Steam Page: http://store.steampowered.com/app/42170/
Source: Youtube Channel MachinimaTrailer
Developer: Fatshark
Publisher: Fatshark
Platforms: PC
Release Date: Jun 12, 2012
Genre: Action-RPG, RTS
Pros:
+ Amazing music that plays a very important role in the atmosphere of the game
+ Quite a memorable experience with an immersive environment
+ Interesting team compositions can be made which changes up the gameplay
Cons:
- There is an excessive amount of padding (grinding/farming)
- Gameplay lacks variation (4 classes, 2 types of each and 2 skills each)
- The main story wasn't enticing and side quests were also boring
Recommended: No, not a game I can easily recommend to anyone, but those who enjoy grinding and dungeon crawling might be able to enjoy this.
There is much to be said about Krater. It's set in a post-apocalyptic Sweden with an almost realistic fantasy sort of theme to it. To be plain and simple, the game is bursting with potential but only begins to scratch the surface of what it can achieve. Krater, at heart, is an old-school, top-down, party-based, Point-n-click Action-RPG, in an RTS control format, with NO active pause like most party-based Action-RPGs. Some games that can be referenced to are Dungeon Siege, Confrontation, and Dragon Age. Most fans of this genre did not like the fact there wasn't an active pause function in Krater to allow them to plan out attack orders. I actually liked that there wasn't one as it forced the player to quickly respond to the situation actively which made the flow of the game a lot faster than most in its genre. The game features party management, stat building, multiple character control, a huge open-world to explore, cooperative multiplayer, tons of quests to take on, various items to loot, and an injury/death mechanic that keeps the game challenging. The problem is each and every one of the aspects that make this game great also has flaws to them that make the game repetitive, frustrating, boring, and unrealized. There are 8 different kinds of characters, but derive from only 4 different classes with only 2 skills each. Stat building is not gained from levels and putting in points, but rather obtaining boosters and implants by either farming for gold to buy them or to loot them (the good ones are super rare). Having multiple characters to control with no active pause does make for a faster and exciting experience, but it is also difficult to manage in cases of large mobs. Traversing the overworld has a sort of Final Fantasy feel to it and is interesting, but it can get annoying when having to travel from one end of the map to the next without being able to save in-between (you start from the last town visited if you exit). Cooperative Multiplayer only offers 3 short campaigns to play on, each with a large difficulty difference from each other (there isn't a cooperative main campaign). It's nice to have side quests in most RPGs, but side quests in Krater are generally boring, requires a lot of running around, and doesn't reward the player very much. There are a lot of different kinds of items in the game, but most of them are terrible and finding an upgrade takes forever (not to mention items are limited to only weapons and gadgets). The injury/death mechanic does sound pretty hardcore and may interest some niche gamers, but for the most part it's a nuisance and can't be turned off. With all this said, the game is revolved entirely around grinding/farming. You grind to get your characters to rank 10 and farm for items and credits (currency) to pay for unlocking the characters up to rank 15 and purchasing all the boosters and implants which are quite expensive and rare. Honestly, I think it's okay that the developers went for grinding as their main source for replay value as many in its genre does the same; however, I feel that this was executed poorly in an inelegant fashion. The limited classes and skills lack variation in gameplay. The side quests give the player no motivation to pursue them as opposed to just running through the multiplayer maps solo as it rewards the player with a lot more credits and loot despite it being unchanging and boring. Everything just seems to fall short of something that could've been great. Just having a cooperative main campaign might have changed the entire experience of the game. Only 24%-32% of the time I spent finishing the game was spent progressing through the story while the rest of the time was spent mindlessly re-running the multiplayer maps solo to farm for credits. I can't say that I didn't have fun with the game because I did, but I was also disgusted and disappointed with it at the same time. What got me into the game and something really worth praising for is the atmosphere the game had. The graphics weren't the best, but it was used efficiently for the world the developers wanted to craft and the music gives it a rather unforgettable experience. The music was something I loved from beginning to end.
