Reviews

• gamedeal user

  Oct 4, 2021

  Solasta: Crown of the Magister is a fantasy tactics game which uses Dungeons & Dragons rules. The player controls a party of four characters on a quest to protect the kingdom from a mysterious enemy, in turn based combat.

  Combat (mostly good)

  • Unlike other games where you create the main character and then recruit companions, in Solasta all four party members are created by the player. The character creator allows you to choose any combination of the usual D&D options including human, dwarf, elf, half-elf, cleric, paladin, ranger, rogue, warrior and wizard. • Fight against a wide variety of enemies such as human bandits, goblins, orcs, zombies, skeletons, vampires, spiders, lizardmen, elementals and more. • Each turn your characters can move, attack, cast spells and use items such as potions or scrolls. You can take these actions in any order, and can easily switch between melee and ranged weapons, which gives you lots of tactical freedom. • You can “ready” a melee or ranged attack, or a basic spell, to trigger when an enemy moves in range, which is this game’s version of overwatch. There are also attacks of opportunity when somebody on either side attempts to leave their opponent’s melee range. • You can use stealth to initiate combat and get a bonus round of attacks on surprised enemies. Enemies can also surprise your party while travelling or resting on the world map. • The maps are fully 3D, and the environment has a big effect on combat tactics, with archers on high walls, flying enemies such as drakes or mages using a levitation spell to escape melee range, while characters take fall damage when knocked off ledges. • The difficulty is nicely balanced for most of the game. Of course failing attack rolls can be annoying, but enemies seem to miss just as often, especially later in the game when you’ve found better armours. The one exception is an insane difficulty spike on a boss around 10 hours in, which is by far the most difficult fight in the game. Fortunately you can skip the fight by passing a dialogue skill check, so a few tactical reloads will save you a lot of frustration.

  Story / RPG mechanics (mostly poor)

  • While the story itself is fine, the way its presented doesn’t really live up to what I expect to see in an RPG. • The story is completely linear, and you can’t make any significant choices to change anything important. Most quests only have one way to solve them, and you don’t get any opportunities to support different factions. • Dialogue choices are extremely limited. During character creation you select personality traits, and they determine what your characters say during cutscenes. Most conversations with NPCs and between party members just play out automatically and don’t give the player any dialogue choices at all. Occasionally you can choose a single line for each character, but sometimes you need to select every option to complete the conversation anyway which doesn’t really count as a choice. • Voice acting is average quality. • The downside of all party members being player created is that the game doesn’t have any interesting characters. Minsc is still fondly remembered after 20 years, but by next week I’ll already have forgotten my Solasta party. • Most side quests are basic fetch quests that you pick up and turn in at a notice board, never even speaking to an NPC. Each party member gets a simple personal side quest based on the background you chose during character creation that takes about 10 minutes to complete.

  Technical (okay)

  • It took me 41 hours to complete the main quest and most of the fetch quests. • I haven’t noticed any bugs, crashes, or framerate problems. • The game’s tutorial is poor. I’ve played most of the major CRPGs, but I don’t play tabletop RPGs, and I don’t think I’ve encountered this specific ruleset before, so there were a few things that I wasn’t familiar with, such as legendary attacks, versatile weapons, and survival rolls after combat. I had to search for information about these things on the forum because Solasta doesn’t explain them in game.

  Overall recommendation (average)

  If you’re looking for an RPG to match the quality of Baldurs’ Gate, Dragon Age, Pillars of Eternity or The Witcher, you’ll probably be disappointed by Solasta, however if you just want a fantasy themed tactics game where you can focus on the combat, you can find some enjoyment here.
• gamedeal user

  Oct 24, 2021

  Good when you have no friends to play D&D with.
• gamedeal user

  Nov 25, 2021

  Clear skies!

  In essence, this is a turn-based tactical RPG, a combat-oriented dungeon crawler, not a choice-driven CRPG. More in the vein of Icewind Dale than anything. It's a pragmatic charmer that revolves around mechanical intricacies and linear storytelling rather than melodramatic relationships and uncurated experience. This is a principal distinction to make since it's vital to adjust one's expectations accordingly. Solasta exceeded mine, having all kinds of wild cards up its sleeve. Solasta itself is a unique world the devs had to come up with instead of Forgotten Realms since they've used an open gaming license. A different yet not completely alien setting, and some of the rules had to be changed or replaced, but it would be unnecessary for me to describe the particularities of how SRD guidelines work. D&D veterans will notice the discrepancies, but everyone else will take the smartly modified ruleset for granted.

