If you liked roleplaying computer games in the early 2000s, you knew that Bioware was synonymous with cool games. The studio started out as a Canadian game developer and made some awesome things. Baldur’s Gate. Mass Effect. Dragon Age. Eventually they were bought by EA and went downhill. Apparently, the latest Dragon Age, Veilguard, sold 50% below its targets, and EA gutted the studio with massive layoffs.
But I digress. At some point one of the Bioware’s developers, Mike Laidlaw, who was the creative director of the Dragon Age series, left, got together with some ex-Ubisoft developers and founded Yellow Brick Games. Their first title is out now and I bought it.
The Story
There once was a magic city where the weavers, magicians, created wondrous archons. Things went horribly wrong, a bloody war broke out, and the city sealed itself and the lands around it from the rest of the world. Now the few remaining weavers are despised, and they drift from settlement to settlement.
Our heroine is a new addition to a weaver caravan, a band of magic experts that include a smith, an atelier, and an alchemist among others. This particular caravan is heading straight for the city to surveil the barrier.
Things go horribly wrong once again, and the caravan ends up trapped within the barrier. They must now explore this new land.
This game gives you that unforgettable feeling of being dropped into a very good fantasy book. It’s weird. It has a feeling that is entirely its own. It’s the difference between Oblivion, which felt generic, and Skyrim, which had its own strange atmosphere. Eternal Strands has a vibe.
Launch Trailer (linked for the email readers.)
First things first: the game is gorgeous.
My merry band of companions.
Relaxing moment in camp with the caravan’s quartermaster and whatever that owl bear critter is.
Oh noes.
So great story, great graphics, how is the combat?
You know how in some games, you can occasionally get somewhere high and drop a rock on your enemy and you feel super accomplished? Or when you set some flammable barrels that have no business lying around the battlefield on fire? Okay, the whole game is like that. Except there are no random barrels. It’s mostly explosive plants.
Gameplay Trailer (linked for the email readers.)
Everything is climbable.
First, you can climb anything. Everything. Tree? Yes. Weird obelisk sticking out of the ground? Yes. Mountain cliff? Yes.
You have your sword and a bow and all that, but you also start out with two magic powers called strands: ice and telekinesis. You are a weaver, after all. Ice makes ice, self explanatory. It slows down enemies, puts out fires, and it will damage you if you stand on it. Telekinesis lets you pick up things and yeet them. (To yeet (slang) means to throw something with a lot of force disregarding the consequences.)
Everything is yeetable, if it’s not too heavy.
So, if you suck at combat games, like yours truly, this opens up a whole new world of possibilities.
Here is how my gaming session went:
Me, mumbling to myself: Can I yeet this rock? Can I yeet that rock at this monster? Oh I missed, and the rock hit the tree, and now the tree broke? Can I yeet the tree? Ha! Can yeet the monster? Ha! Do I have anything else to yeet…
Gordon: What is your obsession with yeeting things?
Me: You do not understand this game.
You can freeze the enemy, yeet them at a mountain wall, drop a steel-rich rock on them, the rock will break, and then you can collect all the materials from the rock and the fallen enemy. I found a cave with ice, and since I do not have any fire powers and there were no explosive plants around, I bombarded the ice outgrowths within the cave with rocks, until I broke all of them, and then the ice melted, and I went in to get the treasure.
Everything is valuable.
The crafting system is so interesting. It breaks all crafting materials into 4 broad groups: forged, carved, woven, and tanned. So basically ore, stone, fabric, and leather. You can make weapons and armor, and every item requires a set number of resources. So if the armor requires 6 tanned resources, you can either put basic leather in, or dense akala fur, which better, or another resource that is even better, and what you slot in there changes the bonuses and stats.
And it changes the color of the armor.
Dragon Age Inquisition, I see you! You remember when you would add one random piece of weird leather to your Inquisition outfit because you wanted the straps on the armor to be white or something? Hehe.
If you have a surplus of low level resources, you can turn them into camp supplies, which allow you to upgrade the caravan crafting stations. The inventory management is limited to materials. You are not going to be carrying a bunch of armor and weapons in your bag. It’s more mission based, meaning you equip yourself and head out.
