Demo Review - ASTRA: Knights of Veda - Coming to Mobile!

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ASTRA: Knights of Veda (Demo Reviewed)
Developer: FLINT
Publisher: HYBE IM
ASTRA: Knights of Veda is a new online action RPG that is presently available on Steam as part of SteamFest Demos from October 9th to October 16th. The game contains a lot of elements you'd expect from a Gacha, but based on what the developer has displayed and rewarded the player with thus far, it doesn't feel all that exciting to play in its current state due to a lot of issues which I will get into.
It is important to note that this game will be released on all mobile platforms at some point in the future; currently, it is only playable on the Steam PC demo version.
At the moment, we do not know when it will be available, but we do know that it will be available in the future. Pre-register on TapTap to gain access to it when it does.
Issues
The Gacha system & rewards In most circumstances, a Gacha will repeat the same process.
You play the game, and the game rewards you with a reasonable amount of currency, which you can exchange for other currency to buy stuff from in-game stores and shops for special gear or for more pulls for characters and equipment, or spend real money to get this reward much more quickly. The problem is that this game feels less rewarding and is being drowned out by this seemingly unfair system.
A whole MONTH!? The few methods to gain currency for pulls is to spend memory pieces for crystals in the shop, however, this is limited to one per month. While practically every single item in the shop is severely restricted. That is, you must grind for days before reaching a level such as 10 or 25. It's worth noting that it took 2 hours to hit level 4.
This is true for the shops too, which all have one-month or six-day refresh timers. It's ridiculous; it shouldn't be this lengthy. It follows that the only reliable way to achieve any real progress would be to constantly pull or play the game. A week for everything would make more sense and put less microtransaction influence.
The main concern I have with this is that you are not guaranteed a (5) star at the start. The game forces you to choose your first rolls which have very low possibilities. This makes it impossible for you to save 20 stars on the first pulls for new players, who have a 1 in 30/50 chance of getting a (5) star character which helps massively.
I hate weapon pulls. It's stupid, and you're usually not getting more than (1) memory of a character. It's generally a (4) star that you already have to unlock their fate potential and then a lot of weapons which you can already find on missions.
The Gacha is used in the game not to pull teams of characters, but to acquire their memories and harness their skills for your own. Allowing you to switch out of their forms and into your normal form with your (4) equipped memories.
There is nothing fundamentally wrong with this system, but I believe a better approach would have been to at the very least give the player their first (5) star 1/30 instead of wasting their time having to acquire it through slower content.
Consider this.
You offer the player a (5) star to assist them through the early game, after which they can begin farming for more. It's a much healthier approach of avoiding individuals from becoming burnt out on wasting scarce resources on inferior versions that will eventually be replaced because they just don't have higher power. 
Logins I'm not often troubled by the requirement for games to have various login options.
Though this is clearly a mobile game and is being launched on PC first. It's just so inconvenient to have to log in twice to play the game, especially without the option to select "guest" as most do. It's just a minor inconvenience, but I prefer not having to log in with multiple accounts for a single game especially through Steam.
Crashes There were a number of crashes and issues related to the resolution, but they were small and resolved themselves with time. There were a few instances of crashing while on missions, though thankfully energy is not consumed until completion. 
Translations It is common when dialog is translated from Korean or Japanese to English. The dialogue appears to be all over the place and makes no sense at points, especially with the voice actors stating completely different things.
Story
I can't take this seriously in English So, let's get into the story. You are slain while attempting to penetrate the Mad King's castle in order to slay him and prevent his lunacy from spreading throughout the realm. The Goddess saves and marks you a Knight of Veda and Master of the Book.
The issue is that this alone is something that everyone in the realm is aware of. You show them this book, and they will let you do almost anything and believe in you and aid you in your quest. You're also a Knight or Veda, although that's secondary.
You meet a citizen caravan and they watch you use your powers in the very first task after the Tutorial. Shocked and in amazement, they inform you that they require assistance and that you should proceed to the Castle to request the assistance of the knights there. You were given a hammer as "proof" that you were sent, but why?
This story does not sit well with me. Why is the player in need of a hammer? This isn't proof, anyone could have killed the citizens and taken the hammer as proof. The player is the realm's most sworn guardian, gifted by the goddess herself. It would have made so much more sense to just escort them through the valley and over the hill or shown the guards the book like the character does with everyone else.
In the English translation this is all the NPC conversation ever talks about in virtually every single line, to the point where it is no longer amusing but annoying.
"MASTER OF THE BOOK!?"
"Is it true!?" *Whispers*
"THE MASTER OF THE BOOK!?"
This is more than being picky, but I had to change the audio to Japanese not only because of this conversation, but also because English actors are all British, which isn't a bad thing, but they don't put any emotion behind their words, making everything sound sarcastic in specific instance of panic, etc. 
Pacing It appears that for a large portion of the chapters, you are sitting there waiting for cutscene after cutscene and story after story to unfold, until you finally get to play the game, only to be cut off by another storm of cutscenes and story after 1 or 2 missions, which are energy based, meaning you will have to stop at some point and replenish.
You'll play the game following the story of the goddess and your mission to find her 12 fragments of her heart, which she bestowed upon the previous 12 masters.
