Despite Broken Roads tapping into some classical role-playing game ideas like in its turn-based combat system and character morality system, the way the game uses these ideas reveal a much more modern take on the genre than one would expect. I will talk about exactly how the game modernizes these classical RPG concepts throughout the review, but it is important to note that the studio clearly loves the genre. Even the game’s Steam page cites the games from the opening sentence of this review as clear inspirations.

One of the most central features of Broken Roads is how it handles the player character’s morality. Rather than offering up simple choices between “good” and “evil”, where your options don’t really vary much between “save someone” and “kill that someone”, the game instead opts to use a more complex system that can be likened more to a compass. A circle divided into multiple quadrants represents your character’s choices.

"It is important to note that the studio clearly loves the genre."

It’s rare that you’ll ever find yourself going down a single path in this compass, and even the game makes it clear that your character’s viewpoint of the world will embody multiple quadrants of the moral compass. It certainly helps that dialogue choices that are going to influence your moral compass are clearly labeled, removing any ambiguity that might come about, and you’ll always have a handle on just how your character looks at the world.

After going through character creation and answering a few questions that set your character’s stats, abilities, and moral compass, nothing is really written in stone, and your character will definitely evolve as the game goes on. Broken Roads doesn’t really use a class system like other RPGs might, and instead things are left more freeform so that you can adapt to situations as they come up. While it might be helpful, for example, to start out as a hired gunman that is a highly-skilled marksman, you might also find yourself investing skill points into some of the more social skills, raising your charisma or even your situational awareness in the process. Similarly, even your moral compass is likely to change depending on the hard choices you’ll often find yourself making; this is the post-apocalypse after all. Resources are scarce and you’ll often be the one deciding who gets food and water, and who gets a bullet in their head for their trouble.

Even the combat in Broken Roads feels like a more modern take on the classic turn-based systems we’ve seen from RPGs with guns, like in Wasteland and other classic titles. While still hanging on to the action points system that you’d find in the genre, the game ditches the use of any hex or grid, instead allowing you to more freely decide where you’re going to go and who you’re going to attack. Just about every action you can take in a fight costs action points, from moving and shooting to throwing grenades, punching someone, or even reloading your gun.

"Even your moral compass is likely to change depending on the hard choices you’ll often find yourself making."

As a whole, however, the combat certainly feels rather simplistic when compared to heavyweights in the genre, and you’re not going to be able to mix and match elemental effects, for example. Most of the fighting is going to revolve around just moving, taking cover, shooting, and tossing the occasional grenade. Thankfully, the combat is incredibly fast-paced, and tends to get wrapped up incredibly quickly.

Aside from the moral compass, the other biggest feature of the game is undoubtedly its setting. A post-apocalyptic Australia is a rare setting to find in video games, after all, and Broken Roads definitely feels like it was made by people who not only live there but are also steeped in its culture. A simple but obvious example is in how slang is handled and how it features tips to learn them.

The story in Broken Roads isn’t too central to its core structure, and the game allows you quite a bit more freedom than you would expect in what order you might want to tackle your objectives. The story is pretty grand, and involves quite a few elements, ranging from political intrigue amongst the various factions and settlements you’ll meet, to more simplistic tasks like keeping settlements safe from some of the more unsavory elements of the post-apocalyptic world, like bandits. Things start off simple enough, with you being tasked with protecting an NPC as they travel between settlements.

"Aside from the moral compass, the other biggest feature of the game is undoubtedly its setting."

Interacting with various characters along the way, however, uncovers a much larger plot that Broken Roads doesn’t really feel like it’s equipped to handle well enough. The game’s central focus is always on what your character is doing, and as such, you don’t really get any other perspective on the narrative as it happens. Because of this, while the story is largely happening in the background, the strength of Broken Roads lies in some of the smaller vignettes it presents. For example, one of the first things you’ll come across is a child in shock, along with a woman looking over a seemingly fresh corpse of a man. The clearly traumatized child also has a gun, and it’s going to be up to you and your companions to figure out how you’ll handle this situation.