I haven’t made it very far, because I have to work, but I did manage to beat the first boss on the first try, despite my gaming shortcomings, and I have made it to the Zone #2. But I’ve only played for four hours. My take on it right now – there is no grind. Like none. You’re not going up the levels, the progression is gear based, and it is all about exploring and finding weird loot stashed somewhere behind a rock, and looking for creative ways to nuke your enemies. There is much more that I could prattle on about – the weather, the day and night cycle, etc, etc.
So what are the negatives?
Well, no character creation, and while there is branching dialogue, I’m not sure the responses affect the story over all, but it does add the RPG flavor.
For some reason this game hasn’t been promoted as much as some others. I know the Avowed is coming, I’ve known about it for months, and this just popped out of nowhere. But now you also know it exists. There is a free demo on Steam that walks you through the prologue. The tutorial is very handholdy, but once you make it through, the game lets go and you are freeeee!
Have fun and let me know if you like it.
Looks really cool!! No comments yet??
You’re the first, article was just published 🙂
Sounds like fun!
I don’t know why, but this game reminds me of Magic Claims. 😀
Have fun everyone!
Looks like fun, thanks for the heads up
Thank you sooooo much for the review! I am a diehard fan of the old Bioware (Mass Effect, Dragon Age), although I confess I haven’t bought the newest Dragon Age 1. (need new computer) 2. Waiting for the price to drop–retired now, and watching the pennies.
Also, few games really capture the magic that was the golden age of rpg– in addition to Mass Effect and Dragon Age, the Thief franchise, Deus Ex franchise, Elder Scrolls — Morrowind and Skyrim, Kingdom of Amalur….
sigh. But I might have to rearrange the budget for this one! thanks!
If you really liked the companion interaction in Dragon Age titles, I would suggest skipping the Veilguard or maybe waiting until a steep discount. Apparently, they ripped the RPG out of it, so what you say to companions has no bearing on the story, their dialogue, or their loyalty.
I’ve played Veilguard all the way through. There is still a loyalty effect to your dialogue and choices. However, the interaction with companions is way more forced and stilted. Like, if you carry a companion all the way through their individual quest, you then have a binary decision of some kind that will determine how they will live their life going forward. I mean, why should your character be able to force another character’s major life decision?
Overall Veilguard was an OK game, and the plot’s pretty good, but it’s nowhere near as good as the other Dragon Age games.
It looks and sounds cool. I am very glad you found a game to play that sounds immersive and exciting
I have had good luck with games and books recommended by House Andrews, so I am in! But not tonight. Tonight we are killing zombies at my house.
Zombicide Black Plague is a board game with miniatures (all of which my husband expertly painted and they are gorgeous— well, they are zombies so they look pretty gross, but the workmanship is beautiful) and you pick your characters and then work in cooperation with the other survivors to complete whatever the mission is for that session and live through the waves of zombies that pour into the city on each turn.
Tonight we play the first game in the Wulfsburg addition (zombie werewolves that are scary-fast), so we may die but it should still be fun. 🙂
awesome review! thanks for sharing! I might have to try this game
This sounds like fun! And I need a new game. Replaying Fallout 4 has been ok but too apocalyptic. My little games are fun but don’t take enough brain power. Thank you!
Got any recommendations for a game similar to Myst or Riven?
This sounds awesome, I’m gonna take a look right now.
The last time I played a RPG game was Return to Krondor. based on the Raymond E Feist books. I may have to have a look. Thanks.
Thank you SO MUCH for this recommendation!!! It’s exactly the kind of game I’ve been looking for <3
Sounds interesting. The “rock dropping” thing reminded me of a game I used to play decades ago where you had to lure a hero to your city to kill the monster.
Or…. you could call out your citizen militia, stand them on a near by cliff and have them throw rocks at the monster. Many, many rocks. For almost six of months of game time. Eventually you killed the monster. But later on you still had to call the hero for story reasons and all he did was amble around and drink all your expensive wine.
