If there's one design decision that's bound to grab audience attention, it's strong pixel art visuals. Throwback RPG games like Chained Echoes or Sea of Stars, platformers like Celeste or Shovel Knight, and crafting or farming games like Stardew Valley and Terraria all look back to earlier eras for their aesthetics, and owe at least some of their success with players to that choice. It's also part of why the upcoming tactics project Dead Weight caught our attention when it was first announced, and why we're happy to see how the game plays now that it's just put out a Steam demo.
Dead Weight is a strategy game that owes as much to JRPG staples such as Rogue Galaxy and Final Fantasy Tactics as it does to the design conventions of FTL, Into the Breach, and XCOM 2. Set in a steampunk fantasy world stalked by threatening, newly awakened gods, players take command of a pirate ship capable of flying between floating islands to discover mysteries and hunt for treasure.
This ship can be upgraded on its voyage through the skies, and its crew also level up to master or combine various combat classes. When fighting does break out, it takes place on small maps where the player units and enemies, including massive gods, have to carefully consider their tactics to succeed. The combination of influences seems to be well considered in Dead Weight, which we hope leads to a solid experience when the game launches early next year.
Dead Weight's demo is available on its Steam page in the meantime, which you can find right here.
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