Recently Played – Emissary of War

As I noted a few days ago former BioWare co-worker Tobyn Manthrope recently released a new videogame “Emissary of War” for iOS devices.

Well I finally squeezed some time in to play through the free first chapter.

It was fun. Regular readers know I’m a fan of tactical RPGs and though Emissary doesn’t have a huge range of character types or special abilities what it does have is engaging and interesting. The combat was difficult enough that I died several times and had to rethink the tactics I used to get through the situation.
Players control two characters — a warrior and a potion throwing sidekick. They have direct control over the warrior but indirect control over the potion thrower. So they can choose who the warrior attacks and where he moves while deciding which potions the sidekick will throw (by using a stacking queue). It works very well.
As you gain wealth you can buy upgrades, most of which are passive improvements (better health, faster attack speed) but some are active. The warrior gets to buy a variety of swords and choose which to use during combat and the sidekicks gets to buy different kinds of tactically interesting potions.
For negatives… not much. The sidekick trips a lot and that gets aggravating. And I thought some of the in-game cinematics took a bit longer than necessary but the story was interesting enough that I wasn’t annoyed.

So do check it out! The first chapter is free.

For those of you who have played it, what did you think