  Presentation & Performance

  The game isn't cutting-edge, but the tasteful artistry of its fantasy architecture has left me amazed. Be that a library dungeon with books flying in the misty air over the bottomless abyss, biome-dependant sights like seething rivers of lava, or a chilling crypt - by and large, the game's presentation checks out. Together with wonderful animation, chunky models with ugly hair, serviceable textures, and good lighting casting crisp shadows. Alas, the looks are inconsistent. Starting with the apparent, the UI seems smooth and ergonomic at a glance but lacks flavor. And while some environments can be gorgeously lush, others appear washed-out or oversaturated. Say you've found a place to enjoy the view for a moment - there's a chance you'll spend the next few fighting the camera that tends to get stuck or go out of bounds. Although, it can be easily remedied by pressing a hotkey to center the view on your party. Nevertheless, great elemental effects made magic fun to use, even though they were often the reason for unwarranted frame drops that regularly bothered me throughout the game. They were worth it though. For one, a fireball produces an overwhelming atomic blast, which is a marvel to behold. Now, that's a properly overpowered screen cleaner! Probably the best one I've seen in any RPG. Hell, even mere healing looks epic. With crunchy sound effects and good music to boot.

  Session Zero

  Despite playing stuff like Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, and quite a few other games that feature the role-playing model before, I still don't know as much as I'd want to about min-maxing in D&D. So, I've created my party on the "I'll sure as Hell regret it later" basis. Even so, except for a few tricky optional fights, my sub-optimal characters didn't meet considerable resistance on medium difficulty. I could've raised it mid-game, but I didn't trust my builds enough. So, if you're D&D-savvy, go for the higher settings, but if you want flexibility - the default one is very forgiving. Either way, the system is customizable, allowing veteran players and newcomers to basically create their own rulesets. All in all, the 5-th edition seems rather streamlined. For example, it lets you unlearn at least 1 spell with each level, so you won't get stuck with a set you hate.

  Fables & Conjectures

  I enjoyed Solasta's easy-to-follow tale about a band of fortune-seeking underdogs accidentally caught in a vicissitude that includes a legendary magical McGuffin originated in an ancient empire and reptiloid aliens coming from trans-dimensional rifts. It builds on a classic fantasy premise with an absolute minimum amount of NPCs required to regurgitate the story for you. No time was wasted. Apart from the excitement of performing various speech checks, the dialog system comes to exhausting a few options before moving on. Which I'm not a fan of, but I suppose it always worked. I loved how consistently democratic the dialogues are though - each character has a say, and what they say depends on their personality traits that dictate their attitudes. An almost procedurally generated party dynamic writes itself. The system is firmly supported by decent voice acting and clever, mildly humorous writing that maintains the all-important stylistic balance, graciously dancing between the lines that keep exposition to a minimum and separate the narrative from coming off as sloppily frivolous or up-its-ass pompous. There was just the right equilibrium of pathos and camp for me to enjoy the funny bad lip sync as par for the course.

  Exploration

  The world of Solasta delivers a true D&D adventure with strong LotR vibes, maybe the strongest of all. Not all fantasy games are able to channel the spirit of the books so successfully. There's a great variety of biomes, from swamps to forests to peculiar fantasy places such as the magic library or necromancer's tower. Enter the ruins, descent into caves, land in an ancient dungeon that will make your skin crawl, or even create your own using the built-in editor. Based on the looks and the humble marketing, I expected it to be a pleasant, inoffensive, if a bit generic, dungeon crawler. For a few hours, it seemed like the case, but then I started to encounter amazing stuff you won't see anywhere else. If you're into bizarre, there's a whole bouquet of weird dimensions with insane geometry. And when told that an artifact allows its wearers to "run along walls", I didn't expect it to work so literally!

  Loot

  Unlike in a lot of games that are scared to lose an audience without bribing it all the time, you don't get showered with powerful items, which makes every valuable discovery dear to your heart. Obtaining a +1 item feels nice, to get your hands on a +2 is a reason to celebrate. A comprehensive crafting system complements this by gradually giving you access to some of the most powerful items in the game, making many kinds of ingredients a desirable find. All of it is balanced in a way that gives the player gratification without adding any hassle. Another loot mechanic, the Scavengers Guild, provides a perfect justification for the party not to work part-time as mules. After you're done with a location, they come and get all the rusty armor and similar trash you left behind while you collect your share in coin. It's always satisfactory to cash in since the game's economy is balanced and your gold actually matters until the end.

