Welcome to another Friday VR Drop, your regular round-up of the virtual reality (VR) videogames due for release in the coming week. The selection features new games, updates and more, plenty to keep virtual reality (VR) players busy for a while.
Cave Digger 2: Dig Harder – VRKiwi
The original Cave Digger was a quirky little title, dropping players in a mining experience all about finding riches and unlocking multiple endings. As the name implies, Cave Digger 2: Dig Harder takes things up a notch with an adventure videogame set within a wild west dieselpunk world. Providing both solo and multiplayer gameplay, you and three friends can mine your way through various biomes, upgrading tools and weapons to aid this dangerous journey deep underground.
Originally released for PlayStation VR in 2019, Table of Tales: The Crooked Crown is a single-player tabletop RPG. A mixture of swashbuckling and sorcery, you lead a party of scoundrels through more than 24 encounters utilising turn-based combat featuring dice, cards, skill checks and over 40 different types of enemy.
Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxy’s Edge Part 2 – ILMxLAB
Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxy’s Edge arrived last year for Oculus Quest and next week sees the concluding part, adding a whole new roster of characters, main campaign and two smaller side tales. The DLC update is called Last Call and sees you head back into Batuu to recover an ancient artefact whilst the tales see you take on the role of a class four assassin droid IG-88 infiltrating a fortress. The second tale continues Ady’Sun Zee’s narrative set during the High Republic era.
Leaving Steam Early Access as well as arriving on Oculus Quest for the first time, Clash of Chefs VR serves up a fast and frantic cooking experience where players can tackle an 80 level single-player or go head-to-head in the multiplayer. Chefs are challenged to prepare American, Italian, and Japanese recipes as fast as possible.
Table of Tales: The Crooked Crown is no longer a PSVR exclusive – it’s coming to PC VR headsets later this month.
Developer Tin Man Games recently confirmed as much. Table of Tales will touch down on SteamVR on September 15, where you’ll be able to play it with pretty much any SteamVR supported device but also on flatscreen. It’ll cost $24.99, though there’s a launch discount of 10% too.
As the name suggests, the game simulates a tabletop RPG in VR. You can expect traditional elements like controlling a party of scoundrels in a world that mixes magic with pirates. But VR is also used to augment the experience, presenting new boards on the fly. Oh, and you have a talking bird companion, just in case you were wondering.
We reviewed Table of Tales back in 2019. “PSVR has really come into its own in recent years, and Table of Tales is a flawed yet unique jewel in its crown,” we said, giving the game 7/10 (yes we used to use that scoring system). “The simple act of playing an animated board game in virtual reality is compelling, strengthened by liberally sprinkling the game with some very clever choices for the player. If you’re looking for something new that emphasizes entertainment over challenge, this is for you.”
This might be one to check out if you’re also into games like Demeo, then.
The magic of VR has taken us into the far reaches of unexplored space, and the darkest depths of our oceans. The prospect of spending an entire game sitting in front of a table in your aunt’s attic, therefore, may not fill you with boundless excitement. But! This is no ordinary table. Besides, if you look up from the virtual table in front of you at any time, you can see a rather beautiful sunset through the frosted glass window.
The eponymous table is the stage for a tabletop RPG. No need to worry about spending weeks of frustration trying to sync the schedules of a group of players for this one, though. The action literally unfolds before you by itself including the environments, characters, and props rising and falling from the table as the story progresses (a bit like the Game of Thrones intro sequence). Narration meanwhile is provided by a mechanical bird by the name of Arbitrix, who acts as the Game Master. I suspect she’s meant to sound like a pirate; but to British ears, she sounds more like a farmer.
Each character is a semi-animated game piece. You play the game much as you would a real-life board game, something that never loses its appeal. Action is turn-based and on your turn you reach down to the table, and pick up the character you want to use. Place them where you want them to go if needed, then choose their action. This is done by selecting one of a small number of cards on the edge of the table, and confirming by touching the character with the card. Simple, yet satisfying. There are (of course) all sorts of people and creatures to slay on your way to the end of the story but, in true tabletop RPG fashion, there are plenty of choices to be made, too.
