The Tenth Line

Combines a lot of unorthodox mechanics in terms of character progression, combat, leveling, etc. I am still getting a grip of how to pilot this thing but so far it's really fun just exploring all the new mechanics. Very cool.
EDIT. After playing it for more, I gotta say the game is POLISHED. I finally got used to the combat system for the most part and it's really something. You have to test out each move yourself to understand what they really do as the UI isn't super clear (which is a little issue, but adds to the experimenting part of the game IMO). Once you understand how the targeting of the ability works (say, if an original targeted enemy dies, what does it target now?), you need to be able to combo and chain the selected abilities of your character to execute them at maximum efficiency. I just fought what seems like the second boss and it is not exactly a walk in the park. The game offers a nice challenge.
The characters are also charming. The story isn't exactly your kids novel but sometimes it does get a little cliche or cheezy. But there are always moments where you see strong undertones of something deeper. Character are hinted with mysteries and have distinct personalities. People talked about how there is a lot of reading but honestly they are some really solid diagloues in a fantasy / adventure setting.
Lastly i want to add on, the character progression in terms of stats and leveling in this game is pretty fun. It's not your typical skill tree to attribute allocation. Leveling up is almost a mini game in and of itself, as you puzzle together stats upgrades onto a board with resitriction of placements. Deciding whether you want to maximize your potential stats gain vs how quickly you want access to additional abilities, and adjusting how much resource you want to spend on utilizing each of your character's unqiue traits. The character building in this game is way more dynamic and entertaining than classic RPGs. And since there is so many places to use your items (which is basically fuel for stats gain / ability activation / etc), you are constantly developing your character as you play. There is never a dull moment that makes you wanna grind for the levels or exp.
Some people find these new systems and mechanics overwhelming and "overly complciated". It's not. They are just different. Takes some time to adjust to, but really easy to pick up since the concepts are pretty intituitve. The only thing is you have to try thigns out yourself, since the game doesn't explain every little detail of how the skills work.
EDIT NUMBER 2:
Okay, so just as I am starting to get deeper into this game, I came to the realization just how freaken high the skill cap is in this game. You can get through it without that much of min-maxing, but for those who enjoys solving for efficiency and opitmization problems, this game is quite a challenge and it is really fun.
Let me explain the combat system a little more for those who are interested. You start by planning your character's moves, then there will be an exectution phase where you act out your character's qued moves in the order you want. Some abilities require you to activate them a few times (chain attacks, etc) so it's not just press three buttons in order you wanted. Keep in mind the big part of this is you don't know your enemies current HP, so if an enemy dies mid combat you might want to switch up the order to maximize damage and targetting. More importantly, the execution phase is TIMED. There is a very real time aspect to this seemingly standard turn based RPG. But that's just the basic of it, each of the character's unique design has a lot to do with what you are actually going to be planning and thinking.
