Ironcast

 PC
User Score
7.1

Mixed or average reviews- based on 30 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 15 out of 30
  2. Mixed: 11 out of 30
  3. Negative: 4 out of 30

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  1. Sjalka
    Mar 29, 2015
    3
    This game is the fast food compared to the candlelight dinner that PC gamers ask for. It is quick, it does not taste good - but it kind of wastes your time good enough until you are ready for some real food.

    However - the game is not entirely bad. It is just simple - and hardly worth sitting down for or switching the computer on. It does however work for a mobile device - like a pad of    This game is the fast food compared to the candlelight dinner that PC gamers ask for. It is quick, it does not taste good - but it kind of wastes your time good enough until you are ready for some real food.

    However - the game is not entirely bad. It is just simple - and hardly worth sitting down for or switching the computer on. It does however work for a mobile device - like a pad of phone - when you have to waste the time while you are busy with more important stuff ( bus ride or toilet - you name it )

    The match-3 mechanics do work - but do not offer enough variation. Even the much much older Puzzle quest does a far better job there. Since you cannot see the enemies board - it sometimes feels like the AI is cheating - because it usually manages to dish out the necessary - rarely much more - or much less though.
    All the while the own board is rarely very balanced - because there simply are not enough variations in icons.
    Also the special abilities are mostly boring leaving little room for real strategy or tactics.

    The art-style is "ok" - not great but it works. It does however have a distinctive "flashgame" feeling - of the cheaper sorts.

    I would have loved to see much better designs for the mechs ( other than tin cans on legs - and even or especially steam punk mechs offer so much more ) - also much more variety in terms of weapons, mounts etc.
    Customizing your mech, your pilot - your tactics could have given that game, which - at its core is fine enough - a way to shine well over comparable products. But since it fails to add complexity - it is just one more below average game you usually get for free on mobile devices.

    In its current state the game is not worth the money - nor does it beat the competition in features or presentation. Too much grinding, too much randomness and way too little variety to justify the replays needed to progress properly.    … Expand
  2. MadJaples
    Apr 11, 2015
    6
    The concept of this game is lost on some people, clearly.
    Although this is a match-3 with a twist, the idea is to *think* about what you're going to match up before you match it. You get three chances to match three or more of separate components of your ironcast (which is just a steampunk variety of mechwarrior), then you have to *think* about what you're going to do about those separate    The concept of this game is lost on some people, clearly.
    Although this is a match-3 with a twist, the idea is to *think* about what you're going to match up before you match it. You get three chances to match three or more of separate components of your ironcast (which is just a steampunk variety of mechwarrior), then you have to *think* about what you're going to do about those separate components of your ironcast. Are you going to fix any damage to any particular part/s of the ironcast, are you going to raise the shields more than once or twice, and so on and so forth. It's not "all that" by any means, it's certainly not mind-blowingly refreshing, because just as there are far too many hidden object games in the market, there's certainly far too many match-3 type games on the market as well, this just attempts to add a little more to it.
    Despite being a match-3 that you'd think was at least somewhat easy, it seems to place much of it's replayability on a reward system based on the XP you amass throughout several attempts at finishing the game (which never will happen on the first try without some kind of cheating going on).
    It's kind of detrimental to the game to have it like that from a player's POV, but from a dev's POV it's easy enough to see why they would choose to have it that way.
    It's not overwhelmingly impressive, it's not like it's bringing anything drastically new to the market, but it's a clean and fairly polished attempt at a simple genre of game that involves more than just matching 3 or more of the same thing together. It won't be everyone's cup of tea, it's not really mine, but I have played it, it's good enough to be played by the average Joe.
    Fair try.    … Expand
  3. ave
    Apr 24, 2016
    7
    It's a given that in the Rogue genre, almost everything is random and your endgame comes from unforgiving mistakes at first and bad luck at last. Ironcast is no different, and after about 20 games, I was only able to confront the boss once, and died a glorious death "so close to beat him".

    Is there any winning strategy in this game ? I'm not sure. What I've learned so far, is that    It's a given that in the Rogue genre, almost everything is random and your endgame comes from unforgiving mistakes at first and bad luck at last. Ironcast is no different, and after about 20 games, I was only able to confront the boss once, and died a glorious death "so close to beat him".

    Is there any winning strategy in this game ? I'm not sure. What I've learned so far, is that Defense is key to survival. If you let your guard down, you will suffer. Oh boy, yes you will. So Defense and Energy Upgrade are a must, but be wary of Energy cost, since some Defenses requires 3 Energy et other ones 4 Energy - this might not seem a lot, but when you are 1 Energy short, you pay a big price in Health, that will later transfer in Golden Bars in the workshop - those precious Bars you need to upgrade.

    What about Weapons ? Whatever your choice, you need one to be used against strong armor and little to no movement (single shot with high damage), and one against fast movement and little to no armor (multiple shots with low damage). Splash damage can be good, as long as you are not in a mission where you have to preserve any component of an enemy Ironcast - just check the splash damage is under the current opponent Defense level.

    One note about Cooling. It's used for Weapons, Defense and Movement. Even if the initial reserve is fairly high, if you use them a lot, you'll be short soon, and working a machinery without Cooling is like setting yourself ablaze.

