Great game.

The gameplay is unique and interesting. The characters vary just enough to spice things up.

The difficulty is very well balanced. Hard is just hard enough to keep you thinking on most turns. I can tell that a lot of people with negative opinions about the game just don't have a desire to learn the system. (Or don't have the smarts to figure it out.) Sad, but I can't tell you how much I appreciate that they didn't muddle it down and homogenize it for mass appeal, like basically every other game out there. WE NEED MORE GAMES LIKE THIS. With an identity that doesn't fear to be unique and takes actual effort to be good at. Over the last year I've learned to quit looking at steam reviews in any kind of authority, because so many of them mean just as little as reviews you'd find anywhere else, and the amount of people that can not handle any level of complexity or difficulty is way too high.

The main story is alright, but I love the characters. I appreciate that the arc for Fleet was exactly the kind of antihero I was hoping for when I played the demo. Reminded me so much of overzealous twitter activists, except those usually just never learn their lesson. The character design and appeal is phenomenal, pretty much across the board. I think Hamir has both my favorite story and gimick. The design appeal for Artemis and Slade are very high. Probably not a character I don't like among them, though I would have disliked Fleet if she hadn't had the arc that she does. While I love foxes(obviously), and want more foxes in Aether, I almost wish they had kept her as a bat... I feel like that would have been super fitting for this town, the main story, and Fleet's general idea.

The amount of content is pretty good, but its variety may be where my biggest complaints are. The enemy variety is super low in the main biomes. 4 or so of the same enemies show up on each of them. I think it was probably difficult to come up with good and unique gimmicks for enemies in this type of battle system, but I really would have appreciated reskins of the same enemy types for each of the biomes, especially when the character designs is one of Aether's biggest strong spots. Maybe even with some slight tweaks that fit the biome or just to spice things up.

The gimmicks of each biome are just busywork and not especially fun. The Lava biome's gimmick was not well relayed, and because it's Art's starting stage and her gimmick is to take damage, initially thought the idea was to take damage and heal through the biome... I realized this mistake pretty quickly, but had it been appropriately explained I wouldn't have taken damage at all. But this is just a small complaint.

I did have a couple other problems with this game, but they were patched out. The team has been working super fast to address both bugs and balance complaints. As of this review they have yet to over-correct/over-adjust, like a lot of indy games seem to do at the slightest sign of reviews from these players that literally just want push A to win experiences. While I haven't seen any talk of post-launch content, I am hopeful for some, because they definitely have a room to make a great game even better.

Great game. The gameplay is unique and interesting. The characters vary just enough to spice things up. The difficulty is very well balanced. Hard is just hard enough to keep you thinking on most turns. I can tell that a lot of people with negative opinions about the game just don't have a desire to learn the system. (Or don't have the smarts to figure it out.) Sad, but I can't tell you how much I appreciate that they didn't muddle it down and homogenize it for mass appeal, like basically every other game out there. WE NEED MORE GAMES LIKE THIS. With an identity that doesn't fear to be unique and takes actual effort to be good at. Over the last year I've learned to quit looking at steam reviews in any kind of authority, because so many of them mean just as little as reviews you'd find anywhere else, and the amount of people that can not handle any level of complexity or difficulty is way too high. The main story is alright, but I love the characters. I appreciate that the arc for Fleet was exactly the kind of antihero I was hoping for when I played the demo. Reminded me so much of overzealous twitter activists, except those usually just never learn their lesson. The character design and appeal is phenomenal, pretty much across the board. I think Hamir has both my favorite story and gimick. The design appeal for Artemis and Slade are very high. Probably not a character I don't like among them, though I would have disliked Fleet if she hadn't had the arc that she does. While I love foxes(obviously), and want more foxes in Aether, I almost wish they had kept her as a bat... I feel like that would have been super fitting for this town, the main story, and Fleet's general idea. The amount of content is pretty good, but its variety may be where my biggest complaints are. The enemy variety is super low in the main biomes. 4 or so of the same enemies show up on each of them. I think it was probably difficult to come up with good and unique gimmicks for enemies in this type of battle system, but I really would have appreciated reskins of the same enemy types for each of the biomes, especially when the character designs is one of Aether's biggest strong spots. Maybe even with some slight tweaks that fit the biome or just to spice things up. The gimmicks of each biome are just busywork and not especially fun. The Lava biome's gimmick was not well relayed, and because it's Art's starting stage and her gimmick is to take damage, initially thought the idea was to take damage and heal through the biome... I realized this mistake pretty quickly, but had it been appropriately explained I wouldn't have taken damage at all. But this is just a small complaint. I did have a couple other problems with this game, but they were patched out. The team has been working super fast to address both bugs and balance complaints. As of this review they have yet to over-correct/over-adjust, like a lot of indy games seem to do at the slightest sign of reviews from these players that literally just want push A to win experiences. While I haven't seen any talk of post-launch content, I am hopeful for some, because they definitely have a room to make a great game even better.