The Iron Oath Preview

The Iron Oath is set in the of Caelum, a world that gets destroyed by the Scourge — an event that raises a dragon and its army from the Void to inflict Blight upon the lands — every decade. In this world, players take control of the leader of a company of mercenaries that acquire numerous tasks in exchange for gold.

Immediately at the start of the game, players will have the opportunity to name their company along with their desired title. Although you can go for titles such as Sir or Ma'am, nothing is stopping you from using this as an opportunity to name your character or naming them over-the-top things such as overlord or almighty. Unfortunately, aside from customising the flag and the name of your company, The Iron Oath doesn't allow you to create your own character and take them into battle. 

Seeing as I was excited to play as a custom character, I was looking forward to being able to take my own into combat with a class from the selection of six already available. This wouldn't have been a problem were it not for the company leader (the player) partaking in the dungeons actively, as they are present in them and making decisions throughout. It would have even been acceptable if the leader wasn’t mentioned as a fighter, but constant mentions of armour and weaponry regarding them indicate that they are well versed in combat; it feels immersion-breaking to have the leader actively avoid battle.

The game's story and narration are interesting, as the writing doesn't feel half bad but is by no means a masterpiece either. Since the game doesn't ask you directly for gender or pronouns, all of the characters actively avoid using any when referring to the player character, opting to use the chosen name instead. Although some moderately important events take place very early on (before I could even care for the characters), I enjoyed the writing enough and it was a welcome surprise. 

I wouldn't judge The Iron Oath too much based on its dialogue given it's a strategy turn-based RPG, but the game has a gargantuan amount of text. Three hours into my run, I'd only been able to explore two dungeons, with the rest of the time spent reading dialogue and the game's lore. Although I don't personally mind this, the amount of text can be intrusive, as you won't be able to play for too long before more appears. That said, I do enjoy the game's lore, so it made being interrupted every couple of minutes of gameplay a bittersweet feeling, as I wanted to continue playing but I also wanted to learn more about Caelum.

Gameplay-wise, The Iron Oath is a quite enjoyable experience despite the Early Access tag. The unique dungeon system has players traversing through tiled dungeons that you'll need to sacrifice some time to explore and scout. Playing recklessly is discouraged through ambushes and walking into hazards, but scouting also has its downsides, as you’ll be wasting more time within the dungeon. The time system gives you debuffs for a set amount of turns according to your difficulty; the debuff occurs every 20 turns for Adventurer difficulty, every 16 turns for the Battle-Hardened difficulty, and every 14 turns for the Warlord difficulty. You can also enable the Iron Man setting with all of the difficulties, which will only allow you to have one save file per game, forcing you to stick to your decisions. That said, The Iron Oath has a unique and innovative "Custom" difficulty, which lets you change the following mechanics:

• Starting coin: 300–5,000
• XP rate: 0%–250%
• Injury length: 25%–250%
• Mercenary salary rate: 25%–250%
• Reputation earn rate: 25%–250%
• Renown gain rate: 25%–250%
• Encounter difficulty: A choice from Easy, Normal, and Hard
• Enemy health: 25%–250%
• Enemy attack power: 25%–250%
• Time mod frequency: 10–30

I found this system to be incredibly useful and innovative, as it should allow players to customise their runs according to how they feel they want to experience the world of Caelum. The easiest difficulty doesn't compare to the easiest custom difficulty, and the same is applicable to the hardest. Since I am neither adept at strategy RPG games nor The Iron Oath, I went for the Adventurer difficulty to get more accustomed to the mechanics. 

Adventuring through the dungeons is very fun but also nerve-wracking, as taking too long is punishing and as such discourages exploration, so it really adds to the feeling of peril whilst traversing them. Everything about The Iron Oath feels surprisingly smooth and self-explanatory, as the game's graphics are not only breathtaking with its pixel art style but also informative on what's what in-game. Except for the level up indicators, which weren’t as well explained; it wasn’t very clear at first that you’d get one attribute point, one skill point, and one upgrade point. That said, it isn't something I was bothered by in the slightest, as you're able to open the skill menu at any time and allocate everything on the fly. Each of the six available classes has a passive and six abilities to play with, all of the abilities have 12 modifications; a staggering amount of customisation I was glad to see. Unfortunately, only half of the modifications are available for the Early Access, which was disappointing — in a good way!

Combat involves plenty of terrain manipulation, too. Many classes have displacement abilities that are great for punishing foes that positioned themselves wrongly, allowing you to deal extra damage and often even stun your foes. Abusing the environment mechanic was incredibly fun and allowed for a lot of strategic play regarding baiting enemies into certain positions in order to gain the upper hand. It was also fun because enemies will sometimes use the environment against you as well, which was very fun. 

The gameplay is what you'd expect from a turn-based tactical game, where each character has different attacks that might take channel time, and every character has their own speed dictating when their turn is in battle. Finally, the graphics for the attacks, along with cinematic pans for whenever a character got a critical hit, made battles a visual feast.

Lastly, the game's overworld mechanic is phenomenal; as the years progress, the world will advance with or without you. The scourge will come and go, cities will fall to ruin, and you'll be in charge of helping them pick up from the rubble. Not only that, but your mercenaries have several systems that encourage swapping among your party, including fatigue, injuries, and even age. As such, you'll want to keep plenty of your members strong and ready for battle, as not only will sometimes battle end in inevitable death, but you'll want to be ready for the time they retire.

Overall, The Iron Oath is turning up to be a phenomenal turn-based tactical RPG, with its unique and eye-catching graphics, interesting lore, and plenty of text to get through. I enjoyed my time in Caelum, and I cannot wait until I can enjoy the campaign through to its conclusion.