Skyward Collapse is a score-based game, points being awarded for pretty much everything we do. But those who want to go for the highscore will need to take a risk and provoke a lot of fighting, as this is the best source for points. There are three basic types of units to deploy – human soldiers spawning at barracks, mythological beings put directly onto the battlefield and tokens – usually empowering the first few humans to reach them. Also, in the later stages Gods will appear with their powerful passives drastically changing the situation on the continent. Each of them has three god tokens, which can be distributed throughout the map, thus gaining limited control over these beings and earning increasing the score.
While the main idea of the gameplay seems complex enough, the devs went further, introducing lots of randomness. The troops move on their own, changing objectives on the go and if you try loading one save data a few times, they will keep acting differently! The gods are also random, leaving the player unaware which ones will spawn until they actually do. And last but not least, there are Woes, – random events happening every few turns, capable of changing everything in a matter of seconds – killing all the units or modifying the landscape. Every playthrough is a new experience, making it hard to become a ready-for-everything God.
In the graphics department, Skyward Collapse is the quintessence of Arcen’s style. The detailed sprites, beautiful, fluent animations and the contrast between the continent and the background – all these create something unique, a game which looks great both on screenshots and in action. The devs conducted a detailed research, especially on the Norse side of the conflict, creating vivid, eye-catching illustrations of many lesser known motifs. And the music…the music is even better than in Valley Without Wind 2. It is so great that even after I stopped playing and got to writing, I still had the game minimized, just to preserve the atmosphere! Big kudos for Pablo, Arcen’s compositor!
Conclusion
I honestly tried to find even one element that could be seen as a flaw on Skyward Collapse. The problem is – it was nearly impossible, as everything the developers did here, they did great, giving us an astonishingly complex game which plays differently every time. The only weak spot would be the time required to actually understand what you are doing. Not everyone will have the patience, but then again, they shouldn’t have picked a strategy game if they don’t. Apart from that, Skyward Collapse is flawless and could be easily recommended to every gamer seeking some innovative, slow-paced, complex gameplay which will take ages to become boring!
See the trailer here:
You can buy the game through steam here:
