a try. It’s true that there are several rather major bugs in the current build, and your archers’ performance can vary greatly. However, enthusiasts of strategy could discover one advantage for each mistake.
Not One of Crown Wars’ Strong Points is Story
Of course, any fan of XCOM will recognize the combination of base development, unit management, and grid-based fighting. However, setting the action in the Middle Ages adds a good bit of variety, with your armored dualists able to shield-flip opponents and beastmasters able to stun opponents by calling out a murder of crows. Everything about it is deliciously pulpy, with a revisionist 14th century that omits all the uninteresting factual elements.
As intriguing as that idea is, the plot is a little unclear. A crew working on a covert project that’s even more significant than the never-ending conflict between France and England is depicted in the opening cinematic. You take on the role of the powerful lord’s heir, inheriting a crumbling castle. You will reconstruct the fortress during the campaign of the game and use it as your headquarters in the fight against an impending dark power. Yet, the dialogue’s frequent flirtations with m’lady-style humor and the events’ inability to consistently give expositional progression made it difficult for me to take the plot seriously. Crown Wars far too frequently had the feel of a TV show with a lot of filler episodes.
No Textbook for Future Kings or Queens
Although the game’s story offers macro-level guidance in the first part, you’ll need to pick up a lot of the fundamentals on your own. However, when it comes to fighting and base development, experience with XCOM-style overwatch orders and increasing the effectiveness of area-of-effect hits would definitely be important. Once you choose an ancestral affiliation that grants access to specific technologies and stat bonuses, you’ll be strategizing your resource acquisitions and getting ready for a series of scraps.
The majority of Crown Wars’ gameplay will presumably be devoted to taking on a fair assortment of enemies on the expansive and diverse battlefields. Every character has the chance to move during each turn-based encounter and can launch two attacks at once. Because Crown Wars forgoes standard strikes in favor of a specials inventory, every unit in the game’s six classes seems suitably strong.
Mode of Beasts
It’s always fun to ravage arenas with everything from guns and explosives to melee weapons, and brutal finishers are often thrown in. The greatest thing about Artefects Studio is how much player autonomy it offers. Choose from groups of hard-hitting tanks and rear-guard archers, ninja-style soldiers who lay caltrops and stealthily pursue opponents, or alchemists that slowly wear out rivals with their acid bombs. Given that they provide a strong extra unit that cannot be destroyed, it is possible to argue that the beastmasters should use some nerfing. And Artefacts, could you investigate the reason why archers keep missing their shots when they are concealed by cover?
There’s also something delightfully diabolical about capturing foes and holding them for ransom back at your castle, even though the majority of mission types naturally center around eliminating opponents or reaching the opposite side of a map. The Black Prince’s schedule is significantly more flexible than XCOM’s, giving you more freedom to pursue side missions and gather resources.
The Adaptable Faces of Combat Fodder
Gaining objectives completed gives you more options for how to use your war payouts. Improving your fortress is almost always a good idea. You can construct facilities that make anything from incendiaries to reviving elixirs, or you can invest in workshops that upgrade your armament. You can even enlist more experienced companion units. Additionally, there is a supplementary customization package that lets you completely change the way your secondaries look if you really want to go technical. The simplified upgrading system, which gives players a choice between two powers every time they level up, is the one thing that lets this down. There isn’t much build variation in Crown Wars: The Black Prince, but the six major classes are all enjoyable to play and offer potential for synergy.
Base management is perhaps a little too simplistic. Yes, there is a sense of progress when you construct hearths that may produce new weapons and chapels that can revive fallen companions. While Crown Wars does depict some of the offensive breakthroughs from the Hundred Years War, I wish there had been a stronger sense of technological advancement over the entire campaign. That’s a significant improvement, but The Black Prince still needs a few minor adjustments. It feels antiquated to be unable to reverse a move order in a contemporary strategy game.
In summary
In Crown Wars: The Black Prince’s battles, details matter. Victory is always possible if you have assembled a well-balanced party and outfitted your warriors appropriately. Success also appears likely if the game can fix some of its flaws. Crown Wars may become a modest hit if the Artefacts Studio’s battle plan calls for a sustained dedication to hearing user feedback and making the required adjustments.
The Black Prince was performed on Crown Wars:
PC with the publisher’s review code provided.
Review Overview
Gameplay – 70%
Controls – 65%
Aesthetics – 70%
Content – 75%
Accessibility – 60%
Value – 70%
68%
OK
Summary :Â With crossbows and catapults, Crown Wars: The Black Prince is a little more than XCOM. First of all, you’re taking control of a group of formidable fighters who wreak havoc on everything in their path like the Black Plague. Crown Wars might be worth a try if you’re willing to overlook shortcomings in the name of ambition.