If I had to offer up a comparison, Broken Roads feels incredibly close in structure to Wasteland 2. While you do certainly have a clear goal in mind, you’re given quite a bit of freedom, and are in fact outright encouraged to explore the world around you and take on as many different side-quests and smaller tasks as you can as you get to learn more about the post-apocalyptic world. All of this is helped by the fact that the writing is quite good, and aside from a couple of characters, the voice acting is able to hold its own as well in presenting the game’s grim but beautiful world.

All in all, Broken Roads is a fantastic way for Drop Bear Bytes to make its debut. The game taps into classical RPGs for its vibes, but when it comes to gameplay mechanics, offers up a more modern take on various aspects like its morality system. Even the combat system, while feeling overly simplistic at times, still feels like it was streamlined in a good way; animations are quick and fights don’t take too long to get through. Instead, Broken Roads puts its best aspects, the choice mechanics and its beautifully realized setting, front and center.

This game was reviewed on PC.

The last point was supposedly especially brutal for the developer (which consisted of two “core individuals” and contracted personnel). “Throughout the entire duration, we, our publisher staff, other publisher dev teams and our close ones were constantly attacked by a cyber persecutor, and some of you, as our community, were also tormented with unwanted messages and emails.

“The matter is now in the hands of our lawyers, so we cannot speak about it any further, but know that we will not abandon it despite the studio’s closure.”

Despite the studio shutting down, no one has been laid off, since it “never functioned as a large corporation.” Instead, the team members decided “that each of us will go their separate ways.” The IP is still owned by the developer, but the chances of further support are looking unlikely.

Stray Souls launched in October 2023 for Xbox Series X/S, PS5, PS4, Xbox One and PC. Check out our review, where we awarded it a 4 out of 10 for its story, characters, voice acting, bugs and other issues, though it did receive some praise for its visuals courtesy of Unreal Engine 5.

https://twitter.com/JukaiStudio/status/1738327876032774630

“Today is a sad day,” said the publisher. “After 10 wonderful years, Versus Evil is shutting its doors. We’ve loved bringing you the best indie games we could find & sharing so many happy memories with you all, our amazing community! From the bottom of our hearts, THANK YOU for everything!”

Versus Evil director of product strategy Francis Fincke revealed on LinkedIn that the company has laid off its entire 13-person team at the start of the Christmas break. Community manager Chris Trippi revealed that it wasn’t an internal decision, but rather, one made by parent company tinyBuild.

Versus Evil has released quite a few games in its 10 years of operation, including the Banner Saga trilogy by Stoic, and Obsidian’s Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire. The company was acquired by tinyBuild back in November 2021, alongside its QA studio Red Cerberus. The acquisition was priced at a total of $31.3 million, with $12.5 million being paid upfront.

While tinyBuild is shutting down Versus Evil, it is currently unknown if this will affect Red Cerberus.

https://twitter.com/vs_evil/status/1738260315203059812

Unfortunately our parent company has made the decision to lay off the entire team here at Versus Evil.

So if anyone knows any open roles for Community Management, or assistant/associate Producer roles, I'd be happy to send my resume over.

DMs open in the mean time~

— Chris ➡️ Hire me! (@LetsGetTrippi) December 22, 2023

https://twitter.com/CupOfLaure/status/1738251515901464789

The story starts with a father who gets up from his stupor and proceeds to shotgun his entire family, almost like that one radio news story from P.T. They were all eating dismembered body parts, but when they’re all shot dead, aha! It was all a hallucination! Do you take control of this broken man and seek the truth, wondering what unnatural horror twisted you to murder those you love? Do you explore the darkness and intrusive thoughts inherent in every person, perhaps venturing on a path towards redemption, or fall into damnation?

No, but that would have made for a much more interesting premise.

"It’s by this point you notice something vital about Stray Souls – the presentation is awful."

Instead, cut to 18 years later where you control Daniel, a Metahuman (no, not that kind) who just inherited his grandmother’s house after she passed away. Daniel alternates between leaving his clothes all over the place like a slob and chatting up girls online, like Martha, who also coincidentally lives next door to him.

