City of the Shroud, A Real Time Tactical RPG with the Heart of a Visual Novel

By GeekyGamerGirl87

Developed and published by Abyssal Arts Ltd., City of the Shroud is a four-chapter episodic game that is classified as a real tactic strategy role playing game. However, the game feels more like a visual novel with an interactive Real Time Tactics vibe to it. Not that that’s a bad thing, because I do love visual novels, but it could be misleading to some. The game isn’t bad at all, just again at times it feels a bit misleading. However, before I go into my review; I would like to thank Abyssal Arts Ltd for providing me with a free code to the steam version of the game.

The game starts off as you portraying  a farmer –who you get to name— from the outer farms who has come to the city to find work to send money back to his family. In addition, you are also looking for a friend from the city of Gayyan that has fallen.  The city of Iskendrun is not what it seems to be. You are shown this upon your arrival and entrance to the city with the city guards. Upon gaining entrance to the city you are forced into a fight with thieves and a monster from the portals. You defeat the monster and thieves with the help of the Hat Merchant; who explains to you how to use “Link Gems”, which are gems that are used to strengthen your moves and  allows you to perform combos. He also explains the usage of “The Combat Wheel”, which is the method you will use to put the moves into play. All battles happen in real time, so you need to be able to think fast.

After this battle, the city folk praise you for taking down the monster and although you try to explain what has happened, they don’t listen. After your failed attempt to explain the situation, you seek out the Hat Merchant who sends you on a quest to speak with the five important people of Iskendrun. The five important people are:  Navid – The High Priest of Iskendrun; who is all for helping everyone but turns a blind eye to some things.  Zem – A woman who is deemed untrustworthy and greedy by Navid, but honestly only cares about the refugees from the falling cities, and that they are treated fairly. Zem and Navid seem to have a love hate relationship because they have a lot of he say/she say tendencies, so it’s hard to believe who is telling the truth. Omar – A soldier who has return to the city of Iskendrun after fighting on the front lines, and notices that his city is no longer the city he once loved. Sohrab – who is the leader of the city guard and has taken an interest in you since defeating the monster. He also believes that  the city must have order to survive and thrive. Then there is Azura – who is the leader of the merchants and only cares about herself and the trade.

The game does use both the gamepad or mouse to play. I personally chose to play the game with the mouse. For me, I felt that the game just plays better with mouse. I did try it with gamepad and the controls were just a little confusing to me. However, I tend to play games like this a little better with mouse and keyboard. So, I will admit that I immediately went for what was comfortable for me.  Gamepad made the combat wheel a little difficult to use. Where as the mouse you simply just follow the links and let go of the button and the attack starts.

The gameplay is simple once you get the hang of it in terms of the battles. However, the one thing I will point out is that there is a lot and I do mean a lot of reading. Which makes me say that this is more like a visual novel and the battle expect is added after the fact. Majority of the battles are simply just tutorials and last anywhere from about five to ten minutes, before you are back into reading more of the story. Don’t get me wrong the story is good, which is why it leaves me a little confused that the developers would not actually market it as a visual novel with RTT tendencies or a crossover. I have read many of visual novels in the past, and I think this is a unique approach to a visual novel. I have never seen a visual novel have interactive parts like this. However, the developers choose to market it as a real time tactic strategy role playing game.

My only thing that scares me about them doing so is that, a lot of people may be put off from the reading and may not give the game an actual chance, because they are looking for minimum reading and more battles. Perhaps, the other chapters focus on more of the battle scenes, and as this is the first chapter this is doing what it should do; which is introducing you to each of the character types and how to use them in battle. However, if the other chapters do follow the same format as chapter one I think the developers may want to look at a different approach on marketing the game.  Just because it might come off as misleading to some.

Graphically, the game does look fantastic. I love the art style of the game. It reminds me a lot of a comic book or –for those of you who can remember— it looks a lot like the art style from the old anime Aeon Flux. It shows that the art designers really care about the project. At least all the main characters are different. There was an instance where it looks like that the developers did kind of use the same character design for one character. If you look at Akilah – who looks to be like a servant to Zem and the character Rosana – a refugee who is a gunner type that you teach to fight. They do look a little like one another. If they are not main characters, I can understand they would reuse the character to save on costs. It’s just I did notice it and hope that this isn’t exactly a repetitive thing. When it comes to the battle art style; I am reminded a bit of Viewtiful Joe with the way it has been designed and drawn. Which doesn’t bother me because I happen to like the art style from Viewtiful Joe.

I also do enjoy the music score for the game. It is really relaxing, and it fits during the battles and even the reading parts of it. You want to be able to focus on the reading, which again I really feel that this should be considered a visual novel, because you again do a lot of reading. It seems like after every battle that ends you are then left to read from anywhere from thirty minutes to an hour before another battle takes place, almost like a reward system for doing all the reading.

There are somethings that were rumored to happen with the game that has not happen yet. For one there was a rumor that there would be a co-op mode on the game. However, there is not a co-op mode for the game. There is also now a rumor that there will be an online PVP mode that is supposed to be added to the game. I’m not sure when this is going to occurred because there didn’t seem to be an option for it on the main menu. Not even a grayed-out option saying “Online PVP Coming Soon.” The game is also said to be cross platform but currently the game is only available on PC and macOSX as a single player game, Although, it is listed on the Abyssal Arts Ltd. website that later in 2019 there will be a Definitive Edition coming to Steam, PS4, and Xbox One.

The game does offer nineteen achievements that you can collect. I imagine that as more of the chapters release the achievements could increase. So, I will say for this first chapter there is only nineteen achievements. The game does offer trading cards, which is something I believe was recently added. If my memory serves me correctly when I first played this game; it didn’t have the trading cards feature but it has since been added. At first, I thought it was odd, that they didn’t have a trading card feature, but am glad they have added the trading cards for it.

Overall, City of the Shroud is not a bad game. I just do feel that some may find it a little misleading. Again, the story is great, the graphics are great, and I absolutely love the music. I still think that from playing the first chapter that this should be considered an RTT Visual Novel. Hopefully, the next chapters will focus more on the battling. Now I’m not saying they should disregard the story because again I love the story, but maybe rethink the marketing for it. If the other chapters follow the same format as this chapter, then I think it should really be marketed as a visual novel. I am still interested to see how the game does in the long run regardless if it turns out to be a visual novel or not. If you would like to experience the City of the Shroud for yourself you can do so by purchasing it on  Steam or Humble Bundle for $19.99 USD.

If you are interested in gameplay video of the game. I have included a short gameplay video here for your viewing pleasure.