A look back at: Kartia: The Word of Fate

Now here's a strategy game that fell completely under the radar. Kartia was honestly quite simple without a whole lot of substance, save one girl, get involved in a fight against another faction.

Only this time we pull a Threads of Fate and can play as two different protagonists, and somehow, they both don't intertwine all that much. Yes, I enjoyed playing both scenarios rather well. And even though Toxa's story ends up being mostly helping the one girl he saves, because wow he just sort of falls in love with her almost immediately, his companions manage to be just as good. Misty goes from being an enemy to a good character real quick, and Posha's determination and her haircut are also good. On Lacryma's side, things are much better storywise, and the characters there certainly are just as good. Troy's a jerk, but at least has respect for his boss, Kun's trying his best to be decent, and, well, I don't like Ele, but who cares about her. The plot Lacryma goes through is significantly more interesting, but in both protagonist's cases, their plots are pretty much driven through characters.

Now I usually do gameplay first, but for a strategy RPG these storylines manage to at least do the best character-wise, despite some simplicities and lack of substance. Well for a strategy RPG it works out well enough, not too annoyingly reliant on RNG all the damn time. The whole deal with Phantoms is certainly one thing as it involves creating with Kartia. Spells also function that way too. Sure, you get enough of that to work around just about anything, especially if you somehow manage to find the secret chest in the second mission in Lacryma's plot. Pretty par for the course. But some missions like the 15th one on BOTH plots basically require you to limit yourself in order to get the best of the best. Worth it? Sure it is. Admittingly I didn't have too much trouble keeping anyone alive, even Phantoms at times. Now, the one mechanic to look out for in Kartia is that there's no permadeath, but that human characters must survive at any time. It's a game over should any human on your side fall.

Now and then though, I'll admit, this sleeper hit really wasn't bad at all, and actually manages to somehow be above mediocre as well. Good game.