Culdcept Revolt review: Believe in the heart of the dice

The Culdcept franchise returns to the West with Culdcept Revolt, bringing with it a deeply strategic and time-consuming blend of board game and card mechanics.

Developer: Omiya Soft
Publisher: NIS America
Platforms: Nintendo 3DS
Release Date: October 3, 2017

Chances are you don’t remember Culdcept if you live outside of Japan. Which is understandable – the turn-based strategy game is about as niche as you can get in the genre. First released back in 1997 on the Sega Saturn as a Japenese only title, Culdcept has made its way to the West only a handful of times. And for the most part, the board-card-game hybrid has flown under the radar. In honor of the game’s 20th anniversary, NIS America has brought the latest entry in the franchise, Culdcept Revolt, onto the Nintendo 3DS.

At the risk of sounding generic, the best way to describe Culdcept‘s gameplay is imagining that Monopoly and Magic the Gathering had a video game child. The game features a familiar playground: a board filled with colored spaces (territories) and dice. Each player also has a Book (deck) of fifty cards, filled with various items, spells, and creatures. Players make their way around the board, collecting magic from various sources.

Magic can be obtained by capturing territories, from tolls, spells, and by making their way completely around the board. Similar to owning “property” in Monopoly, players spend these magic points to summon creatures on territories, allowing them to collect “tolls” from passing players. These territories can also be leveled up using magic, increasing the toll amount. When you land on an occupied territory, you can either attack that territory to steal it from your opponent or pay the toll. The ultimate goal is to collect as much magic as you can by claiming, defending, and/or attacking territories and completing laps around the board. The first player to hit the specified goal magic count and cross a designated waypoint wins the game.

The general concept sounds relatively simple, like a fantasy version of Monopoly. Or at least that’s what I thought at first, being completely new to the series. I consider myself well-versed in the world of digital card games and was intrigued by the idea of playing Hearthstone-esque cards in a table-top environment. What I wasn’t prepared for, however, was just how in-depth and strategic this game can really get.

Credit: NIS America /

For one, the game features a whopping 400 unique cards with a wide variety of abilities, stats, and elemental affinities. Each Book must contain exactly fifty cards – this is where the CCG gameplay really comes in. Deck-building is a huge aspect of the game and Books allow you to tailor your strategy based on your preferred playstyle.

The game boards themselves are unique as well. Each board contains four elemental type tiles: fire, earth, air, and water. These correspond to your creature types, giving players bonuses for matching tiles with creatures (or in some cases, limiting their creature summoning abilities). However, Culdcept Revolt features a multitude of different board layouts with varying special tiles. Some boards will have different branching paths, some will have warp tiles, bridges, traps, and even shops.

Credit: NIS America /

Combine all of these together, add in 2-4 players, and the game can get pretty hectic. Every game plays very differently and requires a huge amount of knowledge about both the cards and the board. The game allows you to also see your opponent’s hand – to an extent. You can see the names of cards your opponent is holding, but no descriptions. So unless you know exactly how much health increase that armor item has, good luck making use of that information.

Knowing when to attack or pay the toll, using spells to disrupt your opponent’s movement, and deciding which territories to level up is just the tip of the iceberg in Culdcept Revolt strategy. With over twenty unique creature abilities, thirteen different board tile types, and the mass variety of cards and creatures, this game is not for the faint of heart. Culdcept Revolt is certainly a large time investment and has a steep learning curve.

One important factor that the game can’t teach you, though, is luck. The RNG in Culdcept Revolt is brutal and game-changing. Not only is there the inherent randomness of drawing cards from a deck, but you also have to handle rolling two dice to determine your board movements. Will you roll just the right number to land on a safe spot, or will you hit right on your opponent’s high toll territory? I can’t tell you the number of games I have both won and lost on this one factor alone. The game is never over until it’s over – you never know who is going to go bankrupt after they can’t afford to pay a huge toll.

Credit: NIS America /

Frustrating randomness aside, Culdcept Revolt does a tremendous job introducing all of these concepts through its single-player story-driven Quest Mode. Players control an amnesiac Cepter (card wielders) on a journey to discover his identity. After joining up with the rebel Free Bat group, you and a ragtag team of Cepters fight for their freedom against the evil Count Kraniss who seeks to destroy all Cepters.

Starting with a series of tutorial missions, the game slowly introduces new game mechanics as you progress through the story. Along with helpful tooltips and the option to display a helper cursor that gives hints on your next move, Culdcept Revolt eases players into the inner workings of its complex game mechanics. Even just watching the AI’s moves can give newcomers a good idea of what types of synergistic moves they can make in-game. The AI isn’t perfect though – it often takes it easy on you (which you quickly learn after playing real people). But the story is worth playing to collect all of its free card rewards.

Credit: NIS America /

From a storytelling standpoint, though, Culdcept Revolt is significantly lacking. The game’s plot is told through a series of Japenese style visual novel cutscenes. While the story definitely improves as the game progresses, I found it overall quite bland and uninteresting. The trope of a mysterious character with amnesia is overdone, and the over the top character reactions and personalities were too generic for my liking. Yes, we get it, mysterious hero, you need to figure out who you are!

Not to mention how shoehorned in most of the battle sequences were into the story, often times in a completely nonsensical manner. It’s almost reminiscent of the Yu-Gi-Oh! anime – any little disagreement turns into an hour-long Cepter battle. I found myself just waiting for the cutscenes to be over so I could get back to grinding card unlocks. Doing all the main missions and side quests should result in a solid 20-30 hours of gameplay, which gives you a really strong understanding of all of Culdcept Revolt ‘s mechanics before you pass out from boredom with the story.

Credit: NIS America /

Culdcept Revolt doesn’t only require significant time to master its intricacies and complete the Quest Mode – one round can last anywhere from about 30-60 minutes. The game at least does give you the ability to save your progress mid-fight, but only when it’s a specific phase of your turn. While I appreciate the ability to play on-the-go on my 3DS, this style of game seems like an odd fit for mobile gameplay. I would have liked the touch screen to be utilized more as well, especially in a digital tabletop game such as this.

Credit: NIS America /

Probably the most frustrating aspect of these battles is the amount of passive gameplay. You are essentially playing a tabletop game, which means you have to wait to take your turns. And when you are in a match with three other players, this isn’t always the speediest. You can luckily control the speed of both player movement and AI turns, but for the sake of learning, keeping that speed at a reasonable pace is recommended. This means a lot of watching instead of playing, and without the benefits of sitting around a table socializing with your friends, that can get tiresome.