  Slicing & Dicing

  Solasta's combat doesn't shy away from verticality while also introducing a great variety of enemies, interactive environments, and stressing the importance of light, which made darkvision, torches, and certain cantrips useful. And boy, does it all add up! As a result, every other encounter develops in many complex ways and often ends up looking so busy that what transpires in its midst becomes indiscernible to an onlooker. Characters are jumping and flying around, walking on walls, squashing enemies with boulders; force fields and explosions fill the air while magical summons fight all kinds of unbelievable beasts, from vampires to minotaurs! And in that Scooby Doo snafu, you have to take a plethora of intricacies into account - exploit vulnerabilities, mind your positioning, think whether you need to go forth right now or set up an overwatch. And all of it feels so... fantasy. To the brim, to the max, you dig?

  Stay in the Light!

  I'm in awe of Solasta as an impossible project. I found myself loving it more and more with every hour as it kept charming its way to my heart. If someone had told me all the incoming variables of making a fully 3D RPG of such caliber for a comparatively laughable sum through the efforts of so few people, I'd tell these mad lads they were delusional. But here I am, praising their ambition's incarnate, their vision implemented, a paradoxical phenomenon. My curator Big Bad Mutuh
• gamedeal user

  Feb 2, 2022

  I’ve seen a fair few people not quite understanding what this game is, so I’m writing this to hopefully clarify some things for prospective customers. Solasta: Crown of the Magister is an adaptation of 5th Edition Dungeons & Dragons’ SRD (system reference document). This means that the game plays by the rules of 5E D&D with exaction. However, the SRD only contains that which its designers considered absolutely essential in order to run and play D&D. The 5th Edition SRD is released under the Open Game License (OGL), allowing anyone to use its contents freely in their own work for potential profit. Solasta’s marketing goes out of its way to mention that Tactical Adventures received a license from Wizards of the Coast to use the SRD. . . . But if you are reading this, you have the exact same license. The SRD does not contain multiclassing (it is an optional rule in 5E). That’s why this game doesn’t allow you to multiclass. The SRD contains only one feat, just to provide an example for content designers to build off of (feats are also optional in 5E). That’s why this game doesn’t contain the feats you will be familiar with. The SRD contains only one subclass per class, meaning it was necessary for the Tactical Adventures team to improvise their own subclasses to fill out a complete roster. Solasta’s original subclasses are not well-designed in my opinion. All that said, Solasta: Crown of the Magister is, as many have pointed out, the most faithful 5E game you’ll find at the moment. Compared to Baldur’s Gate III, this game is much more deserving of the Dungeons & Dragons mark if you consider only the fidelity of its mechanics (Larian has taken 5E’s system design into its own hands, to the system’s overall detriment). And Solasta is pretty fun sometimes, if you like 5E combat, and has some really nice touches, like the way jumping across gaps and ledges works. HOWEVER, as someone who backed right when this game came out in early access, now that it’s received a full release, I can’t really consider it a finished product. The point at which I got turned off was when TA started selling a paid DLC to add in base classes found in the SRD, which I assumed were something that would be included with the game’s full release. That DLC doesn’t contain all of the missing SRD classes, so I’d expect another one at a similar price point in the future. That means the game’s “true” price to get everything that should be included as a base feature will probably be $60, so the game needs to be measured against other games with a $60 launch price, or at least a $50 launch price. The game, of course, has other issues. Subclass balance is not great. You don’t have very much freedom with how you make your characters, and how you play them makes little difference, at least as far as I’ve seen. And since this is a turn-based game where you control a party of four characters, this game could and should support multiplayer (I mean, it’s Dungeons & Dragons, isn’t it?). I’d guess the fact that it doesn’t likely means there’s no one at Tactical Adventures capable of implementing it (i.e. it isn’t going to be patched in any time soon). This all adds up to my feeling that this game isn’t worth its full asking price. I wouldn’t say it’s a bad game, and it was made by a pretty small team with no previous titles that I know of; it’s a respectable accomplishment, and for that reason I don’t regret my decision to support its development. This game makes me wish I didn’t have to choose a thumbs up or a thumbs down for my review, because it’s a game that is just okay. It’s fairly competent, but it doesn’t measure up to its competitors. If you’re looking for a really solid, modern-feeling tabletop adaptation, you’d be better served by Pathfinder: Kingmaker or Wrath of the Righteous, and if you want to play a D&D video game with your friends and don’t mind dealing with some old-school jank, you’ll want Neverwinter Nights or Neverwinter Nights 2. Solasta: Crown of the Magister is only a good purchase if you’re a true 5E enthusiast.
• gamedeal user