Just for your to get an idea, the "roguish" character has this design where before the battle you basically fuel his pack of throwing knives with items, which magically empower the knives with elemental damage. Each of the item will give specific slots (basically numbered knives) elemental damage bonus, and as you use your knives in fights the knives rotate. So for the first turn you might have 2 fire knives and 2 ice knives but later on your knives may be 4 posion knives. Eventually, you go back to the start of the que again and etc. What this means is, when doing many of the rogue's throwing attacks, you can see what element is comming up next. But what this also means is that in case where you fight vs foes that have different elemental resisteance and weaknesses, you are going to need to control your attacks! Imagine during the 10 sec you have to execute all your moves you realize that the weak-to-fire foe is going to die and your ice dagger is going to hit an ice elemntal. So you switch up the order and have have your rogue hit first and then send in the knight to finish the ice elemental off. But then you realize that this would lead to your mage's aoe only doing damage only to 2 enemies instead of 3 (which is a big deal in this game, you fight mobs and mobs of enemies. In addition, if you finish of melee fighers at close range faster that means less attacks against you, so min-max pays off). Furthermore, imagine a case where your next few attacks are all different elements, that's even more improvisation you have to make as the situation develops (remember, no Health bars for enemies!) All this stuff is just for one aspect of a single character's ability. He does other stuff to like bombs and shit. THERE IS A LOT TO MASTER IN THIS GAME, BOTH REAL TIME AND STRATGIC PLANNING
Of course, you don't have to do all that. I am not able to master every move I make. But for those who loves to learn how to master the mechanics of a game, or even fancy the idea of a challenge, this is a really good pick up, AND ONLY FOR 10 BUCKS!
Final EDIT:
Finished it. Great experience. For a indie game if this is not a 10/10 I don't know what is.
I think I undersell other aspects other than game mechanics from what I said above. As I played more and more it became evident that the story is actually really good. By the end I didn't really care much for the fights but rather the plot and the characters. While at first the story seems cliche and simple, you do eventually find yourself feeling for the characters as the plot thickens with multiple factions doing their own things. Character that you might like dies or sacrfises themselves, past stories that nobody want to be forced to remember, tragedies, etc. It is certainly not the most epic story ever told, but it far exceeded my expectations and I felt that I didn't do it any justice with my focus on game mechanics.
Another thing is that I underestimated how much platforming and puzzels were in this game. This isn't portal or anything but the game does a good job of keeping things fresh by rotating the gameplay often. It's a very solid mix.
Now for some cons, cuz every game has them:
- by the end of the game I felt combat was getting a little stagnent. It comes down to using whatever most powerful moves you can each turn given how much mana/SP you had left. I didn't really pay attention or care for stuff like debuff and whatnot, just try to do maximum damage and aoe. Boss fight was still challenging, but the fights do get a little repeatitive. Keep in mind I am a person who gets bored quickly, and I haven't played the end game content, and lastly I still enjoyed the combat for the majority of the game until I was maxed out and maybe even overlevled. This shouldn't be that big of a deal.
- lack of information. This isn't bad either really since I love discovering game mechanics for myself. The ability would say "gives hinder debuff" but not tell you what "hinder" does. I still have no idea what G.Break means even though it's on every ability.
Ultimately, amazing game. Definitly a buy.