It’s not long before scary incidents occur, whether it’s a strange figure skulking about, odd noises coming from around the house or the classic power outage. What could be causing all of these – oh, it’s the ghost of his grandmother. Just out of the blue, revealed immediately and looks more comical than scary. Then she leaves. And returns to peek menacingly around corners. Then leaves again. And reappears. She’s trying her best here.

It’s by this point you notice something vital about Stray Souls – the presentation is awful. When Daniel sees the ghost of his grandmother, he goes from being scared at her twitching appearance to suddenly having a blank expression, like he’s en route to check the refrigerator. The grandmother is also just gone like she was never there in the first place. There’s no building of dread or creating an atmosphere of terror at the unknown past the first few minutes. It’s all a joke with no punchline.

It also gets worse.

"The game draws from other superior horror titles but seemingly can’t decide what it wants to be."

After these occurrences, Daniel contacts Martha – with their messages typed ahead of each other if you skip forward too quickly – and subsequently embarks on a journey to cure his haunting. Sorry, what I meant was going to the cemetery to see his family’s grave and running through the woods while attacked by terrifying creatures as Martha sets off fireworks in the distance to celebrate Daniel’s birthday. Hurray.

Upon controlling Daniel in the woods, I had the biggest personal jumpscare when pressing R1, which brings out The Gun. Why does Daniel now have a gun, and why is it a gold Desert Eagle? How is he suddenly so good at using a gun? Don’t worry, it belonged to Martha and, I kid you not, that’s the short version of the story. The duo then take off to a nearby police station to find clues about their father and how to stop their grandmother. Or something.

The game draws from other superior horror titles but seemingly can’t decide what it wants to be. Does Stray Souls want to be a psychological horror, like Silent Hill, where you must evade terrifying otherworldly creatures? It fails at this because the monsters in question just inexplicably pop up – the reason why is somewhat explained in perhaps the dumbest, most underwhelming lore revelation – and easily fall to a hail of bullets.

"Since there’s no real reason to be scared, there’s no point even shooting anything at some sections where you can just run past and forget about any threats."

There are multiple ammo boxes (all conveniently of the same ammo as your gun) and medkits in the woods, all similar and arranged carefully enough to remind you that this is a video game. Even if you run out of bullets, Daniel can execute a dodge-roll to evade almost every attack. No stamina is required either.

Since there’s no real reason to be scared, there’s no point even shooting anything at some sections where you can just run past and forget about any threats. This isn’t always the case, but the AI being dumb enough to never really outmaneuver or outwit you, forget posing any real danger, ruins that. Don’t tell me to “Try and survive” when my opponents can’t even get past each other without stumbling around.

There’s also a police station with its dark hallways, narrow corners and locked doors that push you to backtrack continuously to find the way forward. Does it want to be Resident Evil? Possibly, but again, there’s no strategic management of resources or running away to conserve ammo. There’s no feeling of surviving against all odds.

Even when it comes to puzzles, Stray Souls’ best work is probably in the house, after which it devolves into gathering items and keys and opening doors (and not even in a fun or clever way). On two occasions, I had to follow Martha, who approached two different doors on two separate occasions, concluded they were locked and tasked me with doing the heavy lifting. Thanks, sis.

"The so-called “jokes” and witty responses are terrible and make games like Forspoken and Atomic Heart look like masterpieces."

Let’s talk about the siblings. The dialogue where Daniel talks to himself is bad enough – when he shoots monsters, he says things like “I got a bullet with your name on it” or “I got your birthday cake right here” with some of the worst voice cracks yet. However, the banter with Martha is simply horrendous. The so-called “jokes” and witty responses are terrible and make games like Forspoken and Atomic Heart look like masterpieces. Their exchanges feel utterly fake and more like how someone thinks siblings interact instead of how they actually would, that too in a life-or-death situation with supernatural forces seeking to kill them.

What’s not said is even worse. There’s no discussion about the horrors they’ve encountered or reacting to events that just took place. At one point, another ghost arrives to do nothing but add annoyingly loud jump scares. Neither Daniel nor Martha react – it may as well not happen, for as little as it adds to the experience. Given how pivotal that character is to both of them, you would think there’d be some emotional breakdowns or disbelief, but nothing of the sort.

