Legion Breaker is marketed as an “active” incremental game where you play a battlemage who’s on a quest to defeat some necromancer king. It’s an extremely simple kinda auto battler that I’ve had the pleasure of completing in just two sittings. Let’s quickly go over my thoughts on the game and what you can expect if you’re into incremental or idle games!
NOTE: I received a review copy of the game and have already completed it 100% before writing this.
Not a True Idler
Don’t be fooled by the “incremental” label, because Legion Breaker isn’t a traditional auto battler like Commander’s Quest or Orc Incremental. It’s more of a fantasy-themed The Last Stand, if you remember that old gem of a Flash game.
You mainly just shoot magic projectiles at an endless horde of undead enemies, and then you have to defeat whatever boss appears after the timer up top ends. It’s a simple gameplay loop that I enjoy precisely because of how little I have to plan or think about while playing it.
Over time, you can buy increasingly expensive upgrades that grant you new powers, drastically change how your current ones work, and even add some much-needed backup for the lone mage.
Huge Skill Tree, Not-so-Big Impact
One gripe I do have with the game is how upgrades work overall. Legion Breaker has a surprisingly large skill tree that you’ll need to grind through if you want to finish the campaign.
While a lot of upgrades do feel very impactful, especially the ones that boost your HP and spells’ damage, some of them may as well not exist with how little they actually help in the grand scheme of things.
If you ever plan on playing the game, please just avoid investing too much on stone walls or spearmen. They can occasionally come in clutch, but they get progressively more useless towards the end of the game, especially considering how expensive their higher tiers get.
I also have to call out the artificial-feeling length of the game, because a good chunk of the time spent completing it was just repeating a level over and over and over… and over again just to afford a few “mandatory” upgrades that were merely huge stat increases.
That being said, it definitely still fits the whole incremental theme. It’s just that it feels like nothing changes at all in some cases, to the point where some of my level clears genuinely surprised me as I had only gotten trivial upgrades like “increase this spell’s radius by 0.5” during that time.
It’s as if luck is a major factor in whether or not the game lets you progress. This length issue is compounded by the game’s “Blight” mechanic, which chips away at your health over time. I feel like having more levels to clear would have felt more satisfying than having to play around the Blight, since I view it as a mere reminder to upgrade my HP.
A Fun, Albeit Abrupt Experience
Despite my issues with the game, I’d say that I enjoyed my time playing through it. Some of my gripes could be alleviated by something as simple as letting you play the game without the window selected.
Right, I forgot to mention that part. For some reason, clicking outside of the window completely freezes the game. Had it not been this strict with unfocused windows, I probably wouldn’t have much of an issue with the grind. I get that it’s supposed to be an active game, but later on, the difference in gold gained while actively aiming your spells and just… not doing that is negligible.
It does get really satisfying once you have multiple spell types unlocked. Slinging massive fireballs and eventually just snapping my fingers to blast clumps of enemies provides some huge hits of dopamine, and the final stretch of the game admittedly gets really fun.
Overall, Legion Breaker is a nice, albeit really short incremental game that could do with a more engaging midway grind. The first few levels were at least incredibly satisfying due to the upgrades being visibly impactful, and then it ramps up again near the end as you get more than just flat number increases.
It’s almost like eating a sandwich with absolutely delectable slices of buttered up, toasted sourdough bread juxtaposed with a single, sad slice of ham in the middle. Like, it still tastes great, but there’s so many little things you can do to make the middle more exciting.