Clever Plays shows off Happy Bastards open-world tactical RPG
Clever Plays, a Montreal-based indie game studio, showed off Happy Bastards, itsirreverent open-world tactical RPG, with a new combat trailer during Sunday’s PC Gaming Show at Summer Games Fest. In conjunction with the showcase, the studio also posted a playable combat demo on Steam to provide a hands-on look at the turn-based combat highlighted in the trailer. “We’ve really been having fun with the combat aspect of the game, working closely with ourinsider community and playtesting to get the feel of the combat just right,” said Mattieu Bégin,creative director for Clever Plays, in a statement. “So we didn’t want to wait to share the combat demo with a larger audience. That said, we’ve planned a more robust demo that shows off all aspects of the game, including the real-time open-world exploration, toward the end of this year.” Previously revealed by the Future Games Show during Summer Game Fest 2024, HappyBastards is an open-world tactical RPG with turn-based combat in which players assemble anunruly squad to help make them a legend through reckless adventuring, bloody fights, lucrativelooting, and dirty dealings. Let the bastards do the dirty work while you give the orders, reap the rewards, and enjoy the high life. This morally bankrupt mercenary sandbox with tactical combat, RPG progression, and a world that reacts to player choices encourages players to become famous by any means necessary. Happy Bastards delivers all the gameplay and features that fans of the turn-based tactical RPGgenre expect — enlisting, evolving, and equipping a group of combatants to take part in acampaign of turn- and grid-based battles with plenty of strategic options; resource management, and an abundance of classes, stats, and abilities and upgrades; and an open-world filled with choices, and a large variety of enemies, NPCs, locations and treasures to encounter. All of this is set against a bawdy and boisterous backdrop and the quest for fame at any cost. When fame is the prize, everything’s fair game. While much of the game is yet to come, the demo released today simulates a dungeon delve,including combat and exploration. Here are four main features that make Happy Bastards’combat system deep and unique: ● Tactics-heavy battlefields – Turn-based combat takes place on small terrains with a square grid, with tactical options such as elevation, line of sight, positional bonuses, control zones, tile effects, traps, shoving and falling, and orthogonal targeting that make positioning and facing really meaningful.● Commands – While players control their mercenaries as in any other game, here theydo so from the sidelines as the main character, barking commands, and contributing tocombat from a shared pool of abilities – several of which can be used each round inaddition to the mercs’ abilities, creating a lot of tactical flexibility.● Tag-team system – One Command, the Tag-Team Swap, redefines squad building and combat dynamics by letting you swap specialized combatants mid-fight, so you always use the “right tool for the right job” even with only three mercenaries on the field at once.● Living characters – Despite the name, the Happy Bastards are NOT perfectly docile soldiers who stoically accept their fate. Quite the contrary! They will react, speak their mind, and impose their battle whims – from simple quips and combat modifiers, to panicking or fleeing. It’s a viable strategy to try to make the enemy team implode in panic. “We’re looking forward to sharing more of the game in the coming months, but hope people willjoin us on our development journey,” said Bégin, in a statement. “People can still sign up for our Insider Program within the Discord, so they’ll be the first to know when we begin testing the open world play. Wishlist and download the Happy Bastards combat demo on Steam. Founded in 2013 as a husband-and-wife team, Clever Plays is a 10-person indie development studio based in Montreal. The team is driven by a mission to create innovative games that combine solid gameplay and unique worlds, while striving to conquer new challenges with each game. Clever Plays’ most recent title was Operation: Tango, a stylistic co-op espionage game that won numerous Best Multiplayer Awards and accolades for Art Direction, Game Design, and more. The studio’s previous game, the 2016 Leap of Fate, a fast-paced rogue-lite in a magical cyberpunk setting, earned a Metacritic score of 80. The post Clever Plays shows off Happy Bastards open-world tactical RPG appeared first on GamesBeat.
Clever Plays, a Montreal-based indie game studio, showed off Happy Bastards, its
irreverent open-world tactical RPG, with a new combat trailer during Sunday’s PC Gaming Show at Summer Games Fest.
In conjunction with the showcase, the studio also posted a playable combat demo on Steam to provide a hands-on look at the turn-based combat highlighted in the trailer.
“We’ve really been having fun with the combat aspect of the game, working closely with our
insider community and playtesting to get the feel of the combat just right,” said Mattieu Bégin,
creative director for Clever Plays, in a statement. “So we didn’t want to wait to share the combat demo with a larger audience. That said, we’ve planned a more robust demo that shows off all aspects of the game, including the real-time open-world exploration, toward the end of this year.”
Previously revealed by the Future Games Show during Summer Game Fest 2024, Happy
Bastards is an open-world tactical RPG with turn-based combat in which players assemble an
unruly squad to help make them a legend through reckless adventuring, bloody fights, lucrative
looting, and dirty dealings. Let the bastards do the dirty work while you give the orders, reap the rewards, and enjoy the high life. This morally bankrupt mercenary sandbox with tactical combat, RPG progression, and a world that reacts to player choices encourages players to become famous by any means necessary.
Happy Bastards delivers all the gameplay and features that fans of the turn-based tactical RPG
genre expect — enlisting, evolving, and equipping a group of combatants to take part in a
campaign of turn- and grid-based battles with plenty of strategic options; resource management, and an abundance of classes, stats, and abilities and upgrades; and an open-world filled with choices, and a large variety of enemies, NPCs, locations and treasures to encounter. All of this is set against a bawdy and boisterous backdrop and the quest for fame at any cost. When fame is the prize, everything’s fair game.