I was just browsing New Releases and saw this game by chance. I thought it was gonna be a mobile game type game, but decided to give it a chance after looking at the screenshots and realizing it was more than that.
I'm about 30 mins. in and so far I like the game. It's incredibly polished, it's not RPG Maker, OST is good, no auto-save (throwback!), and character progression/combat mechanics have some depth and are quite interesting. The bit about the game introducing unique mechanics is definitely there. Oh and there's a mini card game!
The only thing I've encountered so far is if 1 character finishes off the last enemy, the other character is still locked in their combo state until I press the necessary button (A, B or X).
Other than that, so far so good and great job on the release. Can't wait to play more.

Edit: add a few more opinions based on the recent patches that improve alot of Quality of Life issues and balance/mechanic issues. They can be found in bold.
Bought this 2 days ago and had to marathon it to 100% completion in 20 hours. Right now, I'm still playing it on NG+ for the sake of the challenges the game has to offer.
The Tenth line is a great RPG game especially for those who are familiar with Valkyrie Profile and its battle system. You play as a group of 3 travelers. A girl, a talking fox (kobald) and a black dragon mage traveling from one location to another. Along the way, they will make new friends, enemies and the usual RPG crap.
Well then, what makes The Tenth Line good since I just say the usual RPG crap will happen?
Some of the pros of this game.
Plot:
The plot is actually quite good. Characters will go through development and have great dialogue between each other. Plot armors don't really exist and if something happens on the screen, it stays that way. Nearly everything actually happens for a reason. While the general plot might seem straight forward at first, there's actually quite a few twist here and there.
Combat:
The combat has a rather steep learning curve at first because the game has ton of stuffs for you to learn and all you have is a bunch of text tutorial. It might take you a few hours (or even halfway through the game) to finally be able to dodge and properly use super block or block breaker. However, once you do figure it out, it's fun burning through an entire group of enemy in a single wombocombo.
Stat System:
If you have ever played FF10, you will love it. The Tenth Line uses a board-based stat system. You start at a certain source point on the board and you have a bunch of empty space where you can use level up point to put in new items and gain additional stat based on what you used and what slot it is. For example, a red slot will double all attack bonus so a +2 atk will become a +4 atk when used on that slot.
For those who love to min/max, you will love this system alot when you try to maximize the stat and even put something like +Atk in a health slot instead if you find the extra health unnecessary.
For those who just want to play the game normally, no need to worry, even the post-game bosses can be cleared with minimal stat optimizing. You can just insert the proper color into every slot with the best item you can find from just going through the game and it will still be enough to 100% the game. Insane min-maxing is reserved for those who wish to challenge themselves on New Game + with harder difficulty where enemies are much much tougher.
OST:
Although nowhere near legendary orchestra piece in modern gaming, the OST is at least above average and really fit the mood of the setting.
And now the most noticable cons.
Having too much complexity and mechanic aren't always good:
One of the game mistake is trying to give every character a mechanic on top of mechanics. In the end, you only bother with the princess mechanic (Sp or Healing based on what her current gauge is at).
Tox's elemental breath is only really bothered when you want to do some platform puzzle. Having to bother with what element you have in combat or feeding his affinity is just too much work and unnecessary.
Rik magical knives can be ignored entirely.
Added information based on the recent patches: With the buffs and adjustment to late-game mobs especially in NG+, Rik and Tox mechanic are very important for the sake of dealing or negative more damage to get through harder challenges. Those playing for the sake of a simple story mode still need not worry about being punished for trying to learn it.
Status/Inventory Management The Game:
In this game, your character combat performances are effected by what you last "feed" your characters in order to gain additional bonus numbers. These are temporary and will only last a few combat at most. After a few fights, you will have to open your menu, go to your character profile and start feeding each of your character before you take on any big fights if you want to do it with ease. At least 3-4 hours of my gameplay are probably spent in the menu from just feeding the characters over and over.
It makes me wish that items don't drop so often and that bonus last twice as long instead so I don't have to go into the menu every 10 minutes and start feeding characters for 2 minutes.
Update based on the recent patches: With stacking item occupying minimal slots and more gold sink option and means to buy items that greatly reduce the amount of farming to get the best stat items and training items, this strain of this issue has been greatly reduced.
==
There are certainly a lot more pros and cons I want to talk about but in the end, the game is really good and you should give it a try anyway if you love RPGs. At least an 8/10 for me.

The day I saw this game in Steam Greenlight, I immediately gave this game high hopes. I was even more excited about it when I played the Demo and now, even though I'm only nearly an hour into the game, this is everything I hoped it would be. The art style is amazing, the soundtrack is great, enjoyable characters, and the combat system is very well done. This is an RPG well worth the wait.

The Tenth Line is a very solid JRPG that does a great job with its presentation. The mechanics can be overwhelming at first glance, but the game does a good job pacing itself so that you learn what the menus do as you progress. It’s a sort of shout out to a lot of RPGs from the late 90s and early 2000s and seems to draw a bunch of inspiration from titles like Valkyrie Profile, FFX, and Wild ARMs 3. If you’re a fan of the genre, I would give this game a look!
Read the full review here! It was too long to fit onto steam so unfortunately I had to upload it elsewhere V:

