Although it’s been three years now, the influence of “Game of Thrones” continues to reverberate in popular culture. The memes are still doing well on social media, and touchstone stories are still echoing in movies, books, and television. The dark fantasy world created by George RR Martin has even had its own successful spin-off.
That impact, for better or for worse, extends to video games, and Square Enix’s latest title, “The DioField Chronicle,” doesn’t hide its admiration for the show. That’s evident in the intro, which looks familiar, and it can be seen in the political machinations of the various factions.
A FOCUS ON STRATEGY
Square Enix combines a story that follows a gang of mercenaries with a real-time strategy game. It’s less “Warcraft” and more “Fire Emblem” as players control four units and try to outsmart and damage their opponents on the map. Players don’t have to worry about harvesting gold, building bases, and managing resources; instead, they should focus on using their characters cleverly.
That means you have to take advantage of the different abilities of characters to master the battlefield. Each character has an archetype and a role based on their weapons. The main character Andrias Rhondarson acts as a villain who kills weakened enemies. Izelair Wigan acts as the tank, absorbing enemy attacks and absorbing damage, leaving others free to attack.
Other key characters include Iscarion Colchester, a gifted archer who damages multiple enemies at once or sets traps for them. Waltaquin Redditch is a mage who deals massive damage over a large area or heals her teammates. Fredret Lester is a knight on a steed who can scare away enemies of allies and set them up for devastating spells.
THE BLUE FOX
These characters are the core of the Blue Fox mercenary group and play a central role in the campaign. During the game’s 40 hours, players will watch the Blue Foxes rise from a crass unit under the control of Duke William Hende to a legendary fighting force under the direct command of the King of Alletain.
Along the way, players will recruit more members until they have up to 16 fighters to choose from. Some of them duplicate the roles of other members, but they have upgradeable perks that make them slightly different. Fortunately, players have the option to link any of the four units on missions and that basically means there are eight units on the ground.
That gives players some flexibility and deepens the strategy of a combat system that takes into account attack positions, debuffs, and areas of effect. Controllers aren’t ideally suited for this type of gameplay, but “DioField Chronicle” moves slowly enough that the interface doesn’t have too many adverse effects. The key elements are monitoring cooldown times after using a skill and managing characters’ energy points so they have enough to use their powerful abilities. It’s a good enough system that strategy fans can appreciate its intricacies.
A STORY LIKE A HISTORY LESSON
“The DioField Chronicle” has a decent foundation for an epic story, but the game’s problem lies in the storytelling, which is so zoomed out that the campaign is more like watching the History Channel battles between the different factions. On the continent, players hear about the empire slowly dominating the region in view of DioField Island’s magical resource called Jade.
Since players learn about the drama through cutscenes, they never feel involved with any of the characters. While the developers try to capture more intimate moments and add backstory through side missions, the mission design isn’t quite as creative. Usually the Blue Foxes have to take out all enemies on the battlefield, and some of those encounters reuse the same cards.
The campaign has its moments, and it’s especially good when players are forced to get out of their comfort zone. This happens when the core of Blue Fox is split up and players have to use and evolve other teammates, but unfortunately this doesn’t happen enough to make the story or gameplay interesting.
What would have been better is if the developers had reduced the roster to give each of the heroes more development and definition. There were some characters that I didn’t even use because they arrived so late in the campaign, having already put together a good team. I didn’t want to bother calibrating them and seeing how they would fit.
One of the jokes used to describe “Game of Thrones” is an image of a well-drawn horse that starts out beautifully but ends up looking like a child’s drawing. “DioField Chronicle” feels the same, but the drawing wouldn’t be quite as good anywhere. It would have been better if they had taken more chances and challenged players with a more effective mission design. As it is, the strategy game has an intriguing story, but is told in the most boring way imaginable.
‘The DioField Chronicle’
Two stars out of 4
Platform: PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X and Series S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch and PC
Rating:Teen
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