[REVIEW] Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms

 Since hearing of this game a little over a week ago, I’ve been playing it almost nonstop. It’s not the first idle-clicker game I’ve ever played, not by a long shot, but for what it’s worth, I’ve never felt quite so hooked on any of the others as I do on this one, and for more reasons than just the geeky D&D-based setting and characters.

 
Codename Entertainment has created something truly addictive here. Most of the idle/clicker games I’ve played in the past has been largely cut from the same cloth. Click a bunch, get money/points/etc, upgrade the power of your click, stop playing the game for a while as money/points/etc accumulate in your absence when levels get too tough to tackle immediately. And yes, those elements are absolutely present in Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms. It wouldn’t be an idle/clicker game if they weren’t present.

But there’s more to it than just a new game with a slight gimmick. You start out the game with a single character, the Dwarven Fighter Bruenor, and along the way you recruit more characters to increase your party. You use gold from downed enemies to purchase character upgrade and increase their stats and gain new abilities, from Ultimate Attacks that do a lot of damage, or healing spells that help you stay alive.

But okay, nothing I’ve described so far sounds like anything but a slight gimmick. Where does the addictive element come in?

EVERYTHING IS AN ADVENTURE

 
You’re not just fighting wave after wave of enemies for no other purpose than increasing stats and recruiting new characters. You’re doing it because your party is on a quest. This farm is cursed, that person need rescuing, get rid of the goblins in those sewers, and so on. The stronger your party gets, the further they can progress through the quest as a whole.

The quests aren’t disconnected entities, either. They dovetail nicely into each other. Find something odd during one quest, go back later to check it out and end up with an entirely new quest. One thing leads to another, and the whole thing seems designed to lead you along in a story — or more specifically, an epic RP session — that gives you ample reason to keep playing. “I want to know what happens next,” is a strong element here.

Each quest is broken down into stages, typically 50 but a much higher number when you take on more difficult quests later on. Each stage has an objective, which sounds fancy enough, but really, it’s just accomplished by letting your party fight the waves of enemies. Collect 25 berries? Okay, enemies drop those, so I’ll just kill a bunch of wolves for a while until I get enough. Kill 25 monsters? That’s easy enough. Complete your objective and move on to the next stage. Rinse and repeat until the adventure is complete.

Each stage is harder than the one before it, so you can’t just coast by on your initial stats and abilities. And the progression curve is deceptively steep sometimes. I can typically get through the first 35 stages in a single sitting, without doing much beyond spending accumulated gold and letting my diverse party of heroes hack and slash their way to victory.  Even bosses can be killed with no difficulty. But after that, I find I sometimes have to let a stage continue before advancing to the next one, allowing my party to just keep mindlessly killing approaching enemies for money I can use to make myself stronger. And after level 45 or so, I typically have to turn the game off for hours at a time, to let gold accumulate while I go and do something else, because I know there’s no way I can safely make it through the upcoming stages without difficulty.

I prefer to play it safe rather than be daring. I’d rather go slowly and be sure of victory than dash ahead and risk death.

(Character death isn’t really a problem, by the way. They can die, but they instantly revive if you just move to another stage.)

But that’s the way it is with idle/clicker games, and I expected no less from Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms. Games like this reward you for both playing and not playing. The trick is always how to make the player want to come back and take advantage of what they’ve gained while leaving the game alone, and in this case, Idle Champions has done a fantastic job. I am well and truly hooked!

THE DEVIL'S IN THE DETAILS 

 
There are lots of other little tidbits to enjoy about this game that can keep a player engaged and entertained. Since I started playing, there has already been an event, providing extra quests and bonus characters that can be obtained, so there’s additional incentive to check back often, to see what new things might be available.

Staying engaged with the individual stages is easy, too, once you realize just how many bonus chances for gold appear. Crows fly across the background, goblins pop their heads out from under bushes, stone jiggle, and clicking on them yields a surprise stash of gold, which can make improving your party just that much easier. It’s a nice little touch, and it works well to keep a person from becoming too bored in the early areas, when the party can handle anything coming their way without additional clicky help from players.

There are, of course, premium items that can be bought in this game, as you’d expect from a game that is otherwise free. Gems can be bought with real-world money, which you then exchange for chests. Chests contain all sorts of useful items, from bounty scrolls that provide you an immediate stash of gold, to equipment for the characters in your party. It’s the equipment you really want, since they can boost stats and gold acquisition significantly. What you find in chests is random, of course, but it’s all useful.

But as much as you may want to roll your eyes at this moneygrab (though really, I see no problem in a voluntary purchase that helps reimburse the devs for the cost of making such a fun game), be aware that gems also drop from bosses, and they add up quickly. 50 gems gets you a chest, and though I’ve only been playing for a little over a week now, I’ve bought 9 chests, just with what drops from bosses. And I’ve only cleared 4 quests so far! There’s plenty of opportunity to get gems and chests without spending a cent, and I kind of love that. Most games provide small amounts of premium in-game currency as a teaser to players, showing them what they can get if they decide to spend their money later on, but so far this game has been extraordinarily generous with that, and I feel that’s worth commenting on. Right now, everyone in my party has at least 2 pieces of equipment. Any duplicate equipment drops I get from chests increase the power of the one I have equipped, so there’s no loss incurred by getting dupes.

My only complaint here is that chests will always cost you 50 gems. No matter how many you purchase. Most games offer slight discounts when you buy multiple premium items at once, as a way of encouraging you to spend a little more and maximize what you spend. Not so here. On one hand, that does keep things on a level playing field, as it doesn’t reward people who can pay more versus those who can’t. On the other hand, it’s a bit odd when compared to other similar games, and it’s a break from standard conventions. It would be nice if, say, I could purchase 5 chests for 225 gems instead of 250, or 25 chests for 1000 gems instead of 1250. There’s no incentive to save, no value in delayed gratification

But it is what it is, and honestly, I think I’d rather be able to get something at all, rather than have a discount be available that I can’t afford anyway.

 
For a free game, you get a lot. You get an epic adventure with characters who will be familiar to fans of the Forgotten Realms. You get possibly the most addictive idle/clicker game I’ve ever played (though that might just be my fantasy-geek self speaking there). The more I play, the more fun I have playing, and the more I want to convince friends to play (even though that provides me no in-game benefit, so far as I can tell).

Ultimately, if you’re looking for a fun game that will keep your geeky self amused for potentially hours at a time, or for a game that is familiar enough in some ways but offers something unique, then hop on Steam and grab Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms. It’s definitely worth your time.