Adding to this are the facial animations. At first, they seem fine, if a little uncanny, but you eventually notice each character cycling through the same expressions. Daniel will have that same scared mumbling with every single horrific sight. He’ll also randomly yawn and purse his lips to the side. It’s just so odd and jarring, especially during combat.

There’s no intense expression of fighting for his life, though he does react to pain. So we know he’s human in that department, though taking damage does not affect his movement or posture. Characters don’t look at each other while talking, and there are even situations where Daniel doesn’t even look at his enemies while shooting them.

"Perhaps the only real positive to Stray Souls is the visuals. Unreal Engine 5 puts in work, with some solid-looking fog effects and foliage, the latter reacting naturally to the wind most of the time."

Speaking of combat, it’s…existent. Whether in the service of providing an entertaining shooting experience, adding to the horror or just for funsies, I’ll leave it to you. Except for the times when you suddenly can’t aim or shoot. I don’t know what triggers this bug or how to get rid of it.

When shooting, you don’t reload automatically when a magazine is empty, requiring you to stop aiming and press the reload button. There are times when Daniel won’t pick up ammo because he doesn’t need it, which is understandable given the limited amount of ammo to carry. Hit the prompt again, and he’ll inexplicably pick it up, the ammo seemingly vanishing into the ether.

There are weapon upgrades automatically unlocked as you progress through the story, like shooting faster, but otherwise, that’s all you get. You run into “bosses” occasionally, like the one giant creature who seemingly skated around and couldn’t damage Daniel’s body despite clearly flinging him away. At this point, I don’t know how to describe the experience other than “present.” There are some interesting enemy designs, but their tactics range from “spew stuff” to “run/shuffle towards the target and hope for the best.”

Perhaps the only real positive to Stray Souls is the visuals. Unreal Engine 5 puts in work, with some solid-looking fog effects and foliage, the latter reacting naturally to the wind most of the time. The lighting and shadows are solid, as are the atmospherics and effects, though there is the odd glitch and clipping at points.

"The less said about the sound, from the forgettable soundtrack and awful voice acting, the better."

Unfortunately, the character models aren’t always properly lit, with faces feeling overexposed despite the darkness of some environments. The camera can also get janky during up-close moments, perhaps the least surprising thing given everything else. At least the experience runs at a consistent frame rate.

One could go on with other annoyances, like how I couldn’t shoot a padlock to enter the police station without doing the whole song and dance with Martha, after which it could be shot. The flashlight also doesn’t point in the direction that Daniel is facing, but rather the camera’s. It led to an awkward moment where the flashlight was towards the camera, but the light source illuminated things behind the character. Maybe I’m nitpicking, but it’s just one of those things that outright breaks immersion. The less said about the sound, from the forgettable soundtrack and awful voice acting, the better.

Perhaps the final nail in the coffin of Stray Souls was when I discovered some “lore” in the police station. While most lore tries to educate you on the surrounding environment and its history (which Stray Souls also does, and not in an interesting way), this lore piece reads like a Wikipedia page, providing some much-needed context. Daniel has “The Darkness”, seemingly from being haunted by his grandmother, and that’s caused some deterioration in Aspen Falls, where the woods and police station are located.

There’s a cult with an Inner Circle, and Martha stole a sacred gun, though they removed some of the essential parts, so it’s not as powerful (I think). It’s the same gun she gave Daniel, by the way. I still have no idea what to make of it. How does this lore document exist within the context of the game world? Is there an Alan Wake-like figure chronicling it all?

"It feels more like a showcase for Unreal Engine 5 with an abysmal game attached."

It doesn’t matter because reading this document elicits no reaction from Daniel or Martha. It doesn’t alter their fate or present some new path forward. Worst of all, some of the incidents described don’t even feel all that more interesting than the actual story, which is a heck of an achievement.

I know Stray Souls isn’t a triple-A blockbuster horror title, priced at $29.99 instead of the standard $70. However, it feels more like a showcase for Unreal Engine 5 with an abysmal game attached.

