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!

Miasma Chronicles is an underrated gem of Tactical RPG genre. It deserves much better reception than it initially got. Its very similiar to Mutant Year Zero, which was a previous game from these devs. It merges elements of stealth, tactics and RPG in interesting ways.
I actually think Miasma Chronicles is a better game than Mutant Year Zero, which makes the fact that its so underrated even more disappointing. Devs expanded all mechanics present in their previous game and managed to craft an interesting post-apocalyptic world. Characters and story are rather simple but likeable with enjoyably cheesy voice acting and fun twists along the way.
Graphically Miasma Chronicles is quite a looker, for a game using isometric perspective. Environments are richly detailed and well designed, with many tactical options available. Particle effects are especially stunning! Performance wise its quite demanding and requires a decent rig or lowering of graphical settings.
I was playing on Extreme difficulty and found gameplay to be pretty challenging. Every encounter required I "thin the herd" using stealth, before engaging in open combat. Fortunately, stealth has extra depth due to introduction of sound lures, used to separate enemies from groups. Stealth is well balanced as the number of silent weapons is very limited and you'll be only able to kill low tier enemies in stealth.
When detected by enemies, combat switches to regular XCOM-style affair. Fortunately, its has more depth as each character is highly customizable via itemization and skill trees. I quite liked the skills available and the fact you could freely respec each character at any time. It made me micro-manage my squad depending on the type of enemies I was fighting.
I had no expectations for Miasma Chronicles, but I'm happy to say that its a great tactical RPG and manages to stand out in the sea of XCOM clones. Its strange it was so under-marketed, considering the pedigree of the developers and high quality of the final product. I really hope it manages to find its audience and we get to see the sequel, as the story goes in interesting directions, but feels like just the beginning of a bigger saga.

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

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.

Overall 8.5/10 - Recommended
Story / Plot - 5.5/10, the story was a bit slow and didn't really hold my interest after the early part of the game. The story unfolds very slowly and by the end you are focused more on finishing the game than uncovering what's left of the story.
Combat - 9/10 - this is what you'll spend most of your time in the game doing. The combat plays very similar to XCOM 2 with the standard move, shoot, and overlook options for most characters. There's some limited melee options with 2 of the characters that can be very powerful when used properly. There is also a cover systems (half and full), high ground, and explosive barrels you can shoot to damaage foes.
Graphics - 9/10, this game will make good use of your high end CPU and graphics card
Sound/Voice - 10/10, most of the characters have professional quality voices and the sound and sound effects are very good overall. I didn't turn on the music, so I can't speak to that.
Bonus Points for Developer Name: The Bearded Ladies