Armello Review

Armello is one of the games I got from the Steam Winter Sale, and from first game fell in love with it.

Update: Version 2 comes out soon and there were changes to the game. I cover these changes at the bottom of the post.

Armello is a quick-turn based strategy game much like a board game. It brings in classic mechanics seen in games like Catan but with beautiful art styles and music.
The basic premise is this: Armello is a kindgdom, which is currently ruled by The King, who is being overcome by Rot, an evil plague that succumbs it’s victims to corruption and madness. Because The King is losing control to the Rot, the different clans are sending heroes to overtake the thrown to rule Armello.

There are five clans, with four clans available in the initial game. There is the Wolf Clan, Rabbit Clan, Rat Clan, and Bear Clan. Each clan has a few playable heroes you can chose, such as in the Wolf Clan you can play River or Thane, and with the Usurper’s DLC Magna. Each of the 4 clans has 3 playable characters.

The 5th clan is the Bandit Clan, which is only available to the Kickstarter backers until Spring 2017. Unlike the other clans, the bandits are a mix of animals and backgrounds.

The game play goes like this: every hero gets a a day turn and a night turn, which create one full day. The turns always begin with The King and his soldiers. Each character gets AP points to move across the different terrain blocks on the board, and can choose different actions based on the tile, or based on who is on a tile near them, or what cards they have. For example based on the image above, the current character is Mercurio (The Rat). He has 2 AP points so can make 2 movements. He could go for the King’s Guard or Thane (The Wolf). Or play some of his cards which cost resources, but not AP points.

There are 4 ways to win. You either go take the castle and kill The King outright. You can earn the most prestige and be the prestige leader when The King dies of Rot. You can also become infected with Rot and then kill The King as the Lead of Corruption. Or you can collect Spirit Stones which destroy Rot, and once you have 4 stones you take them to the castle and will destroy everything infected by Rot.

The game comes with a great tutorial to start that lets you play multiple characters and unearths story and skills. Definitely do the prologue to learn the game and see the videos that are gorgeous!

I’ve found the game rather addicting and enjoy taking a break to play a round or two. I will probably achievement hunt this game to no end, so I definitely recommend it if you’re looking into games that feel like board games but can be played alone.

Version 2 Updates:

As of February 2019, Armello has made their largest update ever and changed some of how the game works and added some great features. Let’s go over those now.

When it comes to the actual gameplay, the biggest change is how quests work. Before the game would decide your fate at random. Now, you have the ability to choose your fate based on the hidden icons as shown above. You still have a percentage chance of winning, then the icons flip to be secret, spin around, and you can pick one.

Other gameplay affecting additions are mostly just new cards and some art changes. There is now a mastery system for characters, so as you play more of a specific character you unlock different levels of mastery and earn rewards for doing so. These rewards include new dice, chests, a mastery badge, and a new victory move.

Last addition of note from myself is the addition of the clans ground in the menu. You can go into the clans ground and choose your character’s loadouts prior to entering a lobby. So for me, who plays the same three characters regularly, I can go in and setup their ring, amulet, dice, and skin in advance. What I really like about this though is it makes teaching new players about rings and amulets easier because they can take the time to read all the details without a lobby timer going.

Overall I am a big fan of the changes in the version 2 update. They all feel like improvements to the game and add some freshness to it. I’m going to have to start working on my mastery of River now.

The version 2 update goes live on February 26th, 2019. Read the full update notes here.

 

What games are you getting addicted to? Share in the comments!