In summary, buy Black Tabby Games’ Slay the Princess instead. It’s a better horror game, a much better story with interesting characters, has a distinctly gorgeous 2D art style and is cheaper. Even if you receive Stray Souls for free, the few laughs you’ll get from the absurdity of it all and the solid graphics can’t overcome how terrible the gameplay experience is. It may not beat the likes of Skull Island: Rise of Kong or Gollum for Worst Game of the Year, but that speaks more to their utter lows than anything else.

This game was reviewed on PS5.

"During the early days of Stray Souls’ development, we took a lot of inspiration from what we consider to be the best of the best in survival horror games."

Stray Souls seems to be taking plenty of inspiration from survival horror classics. Can you talk about some games that you looked at the most to take cues from for the development of Stray Souls?

During the early days of Stray Souls’ development, we took a lot of inspiration from what we consider to be the best of the best in survival horror games. There’s heavy influence from Capcoms’ remakes of Resident Evil 2-4 in a lot of the mechanics of Stray Souls, and when we were creating the atmosphere of the game, we looked at the Silent Hill series for inspiration on how to get the perfect spooky mood. Alan Wake had an influence on the way we handle weapons and inventory, but also was crucial to influencing the narrative itself. We drew inspiration from The Last of Us in creating our environments and some gameplay elements and finally, we sprinkled a little bit of influence from Souls games into our combat systems.

Stray Souls seems to be placing a lot of emphasis on its technical aspects, from its photorealistic visuals to its facial animations. How much have you focused on that aspect of the experience during development, and what can you tell us about the technologies you have used to achieve that?

The visual elements of Stray Souls have been paramount to our development process. We’re doing some really cool things with Metahuman and Unreal 5 to create realistic characters that can truly express the full range of human emotion on their faces.

A horror game’s setting can make or break the experience, and sure enough, Aspen Falls looks like a pivotal part of the game. What should players expect from it in terms of its atmosphere, backstory, and design?

Aspen Falls is at the epicenter of the story of Stray Souls, and as such, we aimed for it to be something players would immediately resonate with. The atmosphere was definitely influenced by the aesthetic of Silent Hill, but we think that players’ experience while exploring the town will have its own flavor unique to Stray Souls. Regarding the backstory of the town, we can’t really say too much without spoiling the story, but as we mentioned before, Aspen Falls is at the epicenter of the events of the game similar to how Silent Hill is the town that ties together that franchise.

"The visual elements of Stray Souls have been paramount to our development process. We’re doing some really cool things with Metahuman and Unreal 5 to create realistic characters that can truly express the full range of human emotion on their faces."

What can you tell us about the game’s combat? How much of a focus will it be throughout the experience?

We really aimed to have as balanced of an experience throughout Stray Souls as possible. There are some areas that are definitely “combat focused” while other places may have some encounters, but balance that with exploration and puzzles. The combat itself was designed to give players the ability to strategize exactly how they want to approach each encounter. We’re looking forward to sharing more about all of that in the months to come.

How extensive will the options in the game’s branching story be? How much will they impact the story and how it plays out?

Our system is a bit different than something you would find in a visually similar game like The Quarry or Until Dawn. The approach we took was more akin to the player projecting their emotions onto Daniel’s reactions to certain revelations about his past, and those projections ultimately influencing the choices they will make along the way. This results in a much tighter narrative that fits our vision for the overall experience in the game.

What can you tell us about the game’s randomization system? How much variety will it inject into proceedings, especially where replays are concerned?

Players will essentially be on their toes regardless of whether they’re on their second playthrough or their tenth. Randomization of key items, resources such as health and ammo, and even enemy placement will go a long way in keeping the player off balance in subsequent runs. One cool thing about our random weather system is that some players may run into enemies while it’s bright and sunny, making it fairly easy to find and dispatch them, but in a subsequent run, it’ll be overcast with heavy fog which will ramp up the difficulty of these encounters quite a bit.

Roughly how long will an average playthrough of the game be?

It’s difficult to say because everyone will play the game at their own pace, but more industrious players may find their sessions extended by exploring the world and really rooting out everything the game has to offer.

"Aspen Falls is at the epicenter of the story of Stray Souls, and as such, we aimed for it to be something players would immediately resonate with."