    On my own, I like to play the first character (Defense and Movement bonuses) with the second Ironcast (Energy weapons) and play like a tower (almost no movement). I usually bet on upgrading Energy reserve up to 12, Defense then Weapons (same ones, but better if available) ; and on the abilities offered each time you reach a level : Cooling + Defense + Golden bars bonuses. My only weakness is that at a certain point, my weapons might not be up to the task.    … Expand
  4. Tubey
    Apr 3, 2015
    8
    A fiendishly difficult game that has more than an element of a roguelike about it, combining random luck with very solid match-3 mechanics and a steampunk artstyle.

    It has minor faults - the game ends too quick for my tastes as I was enjoying it immensely until the abrupt end, and the story is decent but concluded sloppily - but I had a great deal of fun in the 18 hours it took me to    A fiendishly difficult game that has more than an element of a roguelike about it, combining random luck with very solid match-3 mechanics and a steampunk artstyle.

    It has minor faults - the game ends too quick for my tastes as I was enjoying it immensely until the abrupt end, and the story is decent but concluded sloppily - but I had a great deal of fun in the 18 hours it took me to beat it, and hopefully the ending sets up a very well earned sequel in the future.

    At £10, this game is a no-brainer for puzzle and strategy fans alike.    … Expand
  5. blaicefreeze
    May 8, 2015
    8
    Not quite sure what made the other negative reviewers so sour about this game, but If you are a matching/RPG lover, I don't see how you couldn't like this game. The design of the game is global playthrough (meaning if you die during your current campaign you can start with different, and more powerful gear next campaign.

    I have really enjoyed the game thus far, and I would disregard    Not quite sure what made the other negative reviewers so sour about this game, but If you are a matching/RPG lover, I don't see how you couldn't like this game. The design of the game is global playthrough (meaning if you die during your current campaign you can start with different, and more powerful gear next campaign.

    I have really enjoyed the game thus far, and I would disregard the negative posts, because either the game was too complex, or they had absolutely no idea what they were buying? It is cheap either way, so I definitely think this game is well worth it!    … Expand
  6. Xalard
    May 29, 2015
    5
    This game is plainly way too simple and roguelike elements feel like their only purpose is to extend the pathetic lifetime of this title. I've bought it after TotalBiscuit's review where he compared it to FTL but the quality of this game is nowhere near FTL. Reading reviews it feels like the people praising the game got stuck on the first area and are blaming the lack of variety on thatThis game is plainly way too simple and roguelike elements feel like their only purpose is to extend the pathetic lifetime of this title. I've bought it after TotalBiscuit's review where he compared it to FTL but the quality of this game is nowhere near FTL. Reading reviews it feels like the people praising the game got stuck on the first area and are blaming the lack of variety on that and not the game itself.

    The match-3 mechanic, overall idea and the story are solid but there's not much more beside that. It works for a few hours but replayability is non-existent and this whole 'global unlocks system' that the devs made doesn't help. I've played 6 hours of it, beat the campaign on the 4th try which lasted 2 hours and have no intention on coming back to this game.

    The huge problem is that there's almost no variety at all. The differences between different 'ironcasts' that player can choose boil down to slightly different starting stats and one special ability that typically will get used twice per battle. Opponents faced, besides the two bosses really boil down to two types with very little variety inside of those types. There's no need to adjust strategy, equipment setup or anything else depending on the opponent you face.

    The equipment pretends to have a variety but really doesn't. There are 3 different pieces of equipment that can be changed - guns (which you can have 2 of), shields and engines. For shields and engines your only real choice is to stay with what you have or upgrade. What to upgrade to is typically a no-brainer. Weapons are *slightly* better in that *some of the time* you might have to use a high-damage-per-shot low-repetition gun for dealing with shields and low-damage high-repetition one for better damage-per-turn once the shields are down. Some of the time. I ran 70% of the game with guns of the high-damage-per-shot variety which also at the time happened to be the highest dmg-per-turn available.

    Augmentations that are gained through leveling do present some real choice at times but still there are ones that are clearly superior.

    The rougelike elements boil down to permadeath and randomness and feel like they are only there because otherwise the game would last 3 hours at best. The randomness in battles is just unfair. I'm fine with the fact that weapons can miss or that the board composition is obviously random. I'm not fine with how randomly the AI acts. Sometimes it will waste its entire turn to repair, gather resources and put some pathetic defenses up and sometimes it will wreck you with three salvos of their weapons, taking out half of your HP and half of your systems (mid-game weapons do around 150 dmg per salvo, AI shots up to 3 salvos in a turn, your ironcast at that point has 600-800 HP).

    My final boss fight was the most ridiculous of all. I've managed to destroy all of its systems and while it still had 2/3 of HP, it didn't fire for the rest of the fight despite constantly repairing its systems. I've finished with 80% of HP intact while in some other fights I've lost 1/3 of HP in a single turn when my opponent repaired his weapons then fired at me twice.

    Overall: a half-decent game for a few hours with no variety and no replayability. Go play FTL instead.    … Expand

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
75

Generally favorable reviews - based on 10 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 6 out of 10
  2. Mixed: 4 out of 10
  3. Negative: 0 out of 10
  1. Worth Playing
    May 5, 2015
    80
    The presentation could be better, but the mechanics are so solid that most players won't mind the flat appearance and audio. For those looking for a punishing version of Puzzle Quest, Ironcast is it.
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  2. Quarter to Three
    Apr 22, 2015
    80
    Ironcast exists admirably outside the match-3ing.
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  3. 4P.de
    Apr 17, 2015
    87
    Challenging and captivating turn based match-3-variation somewhere between PuzzleQuest and FTL: Faster Than Light.
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