Heatwaves suck. That is all.
I’m kidding, of course, because we have another little review to share today! In today’s episode of the terribly named ‘Scar Tries’, I have been playing a hilarious little RPG called ‘The RPG’. Yep, it is one of those video games that doesn’t mess around with its title!
At first glance, The RPG may seem like a whimsical joke, and the Store page on Steam certainly plays into that. It’s as if The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim has been hilariously parodied, but don’t be fooled-this isn’t a mere knock-off. The RPG is a surprisingly adept RPG that subverts many of the typical tropes found in open-world games, all while keeping you chuckling.
Despite enjoying it a lot so far, The RPG still struggles with a lot of jank, and I’ve found a few nasty bugs. Despite this, however, I am intrigued to see how the game evolves. The game opens up with a homage to the infamous Skyrim introduction scene with the cart, and I laughed out loud watching the intro. After a big, glitchy dragon destroys the bridge, your character wakes up later in a little village. After some more funny dialogue and picking how your Playmobil avatar looks, the game kicks off with some tutorials and an introductory dungeon to win access outside the central city. The humor sticks throughout the game, and it reminds me strongly of the Supraland games.
The RPG’s mechanics are refreshingly straightforward. Combat is smooth and enjoyable, with no convoluted skill trees or inventory management to bog you down. You can still level up and invest in some minor perks, but the overwhelming skill trees found in other RPGs like Skyrim and Horizon Zero Dawn are nowhere to be found here.
I also love how the game handles the bartering system. While there are better items to buy with gold from the out-of-place vending machines in the marketplace, selling items is streamlined into random bundles of ‘Loot’ that get converted to gold in the pawn shop. So far, so good.
The game isn’t particularly big or long, which I appreciate. Video games have been pushing the overstuffed open world design for too long, often sacrificing content quality for quantity. While the map in The RPG is relatively small, the content has a decent amount of options on how to tackle them, and most missions usually have a few ways of tackling them. The guts of the game are solid, and the comedic nature of the game kept me engaged, although the humor is an acquired taste.
My main issues with The RPG are similar to those of other players: the game is hindered by numerous bugs, which frequently halt my progress. With no reliable save feature in a dungeon, this can get really irritating. Performance is also mixed right now. Despite the low-poly graphics, this is a surprisingly intensive game and will make low-end systems cry. The developer has been active with players and is looking into the issues, so hopefully, things will improve in this regard.
The RPG might be worth holding out on while these bigger issues get addressed, but I still believe this is a solid title for the money.
