Miasma Chronicles

Compared to Mutant Year Zero, the story and depth of characters is bit flat. The world is intriguing, the characters have some wit, and the tactical fighting, focused on more silent ambushes is a good challenge. A fun 20 so hours, but buy it on a sale.
***Update after 20+ hours: cannot put the controller down. The challenge of stealth/silent attack, and changing the combo of your skills, weapons, and consumables based on the enemy is addicting. Still not super bought in the the characters, but I want DLC, and I want more games from this team and developers!

One of the hidden gems among turn-based RPGs. I had a great time with its exploration, story, RPG mechanics, stealth, and tactical combat. The difficulty curve could have been better, but it didn’t ruin the experience.

Easily recommended for fans of squad tactics and turn-based RPGs. Combine Fallout, Control, and XCOM and you would have something like this game. I could also recommend Mutant Year Zero and Wasteland 3.
+Visuals, cutscenes, environments
+Variety of options for game, difficulty, keybinds
+Fully voiced
+Atmosphere, exploration
+Tactical battles
+Variety of skills/options on level up
+Save anywhere
+Characters, story
+Miasma powers
+Variety of weapons, upgrades
-Some clunkiness
-Constant hold to run, no toggle
-Can't name saves
-No mini/map
-Many items/pickups easily missable
-Awkward battle camera rotation
-Very short range on most weapons
-Bounce weapons don't work from elevation

I enjoyed this every bit as much as Mutant Year Zero, up until the arena battle. I get it -- devs wanted to throw in a challenge -- but a non-skippable, multi-wave combat that you cannot save during is just not fun with a game as heavily influenced by the RNG as this one. I still give it a thumbs up, as I enjoyed everything up to this point, but I'm going to leave this one unfinished to play games I enjoy more.

This game is currently in the Humble Choice for June 2024, and this is part of my coverage of the bundle. If you are interested in the game and it's before July 2nd, 2024, consider picking up the game as part of the current monthly bundle.
X-COM with stealth.
The entire time I played Miasma Chronicles I thought “This feels like Mutant Year Zero.” and it’s obvious why. This is made by the same developer, likely the same engine. This time you’re a loner who has a robot who is trying to figure out the secret of the Miasma and a special arm your mom left you. The story sounds good enough to work, but I was more interested in the combat. The combat heavily focuses on stealth and getting into position to execute surprise attacks on enemies and take them apart. If you played Mutant Year Zero you might know what I’m talking about.
While I did skip a couple of cutscenes, a lot of the story felt like stuff I had heard before, missing parents, giving strange items to their kid, and the kid having to learn how to use them. It’s all a bit cliche. There’s a post-apocalyptic world where the focus is on a First Family of sorts that rules the land. The gameplay was fun, but I also remember thinking the same on Mutant Year Zero and that wore off after a while. This is a twenty-hour story, but I wonder if it can keep up the early momentum.
Pick this up if you liked Mutant Year Zero, or want another X-COM title. Combined with Warhammer Battlesector, this is a good combination, but Miasma Chronicles does feel like the weaker of the pair. Still, it’s trying something different and not a lot of strategy games try to include stealth like Miasma Chronicles does.
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Highly recommend. I always liked the idea of X-Com, but just couldn't really get into it. Played Mutant Year Zero a while back on Game Pass, and was thrilled to see this came out- despite me being a year late to the party.

Gameplay is fun, weapons and abilities are nice, and the ability to free roam/explore makes this a solid 10/10 for me. Looking forward to the next follow up.

I'll keep it short.
- Good tactical RPG with some solid mechanics, if at time marginally marred by a couple of questionable choices when it comes to balance and fine tuning.
- Solid production value, with pretty graphics and a nice (if not stellar) variety of visual assets, enemy types and so on.
- Forgettable writing with a bunch of not-particularly-likable characters (to put it mildly).
The story ends in something resembling a cliffhanger (which I doubt will ever see a follow up, since I don't think it sold particularly well) just when it feels it's just about to get interesting, but on a mechanical level I had blast with it (most of the time) and I don't regret the hours I spent playing.
Overall I enjoyed my playthrough and I'd say that if bought on sale it's a very solid way to spend 20-30 hours.