We’re all still reeling from finishing Baldur’s Gate 3 and wandering aimlessly through a digital world now, right? Well, Skald: Against the Black Priory wants to remedy that issue with its 80’s graphical stylings, incredible story, grimdark eldritch horror story, and some absurdly deep RPG mechanics.
Skald has you journeying through a stunning 8-bit world that’s almost always trying to kill you and then dares you to succeed anyway. Aside from your overwhelming tactical genius, you will also have every kind of skill, weapon, and character you can find and bring to your cause. Nothing comes easy in this world, but that just makes earning it all the sweeter.
Fights take place on incredibly detailed grid battlefields and most attacks have an area of influence that means that it’s not just about what attack you use and when, but more importantly where. Your positioning, and keeping your characters working together, are essential especially because you’ll nearly always be outnumbered and outgunned.
Despite the old-school sensibilities of the music and the art, Skald infuses it all with plenty of modern RPG components, including a full inventory system and skill trees. This gives it the feeling of a game that could only exist in 2024, even though its art style suggests otherwise. The mix of classes, status effects, weapons, and armour you need to manage means you can find your own playstyle and master it. That’s not all, it’s also got a cool feature called auto-resolve which is great if you’re finding a specific fight simply too much and can’t find a way out of it, because it just sorts the fight out for you.
So if your longing for a new CRPG – especially on that also taps into that Dungeons & Dragons feeling – but just haven’t found the right one yet, Skald: Against the Black Priory could well be the one to end your woes.