You’ll regularly be faced with a situation where combat is but one of several options, or may not even be an option at all. This is where your characters’ stats, such as Strength and Charm, come into play. Perhaps you’ll try to charm a character onto your side, or use brute strength to break something in your way. A number of stars above the relevant option shows the total number of points necessary for success, which will almost always be above the capabilities of even your most suitable character. You’ll therefore need to roll the dice – both literally and figuratively – on your action of choice.
There are no ‘wrong’ choices, only alternate paths for your story to take. Although I assume (as this didn’t happen to me) losing all your characters in a fight results in a Game Over, failing a chosen interaction doesn’t bring the game to a halt. It probably means that you’ll have a more difficult fight ahead of you, but the story continues. This is just one way in which Table of Tales enthusiastically encourages repeat playthroughs.
Sure, you can wonder what might have happened if you’d succeeded in that failed attempt. But what if you’d gone for one of the other available options? What if you’d gone done path A rather than path B a few stages ago? What scene would have played out there? That NPC that joined your crew… you lost them in battle. But what if you’d looked after them a little better, and they survived until the end? You failed to convince that character to help you just now, but what if you’d managed to get them to believe you? And so on.
There are so many brief yet interesting avenues for the story to explore, the game stands up extremely well to at least a few extra playthroughs, offsetting the modest playtime of roughly two and a half hours. The members of your motley crew are known as the ‘Scoundrels’, and they certainly lived up to the name in my first run through. Two of my temporary allies died, I betrayed an alliance I’d forged, and left an entire island of people to their deaths. Oops! None of that had to happen, though.
There’s a neat, vaguely Neverending Story or The Princess Bride atmosphere, and moment-to-moment gameplay moves along nicely; but it’s not for everyone. The presentation and storytelling are distinctly kid-friendly (with one odd exception I came across, the use of the word “bastards”). There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that in and of itself, but in this case it means weak and toothless humor and a predictable, often derivative plot. In addition, combat only allows for limited scope when it comes to tactics.
Movement and actions are based on action points, so thinking is definitely required, though the simplicity is a double-edged sword. While some will appreciate the limited number of combat cards, and the fact that attacks never miss, others will doubtless pine for something more complex and deep.
Final Score: 7/10 – Good
PSVR has really come into its own in recent years, and Table of Tales is a flawed yet unique jewel in its crown. The simple act of playing an animated board game in virtual reality is compelling, strengthened by liberally sprinkling the game with some very clever choices for the player. If you’re looking for something new that emphasizes entertainment over challenge, this is for you.
Developer Tin Man Games have released a new trailer for their upcoming virtual reality (VR) tabletop role-playing game (RPG) called Table of Tales: The Crooked Crown. This adventure RPG will see players sat before a table which comes to life in virtual space, offering a uniquely immersive tabletop RPG experience.
Table of Tales: The Crooked Crown is a tale of swashbuckling and sorcery in which the player must lead a band of adventures on an epic question. Seated at the mysterious, magical table, the party you take control of will relay on your skills and knowledge to make tactical combat decisions and determined the scoundrels’ fate. Featuring a story that is shaped by the decisions you make, the title is promising to be highly repayable with a number of different outcomes to explore throughout.
Of course, no tabletop RPG would be complete without a Game Master and in Table of Tales: The Crooked Crown players will have the pleasure of meeting Arbitrix – an unconventional narrator who will guide players through their adventures. Tim Man Games’ Lead Writer Ben McKenzie explains a bit about what to expect from Arbitrix, saying: “There have been lots of Game Master characters in games, but many are very antagonistic and only have one goal: to kill you. A big part of Table of Tales is bringing to life a Game Master who is more like real-life GMs: they challenge you, yes, but really they’re on your side. They love the game and want you to have the best and most exciting adventure possible. That’s Arbitrix.”
Tim Man Games have been working on the title for over 18 months and have a deep history in building deeply intertwined tabletop gaming experiences and this new venture in VR is no different. “Our history is deeply intertwined with tabletop gaming with many of our releases reflecting this, so we’re really excited to be taking the next leap forward in this area of gaming by making a really fantastic digital tabletop RPG for VR.” The team write on their blog.
Table of Tales: The Crooked Crown is due to release for PlayStation VR in Q3 2018. VRFoucs will be sure to bring you all the latest on the title in the future, so stay tuned for more. You can see the E3 2018 gameplay trailer for the title below.
