Stirring Abyss

They lurk below and brother let me tell you... darkness becomes then because the light was not made for revealing such horrors. Having said that... stir this dark brew and see what erupts from the depths!

Quite nice and short TBS within a Cthulhu-like theme made by indie developers. I was brought in by the setting of the game, that involves a small crew trapped on the seabed having to repair their submarine while uncovering mysteries on the way - definitely a good start! However, the story is very generic and provides minimum information. Thus, the game relies heavily on the atmosphere of being trapped underwater with unknown and bizarre threats. The use of oxygen to put time pressure on the missions and resource management (at least in early-game) contributes to this high-stakes atmosphere. However, I had no problem in exploring most maps in full and in keeping everyone alive. Game mechanics are simple and there are very few options to build your characters, skills, and weapons you can use. Since the game is relatively short (took me ~20h for a "leave no stones unturned" playthrough), it was fine by me, but I did not get that motivated to replay and experiment other things. I did not find the mutations and the invocation abilities very appealing, as I was (wrongly) expecting some hidden cost in using them. So, I did not bother using them in my playthrough, except void swap once …

Short but fun game

Overall, I enjoyed my time in the depths with Stirring Abyss. It scratched the squad based rpg gameplay I was seeking when I bought it. It's a bit on the shorter side, I'm thinking of this game as more of an appetizer than a main course. I played it on easy, and I feel like there is a level of strategic mastery required to beat it on Hard mode, but that's not for me. The atmosphere of the game is stellar. I enjoyed the music and sound effects. The combat side of things felt good (even compared to the almighty X-com). There was an amount of wiggle room in how to build characters. However, the depth of base building felt a bit shallow (but maybe that was because of the mode I was playing in). All said, I would recommend this game. I had fun with it. It's very different from Terror of the Deep, but it is a tighter narrative experience, and I think there is merit in that.

Very good. X-com terror of the deep inspired, lovecraftian turn based tactics game. Hella hard. Recommended to play on easy your first run.

Undersea lovecraftian fighting action! Challenging but rewarding once you get it.