Fort Triumph Preview

Fort Triumph is a 3D turn-based strategy game with an extremely interactive environment. The combat system is very dependent on getting a good cover from ranged attacks, but there’s a catch. You can kick, blow up or even burn everything on the map… So a good cover can’t really guarantee your safety.

The game is pretty far along but is still in the Alpha stage, so it has a few bugs and it might crash, but the guys at CookieByte Entertainment are working on fixing them. This hardly gets in the way, however, the level of difficulty is another story. If you get the chance to try out Fort Triumph, I’d recommend you low ball the difficulty level of your campaign.

Price: Closed Beta
Genre: Turn-based Strategy
Developed and Published by: CookieByte Entertainment
Reviewed on PC.
Steam

 

Story

Fort Triumph is set on a medieval fantasy realm of magic and monsters. You’ll lead a group of adventurers on their quest to become true heroes. Fight skeletons, goblins, and many other mythical creatures.

This realm is being wrapped and changed by a powerful magic that has everything out of whack.

“As Magic is shifting the natural order of things across the land, suddenly the dead rise to seek adventure, an old dragon started giving away his fortune to the poor, goblin thugs become learned academics, and the very fabric of the reality is at risk.”

What better time to rally a pack of heroes? After all, someone has to clean the mess… You’ll have to fight your way through swarms of monsters, gather the overflow magic to trade with and earn renown to become real heroes.

Gameplay

Fort Triumph combat is based on their interactive environment. Covering mechanics have a very strong impact on ranged attacks, making it close to impossible to hit a well-covered target. This kind of combat style usually drove games to be slow and tedious; having to advance step by step, keeping in mind covers and units’ range, etc.. But the guys at CookieByte Entertainment had a trick up their sleeve that prevented this from happening to Fort Triumph.

Everything in the environment can be destroyed

Those covers are not as safe as they seem. For example, covering behind a tree will block all but the luckiest regular attacks, that’s when you blow it away on to of your enemy. Well, I can hide behind a house then. Sure, houses are more solid covers than trees, with a bunch of HP as to not be destroyed easily. Houses also have a lot of wood, see where I’m going with this?… You can use spells to burn down larger covers, but be careful, flames can get out of control pretty fast.

We’ve been seeing more and more of these environment interaction mechanics on recent titles. It’s very cool to see them in the detailed 3D maps of Fort Triumph. While some of these mechanics still need a few tweaks, you can appreciate how they work together to give the combat a great balance between tactics and action.

There is another feature of the game which while subtle, makes the gameplay more fluid and dynamic. The action point system that CookieByte Entertainment uses allow players to decide if they want to take an action or double their movement possibilities. This might seem like a small point but ends up being a great balancing perk for melee characters.

Closing the gap between ranged and melee

In most strategy games, ranged character either have significantly less power than melee fighters or have their attack range severely limited. This simple mechanic allowed to close the gap between ranged and melee fighters. This way, melee chars can get close to the ranged ones faster, but not overrun them as easily.

The game can be a little unforgiving, with the permadeath and everything. It’s easy for new players to get overwhelmed in the first fights. Remeber to use environmental attacks as often as you can and don’t be ashamed to lower the difficulty.

There is more to Fort Triumph than combat, your party will have to travel the map, fulfill quests, earn magic (the currency) and renown, everything they need to fix the magical breach that has the land upside down. Character customization is still limited, but they’re very close to their Kickstarter goal to expand this area.

Graphics

Fort Triumph uses low poly 3D graphics to create their envolving scenery. With very detailed buildings and awesome particle effects, they made a work of art of their maps. I didn’t feel the same about the characters and UI, they could use a more delicate finish.

The artwork mixes pretty well with the mechanics. This must have been quite a challenge for them, considering how interactive is the scenery. It’s pretty awesome to watch the houses and trees burning.

Summary

With an awesome environment and the very well thought combat system, Fort Triumph makes an awesome twist to the classic turn-based strategy genre. Kick, blow up, burn down… do anything you need to save this original fantasy world from a magical apocalypse.

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