Tainted Grail: The Fall of Avalon

[Maryokutai]

 

Saw a demo for this on Xbox over the weekend and gave it a shot. I'm not a 100% familiar with it but from what I understand Tainted Grail is some kind of tabletop IP that previously got turned into a roguelike ( @shinymcshine made a topic about it). So the next big step for a small developer is, of course, doing a complete TES-like.

Sounds nonsensically ambitious, but going by the demo there seems to be something here. It channels a bit of a darker tone than Bethesda's games, bringing certain horror themes to the aesthetic as well, but overall this is probably about as close as you can get to TES without straight up copying it. The story somehow revolves around the arthurian legend, though to which extent I cannot say, but it gives it a unique hook at least.

 

The console demo is rather short and more or less only includes its 30 minutes tutorial 'get out of the dungeon's segment, but apparently there has been an Early Access version on Steam for quite some time. Can't speak much on that but people seem to like it.

 

Planned for next year, oddly enough only for Xbox at this time (alongside PC of course).

[shinymcshine]

I'll imagine the reality being more akin to Two Worlds / Risen / Outward than Elder Scrolls - so critically panned but actually a fair amount of fun to be had if you don't mind the rough edges.

[Maryokutai]

Oh for sure this will get the eurojank label slapped onto it with the unavoidable -15% score decrease. I just threw TES in there because it's the obvious source of inspiration, with 1st person, silent protagonist, levelling up through 'doing things'. Even the three colour-coded bars for health, stamina and mana might as well be directly imported from Oblivion.

 

The demo is technically sound already though, so that's a good sign. It's not a looker though, so might as well pump the resources into the framerate I suppose.

[Maryokutai]

 

This snuck up on me a bit, coming out this Friday. Now I wouldn't necessarily recommend picking this up on release blindly, there's a lot of potential for this to be a janky, broken mess. But maybe one to put on the wishlist and see how player feedback develops and matures over the next weeks and months. That's my plan at least – it's more of a fall/winter type game for me anyway. But if it's good it certainly deserves more support than the recently released messed-up remaster of a legendary game by the industry's biggest publisher.

[Maf]

This looks really interesting actually. Have to see what the reviews are like 

[shinymcshine]

Definitely on the 'to play' list - having enjoyed "Tainted Grail: Conquest" and the whole warped Arthurian theme.

 

But - if it's not coming to GP then I'll wait from a price drop (as I've got way too many 'to play' on GP before I'm going to be buying).

 

There's a fair breakdown of how it plays here (no obvious spoilers that I noted).

 

https://gamingbolt.com/tainted-grail-the-fall-of-avalon-everything-you-need-to-know

[radiofloyd]

This looks very impressive. Would be curious to read impressions if anyone takes a chance on it.

[Maryokutai]

It's getting quite decent reviews and impressions, the biggest issue seems to be performance and it being locked at 1080p on consoles (finally I have the last laugh with my ancient TV). Series S version seems to struggle really hard though, maybe that's one to avoid.