One of the critiques for Solasta: Crown of the Magister was how “ugly” the characters were for the game. Everyone from random NPCs and important plot related characters to your custom-made dungeon crawler crew. It didn’t bother me too much considering it’s a top-down-tactical experience, even if I admit they could look a bit funky at times. Especially everything connected to hair, specifically beards. This is now fixed, as a result of the engine switch (Unity to Unreal 5), I would assume.
Graphics over?
While this is pleasant for the eyes, I just hope it isn’t a case of graphical fidelity being increased, at the expense of gameplay features and mechanics. Some have already voiced their opinions on the switch – that the world will no longer have a focus on height differences in the world. I have not formed a view on this yet, but I understand the worry. Instead of working in an engine they know, and improving the game from that, they are making a jump into an engine unknown to them. Also, Unreal 5 feels a bit iffy overall. It’s a brutal performance hog, with graphics that many times look smudged. Give me crisp graphics, and functional anti-aliasing any day!
My main concern is DnD 5e and the campaign difficulty. The power level in the original game scaled out of control fast, thanks to the generous XP earnings, and quick leveling. I hope this will be fixed, with custom made changes to the DnD 5e ruleset to make it much more difficult.
Despite my natural pessimism, I’m of course looking forward to Solasta 2. A fun RPG romp in the style of the first game would be much appreciated. Sometimes a good story of evil invading lizards is just good enough, so please devs, don’t go out to make something overly advanced. Make something for us dungeon crawler aficionados!
/Thomas
Tom's Gaming Vault 