  Apr 12, 2022

  It's games like this that makes me wish Steam had a "mixed" rating for reviews instead of a solid yes or no recommendation. On the one hand, Tactical Adventures absolutely nailed DnD 5e, from the combat to the classes to the systems that made the game run. Dungeon crawling is fun but challenging, there were only a few fights that had a huge difficulty spike but solid encounters most of the way through. On the other hand, if you're looking for a roleplay experience, look literally anywhere but here. The story is fine but man, the dialogue is absolutely horrendous. When you create your characters, you pick a background and the personality attributes. A great system in theory but then the game ignores the choices you made in literally every single social interaction your party has. My lawful good Paladin is supposed to be kind, altruistic and lawful so why is she constantly disrespecting authority? Why did she say that we should let the last survivors of a destroyed garrison squabble and kill each other? Because the plot demanded that someone says it... because reasons. Why is nobody in my party reacting to the undead filled castle in the middle of the spooky swamp? We literally asked a guy outside the castle what was going on with it, he tells us its full of undead who tolerate him.... because reasons and my party with a Paladin and a Cleric in it had no reaction to that news whatsoever. I can understand bad voice acting, especially when the company that made the game speaks a different launguage than you do. I can forgive weird animations, weird dialogue, even a generic plot. But this game will routinely rip you right out of any immersion you have and won't even realize it's doing it. If you want to do a bunch of dungeon crawls, Solasta is great for that, their systems are absolutely solid and you'll have fun. But man, Tactical Adventures. You guys need to hire some writers and shore up the roleplaying aspects of your games.
• gamedeal user

  Apr 30, 2022

  More than any other video game I've played, this game feels like playing D&D. It's not a triple-a, high-budget masterpiece. It's your cousin Mitch's homebrew campaign, and he's put a lot of work into it! It's Saturday afternoon, you're in his garage, there's a mini-fridge of soda and you're gonna order pizza later. Katie's elf wizard is hilariously stuck-up, and you're the only one paying attention to the plot, and the rogue insisted on sneaking ahead and got absolutely destroyed by a bunch of magic skeletons. Everyone rushes in to save him. You're all gonna play until 1 AM. I love this game. You might love it too.
• gamedeal user

  Jun 12, 2022

  Let's be honest, you're here because you don't have the time, fellow nerd-friends, or sufficiently patient DMs to keep playing DnD. So you went looking for a CRPG set in 5e and you've already maxed out at level 4 in Baldur's Gate III like seven times now. That led you digging further until you stumbled across this obscure title and you want to know if it will scratch that same itch - for me, it did, but here's where I'll qualify my recommendation: If you are an avid 5e fan, or explicitly are trying to get into 5e, this is your game. If you just sorta like CRPGs and want something you can drop 1000 hours into, this may struggle to earn your $40 with so much quality competition on the market. Overall, I currently give it a 6/10 with a solid 8 or 9 waiting for it on the horizon if the devs can continue releasing quality updates as they have been. That's pretty much my summary, but if you're interested in a more thorough breakdown: PRESENTATION: - The game's graphics, especially character models and animation, are pretty rough. Some are much better than others, but the player characters are especially jank - given how much time you spend looking at them, it will eventually catch your attention. The environments, however, are usually great - even the more "generic" caves and "necromancer lairs" feel practically made and inspired. While those seem like fairly negative takes overall, what's there gets the job done. It all struggles compared to other, more polished and larger projects, but Solasta's big strength comes from its flexibility and it's hard to be hard on the graphics when you realize the game was practically built for customization. - Voice acting also ranges immensely, with some performances anywhere from remarkably professional, but most feeling rather phoned in. The game does feature a novel dynamic dialogue system where the personalities you give your characters determine what quips they make during exchanges, and what options are available during dialogue choices. As wonky as dialogue is, I can't help but applaud the result. If anything, expect the jank, and let the rest pleasantly surprise you. - The music is good, your standard strings, horns and orchestral fantasy faire. That's all I really have to say about it, which should tell you everything you need to know. Gameplay: Please note the crux of this review is based on the main campaign in terms of difficulty. Other campaigns are available including player created ones from the workshop. The game is built on 5e turn-based combat - in regards to mechanics, there's not really a whole ton to add to that. The main thing I'll give it credit for is the 3-dimensionality it brings into play with actual abilities like fly, or spider-walking on walls. This is a very welcome addition compared to how some CRPGs make those spells just give you +2 AC and whatnot. Abilities that pull, push and prone your opponents. Doing so isn't quite as satisfying as some other games, but shooting enemies out of the sky, or yeeting them off cliffs into lava is always its own satisfaction. The game has plenty of classes and subclasses with more on the way. For those unfamiliar with WotC's trademark practice, the core of the setting in its races and classes is public domain. The added non-core classes, sub-classes, and races are behind copyright and its unlikely TA will license them anytime soon. Homebrew content has already started filling the gap, but don't expect to make a Hexblade anytime soon. (No workshop as of time of review) My main gripe with the gameplay is the encounter design seems rather sadistic. Even with a fairly optimized party, it often felt like I only won when the game felt like letting me win. Given this is the nature of RNG-based dice systems like DnD, this may seem like a petty complaint. Things like using sunlight to blind enemies, or crowd control to leverage the odds is totally what the game expects of you - which I like. The problem is without the secret tools the encounters were designed with in mind, you're basically doomed to save-scum certain encounters until the dice give you permission to win. Keep in mind this is on the standard 3/5 "Authentic Mode". While it's cool your main party of 4 are all equally the main character, the resulting inability to swap out characters, re-specc them, or add new custom ones mid-campaign feels like a huge step backwards in the genre. Given the aforementioned dependency on leveraging some mechanics or experimenting, it feels like a lot of tactical decision-making was left out. Instead I found myself straight up restarting the campaign from scratch when I found out my build decisions are sub-optimal, not even bad, just not carrying their weight to the game's expectations. Hopefully this is remedied in some form in the future, but it feels pretty egregious when you only have a party capped at four (plus the occasional bespoke campaign guest appearance). For instance, it's given everything as is, making your party contain a Cleric is almost mandatory. All that said, again, the core of the game is solid. Sure, it's mind-numbingly frustrating when your 27AC, 110hp paladin gets downed after two rounds because the enemy rolled nothing below an 17 that whole time. But when you set yourself up for success with clever mechanics use and preparation, pulling out a solid win in a mainline fight is practically just as satisfying as a real TableTop game. I know I'm coming across as rather salty, but if you don't audibly ask "Yo, WTF!?" atleast once every other level, I'd be rather surprised. Story: The main story is decent with nice world-building that doesn't over rely on in-your-face exposition. It probably won't blow your mind, but I'll admit the Antagonists' plan was rather solid without feeling forced - which I gotta give it credit for. Again, there's not much to say here, but I personally wouldn't count that against the game, especially when player-made campaigns exist. All in all, Solasta is a decent enough 5E engine that I'd say earned my $40. Prepare for some major ups and downs in the experience, and there's definitely a full length to-do list for the devs in my book - but they've done a good job so far and dont appear to be losing steam just yet.
• gamedeal user

