14 DAY TRIAL // Armello, the Kickstarter-funded digital board game featuring some great artwork and very interesting mechanics, has successfully concluded its crowdfunding campaign.
The game managed to blow through a number of stretch goals, raising $305k / €222k over the course of the Kickstarter campaign, considerably more than the ambitious initial goal of $200k / €145k, thus securing the game’s launch on Android and Windows tablets in addition to the original intended platforms of PC, Mac, Linux and iOS.
Fans of strategy and board games have a legitimate reason to be excited, as the game shows the promise of a great production value, with sound mechanics and beautifully animated visuals.
Armello is being developed by League of Geeks, an Australian studio showing a genuine passion for board games, and their talent and dedication to the project is easily apparent from the Kickstarter pitch.
There aren’t too many such titles, mixing board game and card game mechanics and offering a polished experience in the vein of Blizzard’s much-lauded Hearthstone, and Armello has all the hallmarks of such a great title.
The setup is simple, when the king of the anthropomorphic kingdom of Armello falls ill to a mysterious ailment, the four great clans send their greatest heroes to claim the throne and save the realm from certain doom.
You take on the role of one such hero, and embark on a quest to explore the lands and vanquish your foes, performing the Mad King’s edicts and taking on other players with the same ultimate goal in mind.
Players will use an action points system to move their heroes across the hexagonal board, completing quests, capturing settlements to raise your income, gathering followers, exploring dungeons and hoarding treasure and battling other heroes using the game’s unique dice-based combat mini-game.
After hitting the “End Turn” button, players will be busy micro-managing their faction, recruiting followers, equipping items and purchasing talents in each hero’s unique skill tree, while the other players take their turns.
On top of this, over 100 unique animated cards can be used in order to achieve various effects, as card play is fully integrated within the game mechanics.
Players will draw cards from a common deck, and then play them to equip items, recruit characters, trade, or for other more strategic purposes such as healing, casting spells using them in combat for better odds.
Apart from the fact that the game has secured funding, the good news is that those of you who missed the chance to back Armello during the crowdfunding campaign can still do so on the game’s website via PayPal or Amazon, where they can also mark their pre-purchase as a gift.