What happens when you strip Fire Emblem of all its best parts? - Redemption Reapers Quick Review

PLAY IT OR SKIP IT?

Skip it unless you’re desperate for a quick hit of tactical RPG. Redemption Reapers boasts game designers, composers, and even voice talent from the Fire Emblem series, so maybe my expectations were a little too high. But beyond not living up to the massive potential of the Fire Emblem franchise, Redemption Reapers is mediocre in general.

TIME PLAYED

I’ve made it four hours into Redemption Reapers, which has taken me to chapter eight in the story. Thus far each chapter is a single tactical map, plus cutscenes. I also spent a bit of time grinding on old maps with the game’s Skirmish mode, as well as messing around with weapon upgrades, skill point distribution, and all the other usual RPG stuff.

WHAT’S AWESOME

• Satisfying follow-up attacks. The core turn-based tactical combat of Redemption Reapers is deeply unremarkable but not bad at least. But I will give the game some credit: I enjoyed setting up my party members to surround enemies and pull off devastating follow-up attacks. The game doesn’t provide a ton of tools to work with, so these high-damage maneuvers are more or less necessary for success, but they still feel good to accomplish.

WHAT SUCKS

• Super generic aesthetic. Redemption Reapers has a sorta early Xbox 360 era look to its visuals: low-detail environments cover in grime and dirt, strangely smooth and shiny character models, and a color palette that can best be described as “brown on brown on brown...and sometimes gray.” As if that weren’t bad enough, I found the music totally forgettable, standing in stark contrast to what I’ve come to expect from great tactical RPGs.

• Boring story with low stakes. In this game, I took on the role of a small band of anti-heroes—the titular Redemption Reapers—desperately fighting back against a massive evil force of half-zombie-half-orc-looking creeps called the Mort. From that setup, the game doles out tidbits of backstory on these dark characters and their doomed world at a painfully slow rate. If the plot had hooked me in sooner, I might have been tempted to stick with the game, but I wasn’t given any real sense of motivation, grand adventure, or even the slightest reason to care about what was happening.

• Bland map design. Putting together a great tactical RPG map is harder than it looks, but Redemption Reapers has some of the least interesting maps I’ve seen before. Many of the maps are just one or two narrow hallways through a village, crammed full of one or two dozen enemies. Sometimes I had the option to try to escape or to aim for a boss rather than trying to wipe out every enemy, but beyond that I never encountered much variety. The most excitement I ran into thus far was being ambushed by another half-dozen Mort when I was almost finished with a map. Cool!

• Extremely limited character development. The main cast of Reapers have set weapon proficiencies—one uses daggers, one uses swords, one is a big tanky guy with an axe, one is a weak lady with a bow, and so on. The characters get unique skills to learn that lean into their specialties, and I was able to choose which active or passive skills to buff up with my limited pool of skill points. Beyond that, though, the game doesn’t offer much in the way of customizing your character or making them your own.

💬 Are you skipping Redemption Reapers, or do you plan to play it and hope to look past the issues I had? Leave a comment below and share your feelings!