14 DAY TRIAL // The world of strategy RPGs is vast and varied, so it will be hard for Blade Prince Academy, a little indie gem in development at Angel Corp, to stand out. After having played through its entire demo that’s now available on Steam, I have to say that the game has potential.
The anime-inspired art style is well done and the idea behind the combat system is pretty decent. In Blade Prince Academy, you take control of a party of Blade Princes, highly trained magical assassins, who’s sole purpose is to protect the dark city of Abjectalia from threats like chaotic vampires, gangs, and cults.
After a mysterious force attack the Prince Academy and most of the students are killed, Phoebos and his friends are tasked with discovering who’s behind the brutal attack and remove the guilty actors from existence.
The meaty part of the game though is the combat. Blade Prince Academy adopts a real-time with pause combat system where you tap “Space” to pause the game and give commands. The strategy part involves good positioning of your characters to get the best possible damage from your special abilities. Moreover, many of the abilities each character has can be “augmented” with additional effects that can turn the tide of battle.
Truth be told, the first part of the game isn’t that challenging, but I’m pretty sure things become more serious after the first hour (the time it takes to finish the demo). In between missions, you can upgrade your academy’s facilities to be able to recruit more characters for your party or improve the potency and number of your healing potions.
Typically, you’ll be taking 3 or more characters with you in a mission. Some characters are mandatory for certain missions, but what makes it interesting is that the game gives you information about what type of enemies you’ll encounter. This is very important since some are resistant to physical damage, while other are resistant to magical abilities. The information will allow you to pick the characters that dish out one type of damage or the other.
Each mission has an objective, but exploration is encouraged thanks to the addition of chests and destructible objects that reward in-game currency. Chests can contain so-called pacts, which are basically powers that increase some of the stats of your chosen character and decrease others. They are specifically designed for certain classes, so it’s pretty obvious to which character a pact is more suitable for.
There seems to be a social aspect in the game too, but I’m not sure what are the benefits. At the end of each mission, you get to choose what to do and depending on your choice two characters will have their relationship improved.
Classes in Blade Prince Academy seem pretty varied, but the skill tree and quite limited. What I liked about the game is that you can choose your spells loadout before every mission, as well as reset the skills at any time while not on a mission.
Conclusion
I’m also interested to see how the progression system works and how many facilities you’ll be able to build and upgrade inside the Academy. The relationship mechanic is also something interesting that I can’t wait to learn more about.
Without trying to reinvent the wheel, Blade Prince Academy manages to make itself enjoyable. I hope the story is at least mildly interesting because the combat system is quite decent. I encourage everyone who likes the demo to support the game's Kickstarter campaign that ends in June.
