Skulls of the Shogun Bone-A-Fide Edition Switch NSP Free Download GAMESPACK.NET

Skulls of the Shogun Bone-A-Fide Edition Switch NSP Free Download GAMESPACK.NET Another day, another strategy game releases on Switch. With the arrival of the excellent Tiny Metal: Full Metal Rumble and a brand new Fire Emblem game, it seems we’re rather spoilt for choice in a genre that’s already delivered us the likes of Wargroove, Valkyria Chronicles 4 and the sublime Into the Breach, to name just a few in recent times. Skulls of the Shogun is a little longer in the tooth, having first released way back in January of 2013, and at this point has been ported to just about every conceivable platform. It arrives here on Switch in exactly the same form as you’ll remember it, with this version also including the Bone-A-Fide update which landed just a few months after its initial release – adding four new levels to the already generous campaign mode, a new Tanuki monk unit, multiplayer maps, dev commentary and player progression system. Players once again assume the role of recently-deceased General Akamoto who absolutely refuses to take his place in the somewhat long queue for the afterlife; instead, he decides to kick off against the armies of the undead rather than stand in line for a few hundred years to find out. TOP/BEST ADULT VIDEO GAMES IN UNITED STATES OF AMERICA (USA)

Skulls of the Shogun Bone-A-Fide Edition Switch NSP Free Download GAMESPACK.NET

if he’s to be judged worthy to enter the Four Seasons of the Glorious Afterlife. Skulls’ kooky, eccentric sense of humour and bold art style has won it many fans over the years, and it really doubles down on the laughs from the get-go, with plenty of poopy-pants-level conversations and references to modern pop culture littered throughout the lengthy campaign. It may not be to everyone’s tastes, but if it is your bag you’ll be more than entertained here. Sense of humour and aesthetics aside, Skulls also creates a unique identity for itself through a number of gameplay tweaks to the usual systems. The biggest change here is the ability to move your units around freely within a pre-determined circle before launching an attack, rather than having to bump them along on the traditional grid system usually employed in the genre. It’s a change that initially feels liberating, giving the game a slightly more action-oriented feel, almost in the same vein as Valkyria Chronicles. However, it does bring with it its own share of problems. the main one of which is the fact your tiny troops often obscure each other due to the fact you’ll spend a lot of your time lining them up in very close proximity to one another in order to build a “Spirit Wall”.

A fast-paced, arcade-inspired blend of arcade action and turn-based strategy!

The game’s other major gameplay addition. Spirit walls provide units with extra defence, blocking enemy attacks and movement and are something you’ll come to rely on greatly, especially later in the game as you turtle your way through levels to protect General Akamoto at all costs (if he dies, it’s game over). The camera angle doesn’t help in this regard and things can get a little cluttered and confusing, with the general rhythm and flow of the tactical action often being interrupted because you’re not quite sure how best to move your troops around the allowed area; it turns out the good old precise grid system employed by most other games in the genre isn’t popular for no reason. Having said that, the flexibility of movement does allow you to get up to some fun little tricks; our favourite being the ability to kick enemy units off cliffs to their demise, something that really never grows old and fits in perfectly with the irreverent tone of the game. Besides these little niggles, however, Skulls of the Shogun in solo mode is a slick, fun and surprisingly deep strategy game with a very generous campaign whose laid back, fun story is well-written and acted and will certainly take you some time to chew your way through. Blade of Darkness Switch NSP

Skulls of the Shogun Bone-A-Fide Edition Switch NSP Free Download GAMESPACK.NET

It also, more importantly, continues to add layers to its turn-based battling over the course of proceedings with a robust roster of unit types including archers, cavalry, a God for each season and the delightful monk characters – Crow, Salamander and Fox – who act as Wind, Fire and Healers respectively. You’ll also still get to engage in the troubling act of undead cannibalism from whence the game derives its moniker; eating the skulls of your foes ranks up the HP of your units. Grisly, but gripping. Away from single-player content, the big draw with Skulls of the Shogun has always been its multiplayer modes; indeed, the multiplayer option quite unusually takes pride of place atop the game’s menu and it’s here, unfortunately, that we run into a bit of a major problem with this Switch edition. We’re not sure if it’s down to netcode problems – or the fact that the game has been out on so many other platforms for such a long time that interest in the game has waned – but we could not find a single game to play online. We’ve even held fire on our review to test online again once the game released and, unfortunately, now just shy of a week later, things haven’t changed. Searching for online action either brought us up empty-handed or, more worryingly, crashed us back to the console’s homescreen.

Rampage through 24 levels in an epic single-player campaign!