Presentation
Acceptable The aesthetics used in the 2D elements are the game's compelling reason to play it, it feels so Kamitani. When it comes to the armor and weaponry are all to scale with how they would look in real life especially heavy armor. The scenery matches the character aesthetics, and it's just so nice to look at everything around you.
The backdrop scenery is blurry, especially when the game zooms in close, but it's still decent enough not to dismiss. On the other hand, the music is hit or miss, sometimes being fantastic and other times being annoying and loud while not fitting in.
Some basic variety It's wonderful to see that you can vary your appearance a little, even if it's quite basic and not very customizable. It's preferable than being a generic male or female with no capacity to customize your skin tone or features. However, having the possibility to change this later in game with special currency, which is already so difficult to get for anything substantial unless you're willing to farm for hours, is a bit sad.
Gameplay
If you like games where the sole objective is to beat up monsters with the mashing of buttons, then this is a game for you. It's entertaining, challenging at times but a bit clunky owing to stuns that are imposed to you if you take damage but it is excellent for what it does. You have (4) memories to choose from, in which case you use their powers in battle to aid you in taking down bosses and moving the story forward.
Throughout each chapter, the game sends you on missions.
Each location has a number of tasks you must accomplish before reaching the boss stage. You can roam around the visible screen and occasionally find treasure and mysteries, but the main goal here is to take some memories, run in, and battle. You can also waste time destroying rocks and barrels till stuff drops if you desire supplies or complete the same mission over and over again to acquire certain drops that you might need for food, gear or achievements.
I don't feel like you have the same sense of reward as you do in a typical Gacha, where you have particular spots that grant you significant quantities for the amount of energy consumed. Here, you have a lot of energy for almost nothing in exchange for buying or upgrading anything. These are the potential drops, they are not guaranteed, meaning you could spend 300 energy and not get it.
Inactivity Rewards The game feels inadequate in its attempts to reward the player with importance, if you leave the game, the game provides rewards, up to a maximum of 24 hours. These do not add up to much in the start. A few of gold, nothing important. It could be great if it was 100% more effective and didn't give out such small amounts. You can enhance them by playing the game, but the gains are extremely minor overall.
Enhancing You won't get far without the power of memories and their weapons, trinkets.
It is critical to increase them as you travel deeper into the world. If you discover that you are too weak to complete the current quest, you will have to return later when you have farmed up enough tomes to level, or you can try your luck by pulling some 5 stars if you have saved up enough currency, which is scarce. Don't waste your points on non-new player pulls. It's critical that you use the ones you can as soon as possible after being forced to use your first 10 stars. Use them all on the 8 star pulls; this will at the very least ensure you obtain a (5) star early on and avoid bad RNG.
If you ask me, the rewards you get when you level up are equally mediocre. You don't get a lot of pulls. I really hope they find better ways to reward features rather than making it so difficult to obtain non-payment pulls, only time will tell.
Conclusion
Love the gameplay, hate the Gacha The game's beat'em'up aspect is enjoyable. The character designs and styles are all distinct and intriguing. The only flaw is that it is a Gacha. In light of games such as Dragon's Crown that feels exactly like how this game feels. It feels like a Vanilla Ware game that is adding in all of these features that don't need to be a part of this game.
I don't hate Gachas; they can be entertaining and enjoyable to play. It's just that I feel that a lot of these games incorporate Gacha aspects simply because it's such a popular thing, causing the overall quality of their game to suffer as a result when the game becomes more of a slow paced, time sink than an actual pleasant game.
Most of these features, as well as the majority of the game in general, should see some changes. Possibly most of these things will be tweaked to make them less frustrating and more rewarding? I just didn't feel like my time was being rewarded after 5 hours of playtime, but rather that I was being pressured to buy in-game currency in the future so that I could unlock the better characters and continue playing without energy restrictions. It's just so upsetting because it's such a visually beautiful game to look at and fun to play, but feels ruined due to features included.
This concludes my views of this game; while my opinions may be met with criticism, that is what distinguishes gamers; you don't have to like the same things as others, nor do you have to agree with them. If you want to catch me on one of my streams or locate me on social media, you may do so at the following locations, I'm always playing something new.
- Pawkt
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Comments
Latest
carlos martins
carlos martins
1
Is this gatcha?!?!? Another bomb, at least this one had the decency to change the art style... cute little girl with a badly washed ass face was already saturated! Two elements that already ruin a game,This one at least has just one at first, hopefully the gameplay is at least average, having an average quality, it's already good. With so many bad games coming out or in beta that never end, whatever average is already good!
10/10/2023
Pawkt
Pawkt
TapTap Creator
Pawkt
Author
1
I wholeheartedly agree. According to my knowledge, the developer Flint used prior games or something as a reference but by adding the function of a Gacha, really began to ruin the quality of it as a whole. The gameplay is excellent, but you are continuously bothered by the subpar rewards for your time commitment. In addition, the game takes away a large portion of your first pulls, forcing you to waste them on non-new player stuff (you waste scarce stars) Hopefully they pull this feature and it isn't in the full version.
10/10/2023
thanhken
thanhken
1
story 2* you just need to press the skip button. presentation 3* because you pressed the skip button. game play 5* Champions are the most imbalanced? Tanker is too strong .Mages are so useless.No one uses support for pvp why ? and connect together just a farce there are too many problems
10/19/2023
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Gipsy Stylle
Gipsy Stylle
nice game!
10/17/2023
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