Developer: Airship Syndicate
Publisher: THQ Nordic
Platform: PC, Xbox One, Switch, PS4
Tested on: Switch
Battle Chasers: Nightwar (Switch) – Review
Battle Chasers: Nightwar has been out for a while on several different platforms but it came out recently to the Switch. The game was inspired by the original comic book called Battle chasers that has been around since the 90’s. It also takes inspiration from retro JRPG console games. Battle Chasers: Nightwar has been developed by Airship Syndicate and published by THQ Nordic and we got a chance to test the Nintendo Switch version. So with our trusty Joy-Con controllers in hand, we went on an epic journey together with Gully and her friends.
Story
In Battle Chasers: Nightwar you follow the story of Gully and her friends. Gully’s dad, a great warrior, and leader, one day just vanished leaving only his mighty gauntlets behind. These gauntlets are Artifacts with incredible but mostly unknown power. When Gully discovered her father’s gauntlets she didn’t realize that it would make a lot of evil people that wanted the gauntlets come after her. This is how she came in contact with her friends and greatest protectors: Knolan the mighty wizard, Calibretto A war golem, the swordsman Garrison and the rogue Red Monika.
One day Knolan convinced the party to go to Crescent Isle. There it was rumored that a vast amount of Mana reserves exist. Since Knolan is on a personal quest to find out more about Mana he wanted to go to the island and discover if the rumors were true. However, once the group arrived near the island they discovered why so little was known about it. They were attacked by bandits. Calibretto, Garrison, and Gully got knocked off the ship causing the party to be split up. Now stuck on the island they are trying to find their missing friends. It becomes clear quite quickly that this won’t be an easy task as the island is filled with dangerous creatures and people. The story progresses nicely and you get a nice background from the characters when you start the game.
Graphics
The art style of Battle Chasers: Nightwar is beautiful. Both the 2D and the 3D art style has been really well done. The cutscenes and characters conversation are in 2D while the gameplay is mostly 3D. All the different characters have well-designed looks that make them stand out nicely. Monsters and villains are designed well with different “classes” having different looks.
Backgrounds in combat change depending on your location which is pretty simple but nice to have. In the game, you either play on a sort of map top view or in a more 3D view while discovering places or inside a dungeon. All the backgrounds are very detailed and look incredibly to walk through. Even the map view has a really nice design.
Sound
Music in Battle Chasers: Nightwar is pretty great. The tension in the music changes when you enter the dungeon making you more nervous for the battles to come. Combat music is exciting but not too over the top. Voice acting in the game is really well done. You can hear the emotions of the characters coming through. Even the war golem has a fitting voice.
Sound effects in the game are fitting and don’t sound weird. Almost every combat move has a different sound effect with there even being sound effects for every different sort of weapon. Even outside the combat, the sound effects are nicely inserted.
Gameplay
Battle Chasers: Nightwar is an Indie (J)RPG, in which you try to find your missing friends while defending yourself from bad guys and monsters. You discover parts of the world either in the map part or by going into areas like dungeons or camps. On the map part, you follow roads that have certain things you can interact with such as monsters, loot or people you can talk to. Monsters are indicated by bubbles telling you what they might be. Loot can be either chests, flowers or tree stumps where you can get crafting ingredients or money from. Exclamation marks tell you that there are people that you can interact with. Most people are inside a house or tent so they don’t have a 3D model to talk to.
Conversations bring up the 2D art of the characters. Sadly, there’s only one static image per character that just gets flipped if they are talking to someone else. It would have been nice if there were a couple of different images for other emotions. There are some occasions were the talking just gets done by speech bubbles. For instance, in combat, the characters will make random statements or react when one of them or the enemy gets knocked out.
Dungeons or places that you can discover are in a more 3D environment. Before you enter a dungeon you can set the difficulty level with higher difficulty earning you more loot. Enemies here are just randomly walking around and run up to you once they notice you. Some enemies might even drop from the ceiling while some are almost fully invisible. There are a bunch of chests, crates, barrels,.. that you can loot in dungeons as well as crafting benches to craft gear with. While in a dungeon you also have to watch out for different kinds of traps. Each character has an ability that only has a few uses that they can use while inside a dungeon. Since these abilities have a limit you can’t keep spamming them or they might run out when you really need them.
Combat in Battle Chasers: Nightwar is turn-based. Each character can use a regular action, an ability, burst, items and is able to flee from combat. Regular actions can be either defensive or offensive action. A regular attack will create overcharge. An ability will use mana or the overcharge from the regular attacks. Overcharge will always be used before mana gets used. Some abilities even get stronger with a bigger amount of overcharge. Burst gets charged with overcharge and is a powerful ability that differs between the characters. Items can be bought or made on the alchemy table in the village.
When characters level up they get more abilities and actions. They also get perk points which you can unlock perks with. Each character has two different kinds of perk themes. One is more offensive while the other is more defensive. Perks cost a set amount of perk points with better ones costing 6 or more perk points.
Conclusion
Battle Chasers: Nightwar is an incredibly fun game with a beautiful art style. The contrasting views between the map and the dungeons make for a nice change now and then. Story-wise the game is also really great. You immediately get more of a sense what’s going on thanks to the provided backstories. Battle Chasers: Nightwar is a game for everyone that likes RPG games or games with a good story. If you like the aforementioned, this title is certainly worth checking out.
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