<b> Bottom Line Review </b>

A lot of Hard West 2 offers interesting wrinkles to its CRPG experience but overall they thinly mask a flat experience. The overworld gameplay feels hollow and the combat encounters suffer from uneven pacing. Personal mileage will vary for this ambitious indie title, but I had a hard time wanting to play longer after one fight at a time and, when I did walk away for something else, was not motivated to return,

Great game. A refreshing change from turn-based strategies like XCOM that's focused around being aggressive rather than defensive (no overwatch ability)! As you get better, it almost turns into a puzzle game where you find ways to line up enemies and knock entire groups down like dominoes with the bravado mechanic. Healing is cheap, and characters can't die for good so you're free to advanced without worry of permadeath. Great production value, the characters are interesting, it feels like a slightly campy western, and the graphics are pretty. Rather than levels and skill trees, your characters are governed by a deck of cards, and they get better/stronger abilities depending on the hand you create - for example, a royal flush is one of the strongest hands so most of their abilities get unlocked/boosted - which I found quite interesting. I do have a few complaints:
- The game strongly encourages being aggressive and quick but there are so many times where you will run face first into an area and arbitrarily trigger a cutscene which spawns a pod of enemies that you had no way of knowing would happen. After the cutscene it goes back to your turn like nothing happened - only now there's 10 new enemies in front of you and your action points aren't refreshed. This only happens during main story missions - side missions don't really have this problem because the new enemies you find in new areas will naturally filter as they're already there to begin with, rather than spawning in a cutscene.
- No incentives to using other characters once you find the 4-man group you like. There's no leveling or fatigue system or anything to dissuade you from using the same team every mission. For pretty much my entire playthrough, Cla'lish and Bill sat on the bench unless a mission required them because you have no reason to switch up your posse.
- Levels are incredibly linear. This becomes more apparent the longer you play, and you realise that at its core it is a puzzle game with only one or two solutions per level (depending on your team comp). There are no alternate or side routes on the map to get to your goal, just a single line to follow. Would've appreciated side doors or new paths I could blow open with dynamite or something, especially since early on the game stresses how important it is to have dynamite on you.

That said, I would recommend this game if you like turn-based games. It is more of a puzzle game, but it is still worth playing because the aggressive style of gameplay is quite fresh and can lead to some awesome moments.

De los mejores juegos de estrategia que he jugado!
muy parecido a wasteland 3.