I had heard of Skulls of the Shogun at various shows before. Like Orcs Must Die and a handful of other indies, it’s a game that gains a lot of accolades but was never on my appointments list due to its non-Sony platform affiliations. At the beginning of June, though, everyone with PlayStation Plus received Skulls of the Shogun: Bone-a-Fide Edition free. And I hope everyone who received the game downloaded it, because this is one of those Plus offerings that you will most definitely want to get your hands on. Skulls of the Shogun is a turn-based strategy game where you control a general and his army of soldiers. The usual objective is to dispatch the enemy’s general. Each turn, you can carry out five orders. (An order consists of movement and/or one action, in either order.) You are usually in control of more than five units, so right off the bat you’ve got some strategizing to do. The game is fundamentally different from most similar, tactical games I’ve played because there are no tiles, hexes, squares, etc. Each unit has a range within which it can move, something like Valkyria Chronicles or Warhammer 40k. In addition, each unit type has slightly different base stats. Deep Rock Galactic

Skulls of the Shogun Bone-A-Fide Edition Switch NSP Free Download GAMESPACK.NET

The horse-riding samurai, for example, can move the farthest but has mid-range attack and armor. The archer packs a powerful punch but gets hit really hard. Combat gets deeper when you factor in the spirit walls and environmental hazards. An attack from one of the two base melee units causes knockback unless the target is sidled up against one or more teammates. Even a general on the edge of a map can be knocked off with a well-directed prod. The environmental factors of war don’t stop there, either. Scattered around each map are rice fields, bases, shrines, and more. To control one of these structures, you must send a unit there to haunt it for an entire turn. Haunting a structure leaves a unit vulnerable to attack but resistant to knockback. It can also serve as a solid lure now and again. A rice field grants its controller 25 rice each round. Rice can be used to purchase units from bases (which must also be controlled) or to cast higher level monk spells. Monks are summoned by controlling a shrine. There’s a shrine for each monk (Fox, Salamander, Crow, and Tanuki), and some maps have a multi-shrine that allows you to summon a monk of your choosing.

Gain experience and fuse emblems with an all-new player progression system!

The game relies heavily on visual cues. Besides for the various shines calling forth different units, there’s a bunch of other information conveyed through the graphics. If an enemy can’t counter attack, it winces. If it can, it bears its gleaming weapon at you. Banners attached to the backs of units depict health totals. Downed enemies leave skulls scattered across the playing field that can be eaten to power up. I know it sounds silly to say this about a video game, but there’s a lot of visual information to take in. Luckily, the game does a good job making the cues distinguishable enough to not cause confusion. Skulls of the Shogun has a full-fledged campaign and a multiplayer component. The campaign took me about 5 and a half hours to complete, not including the Forgotten Isles section. Most of the missions until the very end teach you a thing or two about battle. You’ll often be outnumbered, but with some foresight and perhaps a couple of retries, you’ll learn how to overcome unfair odds. Along with the overall objective (kill the general), there are three golden skulls that can be earned by completing different tasks. One negative note about the golden skulls is that you don’t know how to obtain them before starting the mission.

I often completed a mission, saw the golden skull caveat, and thought, “oh, come on. I could have easily earned that.” I suppose this is set up in this way to push replayability. The game supports local or online multiplayer for up to four people. There are 36 maps in all, which seems like a lot. The first few multiplayer games I tried failed either at the outset or part-way through the battle. The game simply kicked everyone. I managed to complete two games online – one was taken over by AI by the time the game ended, and the other was a glorious comeback from a sole general to victory. I would love to play more of this game online, but it seems as if the community or the netcode is unreliable, at best. Joystiq says “…we found Skulls of the Shogun to be an absolutely enjoyable experience – so much so that we gave it a perfect score.” It’s fast-paced turn-based strategy inspired by Advance Wars, and supercharged with fighting-game flare! Enter the Samurai Afterlife and join forces with vibrant ghost-samurai warriors, magical animal monks, and mustachioed samurai generals. And now Skulls of the Shogun tastes even better in the Bone-a-Fide Edition, which adds a brand-new episode.

Skulls of the Shogun Bone-A-Fide Edition Switch NSP Free Download GAMESPACK.NET

The new Tanuki Monk, and a heaping helping of new features! So the aesthetic portions of the game are definitely good, but what of the actual gameplay, you ask? In short, it’s pretty damn good. Gameplay is turn based, but on each turn you have 5 “orders” that can be performed. Your team is comprised of various types of units (warriors, cavalry, archers), each of which has their own strengths and weaknesses. Instead of moving on tiles like other strategy games, the actions in this game are more free-roaming. Units are able to move anywhere they want, within a certain radius, and are also able to continue moving after performing an action, which adds to the level of strategy involved. One of your main goals is to eat the skulls of defeated opponents, which restores health. However, if a unit is able to eat 3 skulls, they transform into a Demon, which enables them to perform 2 actions per turn, which is a huge advantage. Gameplay becomes a delicate balancing act of attacking, positioning and staying alive long enough to power up.Blossom Tales II The Minotaur Prince Switch NSP

ADD ONS/PATCHES AND DLC’S: Skulls of the Shogun Bone-A-Fide Edition Switch NSP