Armello Brings Tabletop Battles To Your Desktop
Welcome to Indie Spotlight!
Today we fight for the throne in a magical digital board game — Armello!
The King (who happens to be a lion) suffers from the Rot, a deadly plague that slowly eats at your body while twisting your mind into darkness. The fate of the throne is unknown… so you take some action to sway it in your favor! Other pesky travelers are doing the same, so make haste!
Created by Australian indie studio League of Geeks, Armello puts the fun of dice rolling, cards and hex maps onto your computer screen. Up to four players control an anthropomorphic avatar (they’re all animals) and move around a map collecting items, casting spells and racing to become the most favored subject to the King. You can play as Thane the wolf swordsman, Amber the cunning rabbit, Sana the bear sage, or Mercurio the devious rat. (Kickstarter backers are getting four extra characters as bonus content!)
The game is setup with a day/night system. After every round (i.e. all players take a turn), the time of day switches over. Each character has a preference and will gain bonuses during that phase. At the start of each day the King’s Rot worsens, and after eight days he will fall.
There are three ways to victory. First, and the most common case, you can gain the most influence points by rallying villages and protecting the kingdom, and the King will deem you his worthy successor. For those with less patience, you can invade the castle and take his place by force. (Be warned: the King and guards won’t make it easy for you…)
Lastly, should you be one of pure heart, you can collect four rare spirit stones and cure the King of his illness, forever earning his gratitude. These stones can only come about by luck. Sometimes they are given as a quest reward, other times they are discovered when exploring a cave.
The spice of the game comes in the form of cards. Three decks form the basis of your strategy: Items you can equip and use to improve your own strength, Spells for temporary bonuses, and Trickery which lets you steal from and set traps for other players across the map. Money and mana allow you to buy and cast these cards. You’ll get to draw any combination of these cards at the start of each turn, up to your max hand size.
Combat is handled with good ol’ dice rolling. Your items and traits will determine how many you get to use. You and your for tally up attack/defense points based on your rolls and deal the resulting damage to each other. It’s possible for one or both parties to die in combat, so watch out!
All in all, every step you take a vital to make it to the top! Pockets of land are poisoned, guardsmen defend the castle, and Rot beasts come out of hiding every night to raid the lands.
I’ve been an avid tabletop gamer for many years (grew up waging Monopoly wars with my sister, building a huge collection of games nowadays). Armello fits right into this, with the added bonus that I don’t need to worry about hundreds of little pieces to make up the world! League of Geeks has taken full advantage of graphic design and animation (even the card art is animated!) to create a visually glorious title. So go out there and give this a try!
Armello is available on Steam, iOS and Android. (Update: Armello is available for the PC and the PS4 as of Sept. 7.)
