Thanks a lot for the review! We reduced the number of enemies and waves - it was too much in your demo version. We also improved performance significantly and fixed number of saves + old saved can be migrated, keybinding and menu setting now stay saved. Party AI though is a bigger issue and we will keep working on that. So if you haven't finished DE yet - I hope you will have much smooth experience.
Impressive how much information you deliver in a short space of time, always feel I have a good handle on a game after watching your videos. Most others spread this out over about 6 videos.
Nice to see your content on this one. I think at 30 bucks it’s more than a fair price for the quality it offers. I normally play on harder difficulties , so need to micro a lot anyway. I guess if you want to play story mode and play it one handed with a beer in your other than you might get frustrated. 🎉 P.s. hope you’re keeping healthy and doing well dude. ❤
I can definitely enjoy combat heavy games, but I heavily dislike real time with pause games that are grindy. I don't enjoy having to constantly pause/slow time to react to something - maybe this is a sign I'd enjoy games where I can program responses again as previously I've usually found that setup to be too tedious. I've come to enjoy your content so much I'm watching more videos on this, I can still see myself checking it out if it goes to gamepass or maybe on a big sale.
First off, great seeing to soar, my friend! Sorry I haven't been around for streams, I've been working on a lot of my own stuff lately. Secondly, completely agree with the review. Dark Envoy has some great stuff but honestly, I wish they worked on a lot more of the character development and dialogue. I found myself indifferent about, well, most of the world to be honest. The decisions were also weird, too - it felt like there wasn't any real payoff for most of the choices. Furthermore, because I wasn't really invested, the choices didn't feel like they mattered. This could've been a 9/10, but the setbacks made it a 7.
As someone who played Tower of Time I had Dark Envoy on my 'list' since the first rumours about the development, but because of that part about waves of enemies being the main difficulty I think I'll wait a bit before buying, hoping that there will be some improvements to this system.
I think the game is definitely worth playing but frankly I don't think they'll change that system. Hard to see what they would replace it with considering how consistently it's used.
I played this demo in last years next fest and was really enthusiastic. It most exceeded my expectations. I was very unsure about the combat as I'm much happier with turn based but after a bit of learning I really enjoyed it. I found the characters were pretty reliable at gunning down baddies at their own discretion most of the time, though that may change later in the game. I'm slightly mixed on the talent limits. It sounds like enough for me - In something like Baldur's Gate I get overwhelmed by the options and end up sticking to a few anyway, so I am happy put a lot of points into a few skill than have lots of options (IIRC I could do that here) So outside lack of a combat log I'm pretty OK with your issues and I'll be happy to grab it tomorrow. Thanks for the review!
Yes! Why don't more RPGs offer battle stats? PoE and the Enhanced Editions of the earlier BG games were both good about giving you access to info like toughest enemy killed, total damage dealt, times downed, damage taken, etc. The crossover between RPG players and data nerds is probably huge. Haha. I don' think we need to make excuses for indie developers who release buggy software. Yes, indies are under stricter budgets, but that only means that they need to do a better job of prioritizing high value bugs that are likely to cause lost saves or lost settings. Solasta and the Tactical Adventures team are the perfect example. They got _panned_ for their cutscenes and voice work. But so what? Players knew what they were in for, and it was obvious that the core of the game was solid.
Nice review, I think I will give it a try. Will it get Mod support? Maybe someone will fix the „problem“ of the limited use of active and passive skills. It‘s really odd most games are so limited in aktive skills because of optimizing for casual gamer with a game controller. Could you tell or recommend some Games where we have full access to all purchased skills?
3:34 🤤 Oh my... *Clears throat* I definitely like the look of the skill tree, character building seemed like it would have a decent amount of depth to it from the demo and am glad to not be disappointed.
I see a lot of common with their previous game: Tower of time - the waves of enemies, the well thought character progression and mediocre and underwhelming role playing elements. I think I ll give this one a hard pass as plot is much more important than gameplay for me. Thank you for your review.
After trying several times to play Tower of Time, I decided to pass on Dark Envoy.. I enjoyed the premise, setting, style, etc, but I just could not get past the combat. Did they improve on the combat mechanics at all?
This was exactly my situation as well. The combat in ToT ends up such a chore by the end and Dark Envoy looks like the exact same game. Maybe if it's heavily discounted or free on Epic I'd pick it up.
Loved the combat in ToT, I tended to get totally bored of turn based game combat after a long time. I loved BG3 but I was ready to stop playing when the game was finished as I could not handle another turn based combat. With ToT it always felt fresh, I did character rotate a good bit though.
@@rivgacooper5330 I skipped BG because it was turn based, like just about everything these day it seems.. which was why I thought I would enjoy ToT.. I much prefer rtwp, but that game just didnt feel right.
Personally I think if a game is going to throw waves upon waves of enemies at you then you should definitely be able to have more than four party members.
