Expeditions: Viking

I've played the Rome and the Conquistador games in this series. I found this one to be very addictive and quite polished. Sad to see the franchise ends after Rome

I understand that this is the black sheep of the Expeditions series, but I ended up liking it more than I thought I would given its less than stellar reputation and the fact that I've never found the Viking Age to be particularly interesting.
I'll start off with the bad:
- I did have issues with crashes. I understand on release that this was a much bigger problem than I experienced, but even though it's a lot better than it once was I still encountered some crashes. Most of these were in the later part of the game (after you arrive to Britain.) Mostly it was just a minor annoyance thanks to frequent autosaves, but I experienced a crash immediately after a particularly difficult battle (last autosave was right before the battle) that made me rage quit the game for about a week.
- I wasn't really a fan of the time limit. It wasn't particularly unforgiving or anything. The time limit is a little tight during the Denmark part of the game, but it's fairly generous after you make it to Britain. I was able to experience most of the side content with some time to spare. Admittedly this was with using a guide to help with some of the more obscure side quests and I could see it actually being a problem if you were blindly exploring on your own. I don't know, I don't really think a time limit adds anything to the game and disincentivizes exploration to a degree, which is not something you want in a game about exploration.
Now for the good:
- I liked the character customization in this game. Conquistadors did have some limited customization in the form of promotion, but it's a lot more fleshed out in this game. For starters, the PC is actually a combatant this time around so how you build your character actually matters in combat in addition to out of combat. You're able to recruit a set number of named characters whose stats are predetermined, though you can play around with their gear and abilities, as well as recruit a couple mercenaries that are fully customizable and if minmaxed properly will be better than any of the named story characters.
- I actually found the characters to be pretty likable. Having good characters is always crucial to any RPG and I felt like the ones in this game had a lot more personality to them than in Conquistadors. I ended up liking the main cast so much that I primarily used them even if my customized mercs were better in combat because I liked their interactions so much. The berserker in particular was the real stand out.
Mixed Feelings:
- I feel like the difficulty was a little better balanced this time around. Conquistadors was pretty front heavy in it's difficulty but by the end you were steam rolling everything if you knew what you were doing. This game manages to keep a bit of a challenge throughout though that's mostly because of how broken ranged units are. In Conquistadors, ranged units were pretty worthless, so it feels like they overcorrected in this game because they are incredibly over-powered. I can't tell you how many times I lost a character or two in the first round of fighting because of bullshit enemy archers pulled. The good news is you can do the same with your own archers.
- Camp management and over-world random events. I feel like camp management is easier and overall less important than it was in Conquistador. Not really sure if that's good or bad. The bullshit random events from the previous game return so I recommend saving often in case you get fucked by RNG and get a bullshit random encounter or event (looking at you wolf ambush). These can often times be more difficult than anything in the main storyline.
All in all I liked it well enough I suppose. It definitely wasn't as bad as I was led to believe.

I tried playing AC Valhalla some weeks ago and was really sad to see all the junk, horrible combat, lack of focus and complete junk food of a game it was. I really wanted a nice Viking experience and decided to give this one a shot.
Oh my god, it's been a long time since I had such fun with a game.
Everything is really well researched, you can see that it is based on real history, with no supernatural combat, a very focused narrative story, great character building and even an amazing base building mechanic.
The time limit sure is a scary thing in the beginning, I usually hate them, but please give it a go, it makes total sense on this story and keeps you focused wanting to solve the problem and even getting angry at people when they waste your time.
It gives many options on how to proceed, and for the first time in gaming history they present a very realistic view on the Vikings where they don't only kill and raid everybody (even though you can do it if you want) but they also trade with people, and can make your clan, your party and even your ship totally focused on that.
Truly and amazing game, really recommend if you like story driven games, great RPG mechanics and historical accuracy.

Expeditions: Viking is a unique and very underrated RPG. Sure, it's not the prettiest. Sure, there's very little voice acting. Sure, the combat isn't always the greatest. But it's an enjoyable, immersive saga with a good story, emotional depth, and fantastic ambiance. Bonus points for the two entirely divergent paths in the story that one may take.
Don't expect good production values or perfect mechanics, and be prepared to give the game a bit of time to grow on you. It's worth the patience, not to mention the minimal cost.
8.5/10.

diamond in the rough

It's a good game. It has its faults and awkwardness, especially in cutscene animation, but it's great.
Honestly, archers are overpowered. Slingers are completely useless, so are rogues. Even building dual wielding berserkers, spearmen or more traditional shielded warriors is useless until max level in sword and shield. everything is defeated by archers.

It's fantastic, deserves more praise, I immidiately bought Expeditions: Rome as well as all the DLCs. I think that the developers put a great deal of effort and passion into the game.
60% turn-based fighting with cover mechanism, no magic but some shouts to buff and debuff, poisons etc. 20% choice making, talking, some stealth even, 10% upgrading your village, 10% camping and exploring - it has a lot to offer, but at times feels a bit basic.
I took me a while to get used to it, only prologue is around 5 hours long, almost made me stop playing it but I'm so glad I stuck with it.