Do you have any plans to eventually bring the game to the Switch as well?

You can never say never, but at this time, we do not have plans for Switch.

What frame rate and resolution will the game target on the PS5 and Xbox Series X/S?

60 FPS with adaptive resolution, capping out at 4K on the PS5 and Xbox Series X, and 1440p on the Xbox Series S. The exact range on this is still TBD.

What are your thoughts on the Steam Deck? Do you have plans for any specific optimizations for the device?

We absolutely want to get Stray Souls into the hands of as many players as possible and Steam Deck is part of those plans! We don’t necessarily have any specific plans, but the game will benefit from the same optimizations and rendering settings as other devices in its class.

The game puts players in the shoes of Daniel who has been left with his grandmother’s house with no debts or financial obligations. There are clearly some catches, however, when Daniel discovers that grotesque monsters are trying to kill him once the sun sets.

Stray Souls is set to take quite a bit of inspiration from Japanese survival horror games. The game is also set to feature a bit of randomness in its design through the use of randomised systems, enemy and item placements, and even weather patterns.

Along with its combat and scares, Stray Souls is also slated to feature what the developers describe as “classic-style” puzzles that are meant to evoke the feeling of playing an old-school Silent Hill or Resident Evil game, but with an eye on keeping the puzzle designs more modern.

While lacking a concrete release date, Stray Souls is slated to be released on all platforms some time in Fall.

Obviously this is a bigger development than simply acquiring a developer – Versus Evil is responsible for publishing The Banner Saga games along with Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire. It recently published the Metal Gear-esque stealth title UnMetal along with multiplayer title First Class Trouble. tinyBuild CEO Alex Nichiporchik spoke about the acquisition in a recent video, noting that it was a “complementary label.”

Versus Evil founder Steve Escalante also said, “The joining of tinyBuild couldn’t have come at a better time. By infusing capital and investing in more titles, I’m very excited about the opportunities that will open up for Versus Evil as a publisher.” As for Red Cerberus, it consists of 250 employees who will join tinyBuild, resulting in a headcount that number over 400. Time will tell if tinyBuild continues its expansion efforts in the coming year so stay tuned.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdaS3Bgb0Qg

The game is essentially like Among Us as players are divided into two groups – the Residents and the Personoids. The Residents are human and have to shut down C.A.I.N., the Alithea’s rogue AI. Three keycards are needed to progress to the next level of the ship and get one step closer. The Personoids are essentially machines and must take down the humans before they reach C.A.I.N.

It’s essentially a cat and mouse game but there are a few ways to distinguish Personoids. Residents need oyxgen and Personoids don’t so while the former can republish the ship’s O2 supply, the latter can sabotage it so keep an eye out. Personoids can also pick up keycards and delay the Residents but if they hold on to them for too long – since everyone can see who’s carrying a keycard – then it may give them away.

There are also different passenger logs that will provide hints on a Personoid’s identity. Also, if Personoids don’t dispose of bodies then a corpse scanner can be used to ascertain their identities. All in all, it’s a fairly interesting twist on the formula and should be worth checking out when First Class Trouble launches next week for PS4, PS5, PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and Nintendo Switch.

The title launches with the Creator Pack, a free DLC pack with voices from more than 80 content creators that will play throughout the game. Interestingly, part of the story sees Jesse talking about his escape to a lieutenant who’s examining his report on the whole affair. The “how” is the main appeal of the game and it might be worth checking out just for that.

UnMetal is out for Xbox One, PS4, PC and Nintendo Switch. Check out the “Man of Action” trailer below to get an idea of what to expect, from the various skills that Jesse can wield to some of the cornier one-liners he employs.

Distracting enemies, using objects in the environment to your advantage, crafting weapons, taking on giant helicopters in boss fights, and much more is shown off. Interestingly enough, all of it’s very self-aware about how much fun it is poking at Metal Gear Solid, including quips about an eyepatch, codec-style conversations, and a protagonist with a raspy voice. Check it out below.

UnMetal is in development for PC. Currently, it has no specific release date announced. Stay tuned for more details in the meantime.