Xbox One Review: Reverie Knights Tactics

Can these knights deliver a decent strategy?

Reverie Knights Tactics is a turn-based tactical RPG with strategic battles in isometric grids where every decision can alter the story. Travel through a hand-drawn fantasy world and lead your heroes in a story-rich adventure, visual novel style.

Turn-based strategy games like Reverie Knights Tactics aren’t anything new, the genre has had some big ones over the past few years with the likes of X-Com and even Mario + Rabbids, but can RKT pull off something unique?

The game has some well animated characters and areas, but in terms of gameplay it’s fairly standard for the genre. That’s not a bad thing though as even though it doesn’t innovate, it doesn’t fall apart by following the formula. I will say that battles themselves can feel a bit sluggish at times, taking too long between moves and the animations in-between.

Controls for these types of games for consoles are usually hit and miss and sadly the same also applies here. While the game’s art style is truly brilliant, the game itself doesn’t feel optimised for consoles as much as I would have hoped. In terms of difficulty, RKT can be deeply unforgiving if you aren’t prepared and I said, the foundations of a true tactical RPG are here in full force.

The story is decent but fairly standard fair, so while it should engage you to the end of the main game, it doesn’t really stand out from your typical fantasy plot. The hand-drawn world itself is beautiful and the soundtrack is impressive overall. Framerate seemed decent overall but like I said, the animations themselves look slower than they should.

The Verdict

While not breaking new ground, Reverie Knights Tactics is still a decent tactical RPG with an amazing art style. If you can overlook some of the issues like slow animations and slightly frustrating controls, then you’ll find an enjoyable experience here.

Score: 7.0