  Oct 24, 2022

  Solasta is one of the rare DnD games that fees like the memory of Neverwinter Nights, even though there have been numerous games in the genre. On top of this Solasta put a lot of effort into actually encouraging the use of typically background mechanics like lighting, wall walking, jumping, climbing. There is a wonderful focus on different heights and torches in the environment, and seeing the occasional character just decide to live perpendicular to everyone else is a shock. The story of Solasta is passable. It has all the core pieces of the narrative, but somehow it's missing substance, lore aspects to bite into or reward for exploration and interaction. Many side quests are being asked to return to a place for a client - but even if it's to look closer at the ancient ruins the player doesn't get anything back narratively. Instead the story is largely carried by the dialogue and banter between your characters. Sometimes commenting on their situation and reacting to each other as they brainstorm. This is a a fun system and brings a lot of life to the game, and the characters' demeanour is determined by their background in creation. It isn't a perfect system however, particularly as the game progresses. It is understandably difficult to fill out every situation and voice them on top of that, but it began to feel the person speaking would be picked randomly and their reaction wouldn't always fit their part in the conversation or what they've said previously. Even had one character just take over lines for another at one point, claiming a heritage belonged to them instead. Still, it shouldn't be understated how much more alive these interactions make the game. As a bonus to all of this, Solasta includes a nice dungeon maker. While again not flawless and perhaps missing some freedoms, or overall content in just wanting a greater variety of enemies or locations, it is a comfortable tool to allow new stories to be created. Overall, Solasta lays beautiful groundwork and is still some good fun despite lacking in some areas.
• Javac

  Nov 12, 2022

  I was really excited about this game, but unfortunately I gave up due to really annoying 3D fights underground where it's impossible for the player to see what's going on. Perhaps I just haven't learned all the ways to navigate, but underground areas are too dark to see opponents even when they're in lit areas. Narrow tunnels underground also make it very difficult to rotate things into view sometimes. Things that would help are a list of visible creatures, where you can hover over it in the list to highlight it even through obstacles, and a way to see a top down view of the visible area.
• SuperStromboli

  Nov 13, 2022

  I've played each main campaign and I've made dungeons. I love it. They nailed the 5e implementation. Hats off to those scrappy 15 french developers!