Question *raises hand*
Pretty PLEASE OH PLEASE OH PLEAAASSSEEEE can we have “Everything is yeetable” on a hoodie? Merch store *brings out cash*
At the moment, we are not sure whether the merch store will ever open again. I will make a note of your suggestion 🙂
If I may – could Sarah send a request through Mod R to Ilona, to get permission to quote her? There are lots of shops that will put sayings on t-shirts, sweats, hoodies, etc. Then you (Sarah) would have a one-of-a-kind hoodie. 👕
This sounds like a cool game, reminded me of Zelda BOTW? I’m not very good at that game, I tend to just climb to the top of things and watch the sun set…..
I will be sure to tell my hubby and daughter as they are both gamers. I’m not a gamer because I’m really, really, really bad at it. (Hmmm…“everything is yeetable”….I want to yeet things! Maybe I do have to check this out!!) 😁
If anybody needs me I will be here practicing my yeeting….
(Dirty dishes to wash? [yeet!])
(Random bill to pay? [yeet!])
(Laundry to put away? [yeet!])
Hey, this IS fun!
(Cats annoying me because it’s dinner time? [yee…..ooops, almost got carried away there, sorry little buddies!!!! 😂)
Hehehehe, this reminds me of one of my most-quoted sketches, Kitchen Gun 😀 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OrwPTcgyOIw
BANG and the dirt is gone!
Ok that was funny!
Demos are always good. This weekend I got obsessed with dragon song tavern demo on steam.
Oh wow! This looks exactly to my taste and I’ve never heard anything about it. Thanks for sharing!
I haven’t done gaming since I was in my 20s, but I can appreciate them. The idea and the artwork are great – I hope you have a lot of fun with this.
Cool! I think I might just try it. Thanks!
Looks pretty cool! The MC looks like Caitlyn from the Arcane show.
I have never played this type of game but with your description, I may just give it a try. I mainly read Fantasy (your worlds especially!) so if this can play out on screen as the books I read scroll through my head, it may just be something more for me to do. Thank you very much. Your enthusiasm for this game is wonderful and very encouraging. Keep on yeeting!~!
Very interesting. Great graphics. Unfortunately, the non-option for what your character looks like is unacceptable. For me at least, it outranks all the positives. Sigh…
Even so, thanks for the links. It was fun to look at them.
Oooh interesting… I’ve been in a bit of a gaming rut recently just sticking to world building games since finishing Kena:Bridge Of Spirits (I recommend by the way, combat that scales, very pretty and cute critter helpers) but I haven’t heard of Eternal Strands… will check it out. Thanks! 😀
Is the game real time, turn based, or both?
(Saying that I have the reflexes of a dead cow is NOT true. That statement would be unfair to the cow. For me, real time is out.)
I am afraid to start vid games, because I might never leave my house again, lol. I fell in love with an arcade game at the movies, and it would open with, “Hi it’s me Christy…and I would commence shooting all the bad guys. Man that was fun. It had an attached gun and everything. I could shoot a bad guy, fake-like and I could enjoy the muscle memory of mowing ‘em down. It was safe, fake skillful killing. So much fun, like shotgun class. Lol. If the vid game had a realistic way to fake shoot bad guys I would fall in love and not be able to get out! Lol. Especially if I could change the whole room around for it, man, I would lose it. Lol. Have fun y’all!
Thank you! I need to dropped into a fantasy book – and this sounds like fun. Something to look forward to after the next 9 hours of anxiety inducing work.
”Buy now”
😆
Am I a gamer? Yes. Did I look the game up? Yes. Did I buy it? Sadly, no.
I’m also broke. But right now I play “Aloft” in Single Player and “Sons of the Forest” with a friend, so I’m fine.
Thank you for the addition to my wishlist!
Also I love small Indie Devs. Especially if dipshits like EA fired them because of their own stupidity and bad company politics.
We have some really amazing Devs in germany, and ususally none of them are big companies. Do you know “Enshrouded”? That’s one of ours 😀
Big gaming community here in germany!
(Sorry for spelling mistakes)
None of the games you suggest are ever available for Mac 🙁