Okay strange comment, but have you noticed that every video you have that includes "full", "overview", or sometimes "breakdown" in the title has like five times as many views?
LOL That's because oftentimes it's evergreen content that people come back to repeatedly. It takes a while to make those kinds of guides so I cannot do them all the time.
Combat 1st, story second. Gotcha. But I don't think you needed 10mins+ to come to that conclusion. I mean, you can pretty much tell from the trailer for the game. Didn't mean to bash you like this. Just my observation. No harm feelings I hope. Continue great work man.
That's fairly disappointing I was really looking forward to this. If the game had better/more interesting companions and story I think I'd give it a shot. I may pick this up down the line if it's on deep discount. Good video.
Oof that save issue sucks major sh*t. Unfortunate that the narrative and companions aren't great and the other issues. Sounds like this game would've been better off as a dungeon crawler like Icewind Dale or the Beneath The Stolen Lands DLC in Pathfinder Kingmaker.
@@SlanderedGaming pretty much the same what you disliked +factions being all trashy and companions don't care about them. Although I liked Tower of Time a lot so who knows.
The game is very shallow, and I find it got very repetitive after the 10th or 12th hour. All the dungeons are cookie cutter copies with a few different tile sets. I get it’s an indie game but still.
Top tier materials are limited but that doesn't stop crafting from having a significant impact. You can create low tier items that do things like increase your crit damage by 20%.
Thanks a lot for the review! We reduced the number of enemies and waves - it was too much in your demo version. We also improved performance significantly and fixed number of saves + old saved can be migrated, keybinding and menu setting now stay saved. Party AI though is a bigger issue and we will keep working on that. So if you haven't finished DE yet - I hope you will have much smooth experience.
Awesome glad to hear it! Thanks for the review copy, I enjoyed my time with the game.
Impressive how much information you deliver in a short space of time, always feel I have a good handle on a game after watching your videos.
Most others spread this out over about 6 videos.
Thanks glad you enjoyed it!
Nice to see your content on this one.
I think at 30 bucks it’s more than a fair price for the quality it offers. I normally play on harder difficulties , so need to micro a lot anyway. I guess if you want to play story mode and play it one handed with a beer in your other than you might get frustrated. 🎉
P.s. hope you’re keeping healthy and doing well dude. ❤
Thank you! Taking my health do by day but so far so good.
You sold me at "multiple specializations"!
Looking forward to seeing your class breakdowns!
I can definitely enjoy combat heavy games, but I heavily dislike real time with pause games that are grindy. I don't enjoy having to constantly pause/slow time to react to something - maybe this is a sign I'd enjoy games where I can program responses again as previously I've usually found that setup to be too tedious.
I've come to enjoy your content so much I'm watching more videos on this, I can still see myself checking it out if it goes to gamepass or maybe on a big sale.
Thanks glad you enjoyed the video. :)
First off, great seeing to soar, my friend! Sorry I haven't been around for streams, I've been working on a lot of my own stuff lately.
Secondly, completely agree with the review. Dark Envoy has some great stuff but honestly, I wish they worked on a lot more of the character development and dialogue. I found myself indifferent about, well, most of the world to be honest. The decisions were also weird, too - it felt like there wasn't any real payoff for most of the choices. Furthermore, because I wasn't really invested, the choices didn't feel like they mattered.
This could've been a 9/10, but the setbacks made it a 7.
Good seeing you dude. Hope things are well.
I'm definitely interested in seeing more about this game, so it would be cool if you could fit in some more coverage about it.
I dropped a couple of other videos on it today. I'll review the classes one by one over the course of this week.
As someone who played Tower of Time I had Dark Envoy on my 'list' since the first rumours about the development, but because of that part about waves of enemies being the main difficulty I think I'll wait a bit before buying, hoping that there will be some improvements to this system.
I think the game is definitely worth playing but frankly I don't think they'll change that system. Hard to see what they would replace it with considering how consistently it's used.
I didn't even know this game was coming out, super useful review. I might have to check it out.
Thanks glad you enjoyed it.
I played this demo in last years next fest and was really enthusiastic. It most exceeded my expectations. I was very unsure about the combat as I'm much happier with turn based but after a bit of learning I really enjoyed it. I found the characters were pretty reliable at gunning down baddies at their own discretion most of the time, though that may change later in the game. I'm slightly mixed on the talent limits. It sounds like enough for me - In something like Baldur's Gate I get overwhelmed by the options and end up sticking to a few anyway, so I am happy put a lot of points into a few skill than have lots of options (IIRC I could do that here)
So outside lack of a combat log I'm pretty OK with your issues and I'll be happy to grab it tomorrow. Thanks for the review!
Awesome! I hope you enjoy the game!
Yes! Why don't more RPGs offer battle stats? PoE and the Enhanced Editions of the earlier BG games were both good about giving you access to info like toughest enemy killed, total damage dealt, times downed, damage taken, etc. The crossover between RPG players and data nerds is probably huge. Haha.
