After surrendering to Total War: Warhammer 2, Gus tries on a new mistress to his gaming passions ~

Lloyd Sabin, 30 July 2018

Winding down my summer of high fantasy gaming and still smarting from a major defeat in battle in Total War: Warhammer 2, I switched over to Tyranny by Obsidian for a few hours. It was only a few hours because Tyranny is quite dense with lore, and, already fatigued from Warhammer, I put Tyranny aside for another day to give it the time it deserves to shine.

If you’re willing to take the plunge with Tyranny, be ready to read a lot. Some gamers don’t dig this, some love it.

That said, the first 3-4 hours are excellent and different than most traditional isometric RPG games on PC…think Baldur’s Gate, Icewind Dale, and Pillars of Eternity with some new ideas introduced, like world-shaping. It will become more clear with the screen shots below.

If you’re willing to take the plunge with Tyranny, be ready to read a lot. Some gamers don’t dig this, some love it. I was somewhere in between, but chalked it up to timing. If I had started off my summer fantasy gaming binge I would have been much more in to it. That’s why I temporarily put it aside. I will be back, for sure, when I am in the mood for some deep, dark fantasy that allows me to be as bad as I wanna be.

For now, check out the intro screen shots below along with some shots of the first few hours of gameplay and see if Tyranny is something that will please the little fantasy golem in you.

Yes as a matter of fact that does kinda sorta look like me. Just, er…taller.

Real men dual wield.

So detailed avatar creation is nothing really new in PC RPGs. But creating the world you play in through a choose-your-own-adventure intro is.

I loved the world conquest intro in Tyranny. Intros like this to RTS or grand strategy games would be fantastic. I wish this kind of idea was used more often.

Each phase of the intro led to a different aspect of the world’s character.

Every action you take has a result, just as the tactical combat does in the main part of Tyranny.

Some decisions are quite complex.

As the intro winds down, you get the sense that all roads would have led to your evil victory anyway. Which was fine for me going in to the game because I loved the idea of playing the bad guy. Or at least the Guy You’re Not Sure About, as Vince Vaughn would say (as Trey in Swingers).

With the intro complete, you are dropped in to the main part of Tyranny. There are a ton of people and factions to get to know as you start, including the Disfavored and the Scarlet Chorus just to name a few. You begin Tyranny alone but will soon build a raiding party.

This aint your father’s RPG, son.

Verse is the first companion you find and she is not to be trifled with. You can control her directly in combat (which was a pain for me) or set her to be controlled by the AI, which I did.

There are a ton of choices to be made before and after combat. You can be as evil as you want and lie all the time if that’s the path you want to follow.

Tyranny’s world map.

This meeting with the archons is what really cracks the story open. They don’t like each other at all and are forced to work together. They also potentially hate you as well.

It’s clear that a lot of time and care went in to Tyranny’s creation. Feeling that way, I wanted to appreciate the game with a clear head so I put it aside for now.

Thanks for reading and see you again in two weeks…we all need a vacation, even from a hobby like gaming, once in a while!

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