Veterum has brought me quite a lot of joy over the past few weeks! We’re halfway into January, and a lot is happening behind the scenes here. It is usually a slow start to the year for big releases, and it’s given me some spare time to play the games I’ve had knocking on my door. Veterum is one of those examples, and if you’re a fan of Battle Brothers, this is one game you don’t want to miss. It’s in Early Access right now with a fair amount of content and polish, and is available for $19.99.
At its core, Veterum is a dark fantasy tactical RPG. That is quite the mouthful, but we do need more games like this. The punishing turn-based combat is in full display, but this is a kinder game than the brutality of Battle Brothers. While the game is still challenging with plenty of planning needed to survive, it’s not quite as cruel to your squad as Battle Brothers.
There isn’t really a narrative to the game yet, with the sandbox gameplay the core of the content right now. A campaign is still in development, but is scheduled for release before 1.0. Despite the light story, I appreciate the world and setting of Veterum. Order of the Gatekeepers in a mysterious and perilous world on the brink of apocalypse. You lead a diverse force composed of humans, dwarves, elves, and wildmen, with plenty of opportunities to grow as a mercenary band. Veterum is focusing more on the gameplay than writing right now, and that’s fine with me.
The core gameplay loop is probably Veterum’s biggest strength, and you roam around the open world picking up quests, navigating tricky encounters, and dealing with environmental puzzles with some potent battles. Everything is procedurally generated with everyone’s favorite phrase, ‘no two playthroughs are the same. I’ve always disliked that with roguelike tags because it’s more often than not bollocks, but Veterum makes a decent swing at things. The battles, town resources, and quests change with every map, which does make things somewhat unpredictable, and all this feeds into the gameplay. The game does a good job of blending exploration with managing your growing army, and it made me care about my party and make careful decisions about where to go next.
The combat system is another key point, and I’m enjoying the careful balance between challenge and punishment. Combat takes place on a hex-grid and is turn-based, requiring careful positioning, thoughtful unit selection before a battle, and effective use of the environment. Factors such as morale, fatigue, line of sight, terrain, and weather all impact the outcome of fights, which I appreciate. Not everything is about having the most magic or blades. Environmental interactivity is another important part of combat, and you can deal with threats through cool things such as freezing rivers, building barricades to funnel enemies into kill zones, and so on. It’s pretty cool, and I wish more turn-based RPGs had more environment interactivity.
Despite the Early Access tag and lack of a full story right now, I feel Veterum is in a pretty good place already, with most of the core systems in place and plenty of content. There are even some impressive modding capabilities through the built-in unit and map editors, so that people can develop their own scenarios and worldspaces. I haven’t dabbled with this part of the game yet, as it’s an impressions review first, but I love games that do this.
To conclude, Veterum offers a rich strategy experience that’s impressive for an Early Access title. As I always stress with games in constant development, only buy an Early Access game if you feel the content and polish it currently has are enough, rather than buying based on a hypothetical future. If getting beaten down in Battle Brothers got you down (awesome game though!), and if you want something a bit more experimental, I can easily recommend Veterum.