Aesthetics
Art-Style: 3D Steam-Punk-ish/Post-Apocalyptic
+ There's a colorful and almost fantasy-like feel to the game
+ Animation and effects have nice details to them that make the game feel visceral
+ Straight-forward and clean user-interface
+ Incredible over-world map in design, atmosphere and aesthetics
+ Memorable tunes have an impressive effect on the game's experience
+ Powerful and effective usage of sound-effects
+ Explosions, shockwaves, and electrocutions are quite the spectacle
- Difficult to distinguish characters with enemies when not selected
- Character designs are a bit boring
- Graphics not entirely optimized very well (frames will lag or freeze occasionally)
- Not a lot of variation in the look of dungeons
Aesthetics: 8/10
Buttons
Controller: Keyboard and Mouse
+ Can change the key-bindings to hotkeys
+ Pretty easy to select individual characters and the whole party
+ The flow of combat and the way skills work is pretty solid
- You can change keybindings, but you can't arrange skill order
- Can't scroll the map through mini-map
Buttons: 6/10
Concept & Content
Core Concept: Grab quests & fulfill them, grind & farm when needed
+ There are some dungeons that are random and different each time
+ The flow of quests leads you where you need to go, never get lost
+ Lots of side quests for the player to earn extra credits or level up
+ Cooperative mode can be started at any point in the game
+ You can choose the kind of team you want to have
+ Combat is fast-paced and can be excitingly frantic
+ There isn't a lot of voice-acting, but some of the stuff they say are pretty funny
+ Booster/Implant mechanic leaves plenty of room for experimentation and builds
+ Gadgets adds an extra layer of strategy in combat, almost like an extra skill
+ World map is pretty big for a small game, so lots of places to explore
+ Injury/Death mechanic gives the game a bit of a classic RPG challenge
- Having an injury is troublesome, but a character death means starting over...
- World map can be annoying to traverse when just trying to get to a destination
- Items are limited to weapons, gadgets, boosters and implants; no armor
- Boosters/Implants are necessary but expensive and rare which forces farming
- Combat can feel pretty dumb when you're permanently stunned or mobbed
- There are only 4 classes with 2 variations of each with two skills each
- Side-quests are boring and don't reward the player very well with the time spent
- Cooperative mode is limited to 3 short missions that has vast difficulty curves
- Some maps have enemies right behind it that get aggro'd but can't be killed (can't pick up items and can't heal until they die).
- Krater is very atmospheric, but the story fails to be engaging or interesting
- The core design, flow, and execution is solid, but not fully realized
- The game demands so much grinding yet lacks variation that it becomes a chore
Concept & Content: 4/10
Duration
+ The main story quest of the game has a nice steady flow to it in the first 2 chap.
+ If I really wanted to play more, there's still a lot of quests I can do
- Once you hit that difficulty wall, the flow of the game comes to a halt
- Prepare to grind/farm a LOT to get anywhere in the game
- A lot of the difficult boss battles are actually just long and tedious
Duration: 4/10
Fun
+ I thought a 3-man party Action-RPG with no active pause made it exciting
+ Trying out different combinations of team compositions was pretty interesting
+ Although limited in variation, Multi-player co-op can still be pretty fun
+ The atmosphere from the graphics and music made quite the experience
+ I honestly feel like this could've been an incredible game, it was "sorta" fun
- I was disappointed when finding out co-op was only 3 short missions
- So much grinding/farming was required that I felt like I wasted a lot of time
- I've gone through frustration, boredom, desperation, and disgust playing this
- Rather than feeling satisfaction and relief from beating the game, I felt nothing
- Krater is an unrealized gem that could have been much better
Fun: 5/10
Overall
Krater was a crazy roller-coaster ride that had me conflicted in how I felt about the game. On one hand, I had fun with it and thought it had a lot of great ideas. In the other side, I felt like I was wasting a lot of time grinding/farming. I could've gave up playing the game a long time ago, but I was stubborn and wanted the satisfaction of completing the game. What was saddening was that I didn't feel satisfied or relieved about completing the game. The fact that I spent so many hours on the game and worked so hard to completing it made for a memorable experience, but not one I'd really like to revisit. I suppose it's one of those "I'm glad I got through that" kind of experiences. I do enjoy a challenge, but that challenge was covered in so much padding from grinding and farming that it was a long and tedious quest that didn't feel as fulfilling as it should have. Krater has a solid base to work off of a really good Point-n-Click, Action-RPG experience, but the content and quality of all the aspects that made this game needs to be refined before it can really reach there. I don't regret buying or playing Krater, but it's not a game I could really recommend a friend. Sadly, I had a friend buy it before I started playing so we could co-op together only to find out multiplayer was only 3 short missions. If I were to play the game anymore after this point, it'd be to help my friend grind in co-op mode until he finishes the game. Overall: 5.4/10
But really, if I didn't point it out enough times, the music is incredible and one of the major factors that made this game such an amazing experience in the times I did enjoy the game. This theme is like an anthem for the game:
Source: Youtube Channel Mister Potatoman
The soundtrack can be bought with the game. If you would like to listen to the original tracks before they were remixed into the game, you can check out Christian Gabel's Soundcloud Page.
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