Steamfarer

One of the most important things in an RPG is the ability to explore the world you find yourself in and learn more about its history and lore. Old D&D titles had it pretty good in this regard, but this was partly because they were already based on a huge universe people were familiar with beforehand. Many other games use this trick as well, such is the case with the The Witcher franchise, which is based on a book series.

Steamfarer is a role-playing game with turn-based battles and a pretty intriguing universe, although it’s a bit too rough at the moment to make a deep impression on players. There’s certainly potential, on the other hand, because this particular sub-genre is far from exploited, especially when it comes to all the intriguing technology one can come up with using steampunk ideas.

The game puts you in the role of a captain of an airship, and your duty is to gather a worthy crew and explore the world in search of treasure and other interesting things. You can engage in battles with other ships and use your crew’s abilities to get the most out of your weapons, as well as search for loot and hoard currency in order to get new upgrades for your ship.

Your ship has a number of slots that can be used to equip items, much like on a character in a regular RPG. These items provide you with bonuses and other abilities, which come in handy during the combat. Speaking of which, the fights take place in turns, so you get plenty of time to think about your next move and see what ability combos work best in certain situations.

As mentioned before, the game is a little rough in this stage, but that’s only natural when you consider the fact that it’s still an Alpha version. It’s a bit of a bummer to see such small and cramped maps as well, especially since they force you to follow a linear path through them. However, the graphics are certainly nice, so it’s only a matter of better level design and original ideas in this regard.

Steamfarer appears to have a bright future ahead, but it needs to sort a few things out before players can have a blast with it. Hence, linearity needs to be dispensed with, and it would be nice to see more variety in the environment, especially given the theme and the setting of the game.