A fantastic turn-based RPG experience that came out of nowhere. The game hooked me with its charm and then kept me with its surprisingly well-written dialog and character development. Every character has a clear reason to exist and be with the party throughout the story. There are many twists big and small that kept me glued to this game. I had trouble sleeping for a couple of nights over the course of my playthrough because of my desire to see how the story unfolded.
Like many have mentioned, the combat system has a steep learning curve. I have never played a turn-based RPG that requires such a great of amount of attention, pacing, and strategy as this one. The game starts out easy enough but ramps up the difficulty real quick, to the point where you may have to consult the manual and/or the disccusion forums to figure out how to play better. If you like your games to be challenging, you will probably love this, but if you don't have enough patience to fail a few times before things click, this might not be for you. I spent four hours on a main story boss (I'm sure everyone who's played this knows exactly who I'm talking about), but I had a real blast figuring out how to win (It's worth noting that this boss had been toned down since I played). There is a story-only option that supposedly removes encounters on the way to bosses and makes bosses simpler. I think the story and writing alone makes this game easily worth it, so this is likely a good option for those who get frustrated spending so much time figuring out how to beat a game (though personally I think removing the hardship of the encounters makes the experience less epic).
The difficulty comes from the huge amount of mechanics this game has; if you neglect just one of the many things that goes into the performance of your characters, you may struggle (examples include weapon training or replacing obsolete upgrades). I was still learning more by the time I reached the end of the game, which can be a good or bad thing, depending how you look at it. That being said, I think the number of mechanics could have been toned down a bit. Perhaps leveling up or weapon training could have been simplified. You will spend a lot of time in menus because of how much you are able to tweak your party members. Personally I love this kind of thing, but I know plenty of people who find stuff like this to be tedious and interruptive (especially if you are one of the fair amount of gamers that found FFX's sphere grid system or FF7's materia system annoying).
Platforming is used as a means of traversing the levels. Compared to other platformers, it's nothing special, but I did enjoy it as something interesting to do in between battles and story segments. I think it's a good alternative to simply walking around like in your typical classic/retro-inspired turn-based RPG. You have to guide each of the 3 characters through a section to advance. Each character has a different groundspeed, airspeed, and jump height. They each also have a unique overworld ability (e.g. ability to push rocks), so you occasionally need one character to help another one out, especially if you go for 100% treasure collection. None of the platforming is very difficult, in my opinion, but it can be pretty punishing if you miss a jump in certain levels as you will have to retraverse a lot of the level. This can also happen if you get ambushed (run into an enemy without attacking), as this often results in a gameover (espeically later on) depending on how far your characters are from one another in the level.
The OST was a real pleasant surprise coming from a game of this production value and a composer who, prior to The Tenth Line, had never completed a commercial project. Many songs feature emotional melodic swells that really fit in with the story that give me shivers. There is a great variety of music here that reminded me of the importance of quality music in an RPG experience.
Overall the game's virtual presentation and art were, in my opinion, good. Nothing amazing, but the envrionments were detailed enough to keep me immersed in the setting. Most importantly, the visual style of the characters and environments is highly consistent and cohesive.
Most of my complaints are minor.
As said before, I don't think the game needed to be so complex. While some will absolutely love the amount of depth this game has, I feel that most will wish it wasn't so complicated.
I wish the particle effects were a little more detailed. Most of the elemental attacks were more or less just blobs of color. Animations are good enough but could have been smoother.
One last thing. The lone developer is awesome. If you have absolutely any problems with the game, you can post in the discussion forum and he will likely respond personally within the day (if not the hour). It's obvious he has put his soul into this game and that he wants little more than to give his players an awesome experience. I look forward to his future work.
edit: Added paragraph about platforming.

Initially, I was mostly drawn to this game because I really enjoyed the creators previous freeware games (The Reconstruction, I Miss The Sunrise, and The Drop <- All highly recommended, by the by). So there's that.
When I got the game, I was immediately drawn into into the story and the characters. As I went on, I found it a refreshing twist to something that I would see as a sort of silly, cliché story plot in something else. What really made the game stand-out to me were the characters. They were wonderfully written, and I was extremely attached to them by the endgame, and they sent me through this roller coaster of emotions that I don't really feel for a lot of other games. Not everything is as it seems within the game, and I think that's my favourite part of it all.
The combat system in the game was interesting, though I will say that I didn't really get "the feel" of it until quite late into the game, honestly. It's a little hard to wrap your head around at times, but all-in-all, it was a pretty interesting way to present battles. Although I will say it got a little formulaic at the end, using the best moves when you can, and stalling until you could, but it's not a major gripe with me, because I tend to experience that with almost EVERY RPG I play. Despite that, I still did try to experiment.
The powering/leveling-up system in this game was unique in its way. I've never been real good at item management, but I had to catch on real fast if I wanted to utilise their powers to their fullest. And so I did, and then my players got really powerful, really fast.
Quad Pro Quo is really fun in its own right, and I kind of just kept playing games of it to play it.
The platforming of the game was simple, but could be a little more than awkward at times, at least for me, anyway. But otherwise it was perfectly okay! It was mostly just trying to figure out whether I'm going to be able to pass through it or not, and if not, can I get through it without bonking my head and falling into the pit and having to slowly walk back to where I was (looking at YOU Tox).
Otherwise, I highly recommend this game. I had pretty high expectations for it, and it did not fail to deliver. There were a few problems and a few frustrations along the way (a couple of things could be really vague at times), but otherwise it's really well-made and well-polished game!