Foretales is an excellent game hampered by excessive RNG and over-reliance on time-wasting mechanics to inflate playtime.
Singleplayer.
I like Pixar films as much as anyone, but there was something magical about classic Disney animation. For me, the most memorable film from my childhood would be non-other than Disney’s Robin Hood, the first Disney movie I remember owning on VHS.
So you can imagine my delight when I was offered the chance to review Foretales, a title inspired by the movie’s aesthetic. After playing through the game, I can honestly say the artists at Foretales have done an amazing job capturing the classic Disney aesthetic.
From playable characters to minor NPCs, every character looks fantastic and would easily fit in with the Disneys Robin Hood.
While Foretales has a few mechanical issues, I have no complaints about the artwork, which is quite frankly better than what is found in many AAA titles.
In Foretales, players lead a party of three characters, each with unique skill cards and abilities, through a series of increasingly difficult challenges, where bringing the wrong character can be the difference between victory and defeat, something which players may not be made aware of until it is too late to salvage their run.
Early in my first playthrough, I made a mistake, which resulted in a forced game over seven hours later, something which was made all the more frustrating due to Foretales not allowing players to “save scum”, which forces players to restart the entire narrative upon reaching an unsatisfactory ending.
In total, Foretales has seven separate endings to be unlocked, which are dependent on choices the players have made throughout the story, such as the order they undertook certain missions, the factions they allied with and how they handled conflict, with pacifist and violent choices leading to different outcomes and skill cards, with more violent players being rewarded with cards that do additional damage, at the cost of further decreasing their positive reputation, locking out several ending scenarios that are only available to players who walk the straight and narrow.
Most problems can be solved in at least two ways, with some missions offering as many as three unique solutions, ranging from violent encounters to more stealthy approaches that take advantage of the player’s onhand skill cards and resources to bypass potentially difficult encounters.
Developers of deck building games often struggle to keep players engaged, as frankly, making an engaging game where all the action takes place on a tabletop is very difficult. As a result, most developers struggle to create engaging scenarios and characters that grow on the players, resulting in overly formulaic games that, while fun for a while, do not allow players to become immersed in the story and its many characters.
Foretales, however, manages to keep both the narrative and combat fresh by including a multitude of items to collect that not only have an effect on the narrative but allow for greater creativity in combat, such as allowing players to create powerful explosives or use acid to weaken heavily armoured foes.
RNG mechanics in small doses are a great way to keep a game feeling fresh and encourage replayability, however when almost every aspect of gameplay is tied to an RNG mechanic, problems begin to arise, and while I can see why the developers opted to rely heavily on RNG, I find myself enjoying Foretales less and less the more I play it, due to the at times punishing RNG mechanics that do not fairly reward players for their efforts.
I must preface this by saying I understand why indie developers try to limit progression; with gamers pushing for longer games, it must be very appealing to make a few changes to core mechanics and gain an extra 10+ hours of “content” unfortunately, such content is unrewarding, and the final product is always weaker as a result.
Several times while playing Foretales, I would finish a mission with a large amount of food, coin or reputation, only to have it reset at the start of the next mission.
This was especially frustrating when the objectives of said missions were often dependent on such resources, and I was forced to re-farm the same materials, despite there being no in-universe reason for why my character has lost access to his reputation or gold.
While this required me to spend an extra few hours playing the game throughout my first playthrough, it has left me not wanting to replay Foretales, which is a shame due to its vast replayability and multiple unique endings.
Foretales is a strategy video game developed by Alkemi and published by Dear Villagers, it was released on 15 September 2022 and retails for $19.99.
Foretales is available on the following platforms: Nintendo Switch, and PC.
A single playthrough of Foretales can take anywhere between 2 and 8 hours to complete, depending on the choices made by the player and RNJg, which has an incredible influence on how long each level takes.
I recently replayed the same level twice and noticed a whopping 44-minute difference in the time it took to complete the same mission due to RNG resulting in necessary cards and resources not being made readily available for well over 40 minutes, unlike my second attempt where I was able to gather the needed resources/ cards in less than 30 seconds.
There is nothing wrong with a game relying heavily on RNG mechanics, but it needs to have some constraints; in my example above, I felt bored and frustrated in the 45-minute run and cheated in the second, where everything was essentially given to me on a silver platter.
Foretales is rated PEGI 12 and contains:
Foretales is worth playing, but a heavy reliance on RNG and limited player progression will negatively affect player retention, resulting in Foretales potentially receiving less post-launch content than the developers might have originally envisioned.