I don' think we need to make excuses for indie developers who release buggy software. Yes, indies are under stricter budgets, but that only means that they need to do a better job of prioritizing high value bugs that are likely to cause lost saves or lost settings. Solasta and the Tactical Adventures team are the perfect example. They got _panned_ for their cutscenes and voice work. But so what? Players knew what they were in for, and it was obvious that the core of the game was solid.
When I don't mention that detail I find that people bring it up in the comments as key information that I left out.
Nice review, I think I will give it a try. Will it get Mod support? Maybe someone will fix the „problem“ of the limited use of active and passive skills. It‘s really odd most games are so limited in aktive skills because of optimizing for casual gamer with a game controller. Could you tell or recommend some Games where we have full access to all purchased skills?
3:34 🤤 Oh my... *Clears throat* I definitely like the look of the skill tree, character building seemed like it would have a decent amount of depth to it from the demo and am glad to not be disappointed.
Yup it's definitely a strength of the game.
I see a lot of common with their previous game: Tower of time - the waves of enemies, the well thought character progression and mediocre and underwhelming role playing elements. I think I ll give this one a hard pass as plot is much more important than gameplay for me.
Thank you for your review.
My pleasure. :)
Great review, I liked tower of time so i'll def get into this, but sadly it doesn't sound like the story/characters will be as good.
👍🏾👍🏾🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥💪🏾💪🏾 I’ll definitely be playing this game based off your impressions.
Awesome hope you enjoy it!
Excellent critique. Very informative.
Glad it was helpful!
After trying several times to play Tower of Time, I decided to pass on Dark Envoy.. I enjoyed the premise, setting, style, etc, but I just could not get past the combat. Did they improve on the combat mechanics at all?
This was exactly my situation as well. The combat in ToT ends up such a chore by the end and Dark Envoy looks like the exact same game. Maybe if it's heavily discounted or free on Epic I'd pick it up.
I didn't play ToT so I cannot compare.
skipped for the same reason.
Loved the combat in ToT, I tended to get totally bored of turn based game combat after a long time. I loved BG3 but I was ready to stop playing when the game was finished as I could not handle another turn based combat.
With ToT it always felt fresh, I did character rotate a good bit though.
@@rivgacooper5330 I skipped BG because it was turn based, like just about everything these day it seems.. which was why I thought I would enjoy ToT.. I much prefer rtwp, but that game just didnt feel right.
Personally I think if a game is going to throw waves upon waves of enemies at you then you should definitely be able to have more than four party members.
My sentiments exactly.
Okay strange comment, but have you noticed that every video you have that includes "full", "overview", or sometimes "breakdown" in the title has like five times as many views?
LOL That's because oftentimes it's evergreen content that people come back to repeatedly. It takes a while to make those kinds of guides so I cannot do them all the time.
Looks really fun. Shame I dislike Real time with pause so much 😞
Combat 1st, story second. Gotcha.
But I don't think you needed 10mins+ to come to that conclusion. I mean, you can pretty much tell from the trailer for the game.
Didn't mean to bash you like this. Just my observation. No harm feelings I hope. Continue great work man.
All good. I don't really change my content based on the marketing of the game. Just review it based on the merits of what I experience.
@@SlanderedGaming You should try Icewind Dale. Both 1 & 2 were combat heavy, all cool with that. But imo 1 had better story and villain.
That's fairly disappointing I was really looking forward to this. If the game had better/more interesting companions and story I think I'd give it a shot. I may pick this up down the line if it's on deep discount. Good video.
It's definitely worth playing but yeah I would expect a tale of epic scale compared to some of our other favorite cRPG's.
Oof that save issue sucks major sh*t. Unfortunate that the narrative and companions aren't great and the other issues. Sounds like this game would've been better off as a dungeon crawler like Icewind Dale or the Beneath The Stolen Lands DLC in Pathfinder Kingmaker.
Sometimes you have to get something wrong before you get it right. Hopefully the narrative elements in their next game will be stronger.
Thanks for this. Definitely seems like a pass for me. Saved me some money!
I hope they will do sth after release becouse its not looking great
What do you dislike about the game?
@@SlanderedGaming pretty much the same what you disliked +factions being all trashy and companions don't care about them. Although I liked Tower of Time a lot so who knows.
So glad I watched this. I will not be buying this game. Thanks for the video.
My pleasure. Some of the issues seem to be cleared up with the Day 1 patch but we shall see.
The game is very shallow, and I find it got very repetitive after the 10th or 12th hour. All the dungeons are cookie cutter copies with a few different tile sets. I get it’s an indie game but still.
Great review. I'll be skipping this one.
another game with wasted potential
I heard crafting isn’t good because of limited amount of top tier materials
Top tier materials are limited but that doesn't stop crafting from having a significant impact. You can create low tier items that do things like increase your crit damage by 20%.