While much of the game is yet to come, the demo released today simulates a dungeon delve,
including combat and exploration. Here are four main features that make Happy Bastards’
combat system deep and unique:
● Tactics-heavy battlefields – Turn-based combat takes place on small terrains with a square grid, with tactical options such as elevation, line of sight, positional bonuses, control zones, tile effects, traps, shoving and falling, and orthogonal targeting that make positioning and facing really meaningful.
● Commands – While players control their mercenaries as in any other game, here they
do so from the sidelines as the main character, barking commands, and contributing to
combat from a shared pool of abilities – several of which can be used each round in
addition to the mercs’ abilities, creating a lot of tactical flexibility.
● Tag-team system – One Command, the Tag-Team Swap, redefines squad building and combat dynamics by letting you swap specialized combatants mid-fight, so you always use the “right tool for the right job” even with only three mercenaries on the field at once.
● Living characters – Despite the name, the Happy Bastards are NOT perfectly docile soldiers who stoically accept their fate. Quite the contrary! They will react, speak their mind, and impose their battle whims – from simple quips and combat modifiers, to panicking or fleeing. It’s a viable strategy to try to make the enemy team implode in panic.
“We’re looking forward to sharing more of the game in the coming months, but hope people will
join us on our development journey,” said Bégin, in a statement. “People can still sign up for our Insider Program within the Discord, so they’ll be the first to know when we begin testing the open world play.
Wishlist and download the Happy Bastards combat demo on Steam. Founded in 2013 as a husband-and-wife team, Clever Plays is a 10-person indie development studio based in Montreal. The team is driven by a mission to create innovative games that combine solid gameplay and unique worlds, while striving to conquer new challenges with each game. Clever Plays’ most recent title was Operation: Tango, a stylistic co-op espionage game that won numerous Best Multiplayer Awards and accolades for Art Direction, Game Design, and more. The studio’s previous game, the 2016 Leap of Fate, a fast-paced rogue-lite in a magical cyberpunk setting, earned a Metacritic score of 80.
The post Clever Plays shows off Happy Bastards open-world tactical RPG appeared first on GamesBeat.
irreverent open-world tactical RPG, with a new combat trailer during Sunday’s PC Gaming Show at Summer Games Fest.
In conjunction with the showcase, the studio also posted a playable combat demo on Steam to provide a hands-on look at the turn-based combat highlighted in the trailer.
“We’ve really been having fun with the combat aspect of the game, working closely with our
insider community and playtesting to get the feel of the combat just right,” said Mattieu Bégin,
creative director for Clever Plays, in a statement. “So we didn’t want to wait to share the combat demo with a larger audience. That said, we’ve planned a more robust demo that shows off all aspects of the game, including the real-time open-world exploration, toward the end of this year.”
Previously revealed by the Future Games Show during Summer Game Fest 2024, Happy
Bastards is an open-world tactical RPG with turn-based combat in which players assemble an
unruly squad to help make them a legend through reckless adventuring, bloody fights, lucrative
looting, and dirty dealings. Let the bastards do the dirty work while you give the orders, reap the rewards, and enjoy the high life. This morally bankrupt mercenary sandbox with tactical combat, RPG progression, and a world that reacts to player choices encourages players to become famous by any means necessary.
Happy Bastards delivers all the gameplay and features that fans of the turn-based tactical RPG
genre expect — enlisting, evolving, and equipping a group of combatants to take part in a
campaign of turn- and grid-based battles with plenty of strategic options; resource management, and an abundance of classes, stats, and abilities and upgrades; and an open-world filled with choices, and a large variety of enemies, NPCs, locations and treasures to encounter. All of this is set against a bawdy and boisterous backdrop and the quest for fame at any cost. When fame is the prize, everything’s fair game.
While much of the game is yet to come, the demo released today simulates a dungeon delve,
including combat and exploration. Here are four main features that make Happy Bastards’
combat system deep and unique:
● Tactics-heavy battlefields – Turn-based combat takes place on small terrains with a square grid, with tactical options such as elevation, line of sight, positional bonuses, control zones, tile effects, traps, shoving and falling, and orthogonal targeting that make positioning and facing really meaningful.
● Commands – While players control their mercenaries as in any other game, here they
do so from the sidelines as the main character, barking commands, and contributing to
combat from a shared pool of abilities – several of which can be used each round in
addition to the mercs’ abilities, creating a lot of tactical flexibility.
● Tag-team system – One Command, the Tag-Team Swap, redefines squad building and combat dynamics by letting you swap specialized combatants mid-fight, so you always use the “right tool for the right job” even with only three mercenaries on the field at once.
● Living characters – Despite the name, the Happy Bastards are NOT perfectly docile soldiers who stoically accept their fate. Quite the contrary! They will react, speak their mind, and impose their battle whims – from simple quips and combat modifiers, to panicking or fleeing. It’s a viable strategy to try to make the enemy team implode in panic.
“We’re looking forward to sharing more of the game in the coming months, but hope people will
join us on our development journey,” said Bégin, in a statement. “People can still sign up for our Insider Program within the Discord, so they’ll be the first to know when we begin testing the open world play.
Wishlist and download the Happy Bastards combat demo on Steam. Founded in 2013 as a husband-and-wife team, Clever Plays is a 10-person indie development studio based in Montreal. The team is driven by a mission to create innovative games that combine solid gameplay and unique worlds, while striving to conquer new challenges with each game. Clever Plays’ most recent title was Operation: Tango, a stylistic co-op espionage game that won numerous Best Multiplayer Awards and accolades for Art Direction, Game Design, and more. The studio’s previous game, the 2016 Leap of Fate, a fast-paced rogue-lite in a magical cyberpunk setting, earned a Metacritic score of 80.
The post Clever Plays shows off Happy Bastards open-world tactical RPG appeared first on GamesBeat.
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