There's a solid game in there, but there's still a lot of bugs. Mechanics that don't work consistently, abilities that don't do what the tooltip says they do, and narrative inconsistencies within conversations break immersion. Consider waiting for more patches.

Beyond that is an Owlcat CRPG, and if you liked their previous works, you're going to like this too. Compared to Wrath of the Righteous (WOTR) it's easier to get into as well. It focuses on purely turn-based combat and slims down the tedious non-CRPG mini-game layer they always insert, though it's still present and still tedious.

Companions are strongly written, but some feel a little too distant from events. Sister Argenta is a prime example, someone with a strong personality, but which is rarely expressed. She's silent most of the time, and her personal quest is announced near the start, then nothing happens until it suddenly resolves near the end. More was needed to flesh out some of the companions within this story.

The story itself is also a step back from WOTR as it never really coalesces into a singular thread. Whereas WOTR is about the crusade and what kind of crusade you will run, Rogue Trader can't really decide if it's about you, your province, the plots of your enemies, the plots of your friends... It all culminates in a bit of a limp climax that comes out of nowhere. The Acts are just a series of unrelated threats, more akin with Kingmaker, but without even the thread that game had tying it all together.

Those who have played Owlcat games before will also know how broken their encounter design is. Not so much here, and in fact this game is far too easy because game breaking builds can be stumbled upon with such ease that it's seemingly by design. Whereas Core difficulty in WOTR had me redoing many fights, here Daring difficulty saw me never lose, and by the halfway point the enemies would never even get a turn. It has the Wasteland 3 problem of combat simply being a case of the turn one alpha strike, and all terrain is an utter irrelevance not far into the game. Modern X-Com is a much simpler system, yet still manages to be a more engaging one. There is no pre-buffing though, so halleluiah!

The ending represents a step up over WOTR though, with lots of sides covering everything. You get satisfying resolutions on all your choices, and there's a lot of ways things can turn out depending on what you did.

All-in-all I enjoyed this. It's an Owlcat game through-and-through, it just doesn't hit the same highs as WOTR.

There's a solid game in there, but there's still a lot of bugs. Mechanics that don't work consistently, abilities that don't do what the tooltip says they do, and narrative inconsistencies within conversations break immersion. Consider waiting for more patches. Beyond that is an Owlcat CRPG, and if you liked their previous works, you're going to like this too. Compared to Wrath of the Righteous (WOTR) it's easier to get into as well. It focuses on purely turn-based combat and slims down the tedious non-CRPG mini-game layer they always insert, though it's still present and still tedious. Companions are strongly written, but some feel a little too distant from events. Sister Argenta is a prime example, someone with a strong personality, but which is rarely expressed. She's silent most of the time, and her personal quest is announced near the start, then nothing happens until it suddenly resolves near the end. More was needed to flesh out some of the companions within this story. The story itself is also a step back from WOTR as it never really coalesces into a singular thread. Whereas WOTR is about the crusade and what kind of crusade you will run, Rogue Trader can't really decide if it's about you, your province, the plots of your enemies, the plots of your friends... It all culminates in a bit of a limp climax that comes out of nowhere. The Acts are just a series of unrelated threats, more akin with Kingmaker, but without even the thread that game had tying it all together. Those who have played Owlcat games before will also know how broken their encounter design is. Not so much here, and in fact this game is far too easy because game breaking builds can be stumbled upon with such ease that it's seemingly by design. Whereas Core difficulty in WOTR had me redoing many fights, here Daring difficulty saw me never lose, and by the halfway point the enemies would never even get a turn. It has the Wasteland 3 problem of combat simply being a case of the turn one alpha strike, and all terrain is an utter irrelevance not far into the game. Modern X-Com is a much simpler system, yet still manages to be a more engaging one. There is no pre-buffing though, so halleluiah! The ending represents a step up over WOTR though, with lots of sides covering everything. You get satisfying resolutions on all your choices, and there's a lot of ways things can turn out depending on what you did. All-in-all I enjoyed this. It's an Owlcat game through-and-through, it just doesn't hit the same highs as WOTR.