Foretales Reviews
A card-based choose your own adventure game that emulates your favourite board games, Foretales has a novel gameplay idea that sadly gets a little too repetitive to hold your attention for the multiple playthroughs its story options offer. It’ll make for a warm and comforting couple of sessions play and there’s a lot of scope for an expanded sequel, but what’s here may leave you wanting even after just one playthrough.
Telling a story just by using cards isn't an easy task. Despite this, Foretales manages to make you love and care about its characters and world.
Review in Turkish | Read full review
Foretales is a game that perfectly succeeds in creating a story of infinite possibilities. A cross between a fantasy board game and a good book set in the Middle Ages.
Review in Italian | Read full review
At the end of the day, Foretales offers a broad and delightful journey all within a digital tabletop setting. Its card art and party are diverse. Clever and varied card mechanics, along with party members' abilities, make for a fun suite of solution tools to use against some tough and fantastical narrative-based obstacles. However, with a lack of checkpoints, players may at times feel like they have bitten off more than they can chew in a run. Still, this remains a funky, unique little indie worth checking out for ambition and coziness alone. Carry on.
Foretales has been an entertaining ride, especially when it comes to the writing and the smart way in which cards are used during the non-combat sequences. The way the story expands and changes based on decisions means there is much replayability and more great writing to enjoy, and as long as you can avoid too much combat, Foretales has every reason to be a game to look out for when compared to contemporaries like Inscryption or Voice of Cards, or its real-life counterparts like Yu-Gi-Oh!.
Card games can be a tough sell, especially in video games. The threat of mechanical complexity can put some off, while for others it just seems a boring choice when fully-animated adventures are just as readily available. Sometimes, Foretales doesn’t do the best job of countering this argument, as it can disappear up itself through endless, monotonous combat. And yet, when it puts down the dagger and lets you explore the world to work things out for yourself, it shows that we’re nowhere near close running out of engaging new ways to use small slabs of art.
Rather austere in its presentation, and repetitive in its gameplay, Foretales unpacks an intriguing story via a roguelite narration, which makes you throw part by game, but in moderation. You will at least want to achieve a beautiful ending!
An interesting narrative-based card game whose gameplay loops get repetitive too soon.
Review in Italian | Read full review
Foretales offers a fun and open way to experience a story about saving the realm from impending doom. The freedom offered in its card game gameplay promises multiple unique playthroughs.
The systems and inner workings of Foretales create a captivating, addictive experience, but the repetitive nature of character and location cards stymies an otherwise magnificent experience.
Foretales offers a unique experience when it comes to creating a narrative via cards, although some systems are bit too “rigged” for my tastes due to preserving the “boardgame feel”, it’s still one that I recommend for the characters and how beautifully told it is.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
Foretales combines cards, puzzle elements and a bit of RPG to create a compelling narrative experience. The journey of the thief Volepain is filled with intriguing situations and their solutions include more than one possibility — experimentation and creativity are essential to advance the plot. Combat, puzzles and the variety of events enrich the experience, but there are a few issues: some objectives have way too complicated answers, navigating through some areas is tiresome and its reuse of locales and situations bring some repetition to it. Luckily, the ambientation includes an awesome dub, vibrant visuals, and charismatic characters, compensating the negative points. Overall, Foretales is a unique adventure worth checking out.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
Foretales is a great entry into the deckbuilding genre. Featuring a very simple gameplay style, this title is really easy to get into, but can still be challenging at times. The narrative is intriguing and the visual design is gorgeous. Foretales is definitely worth giving a go, whether you have played deck builders before or not.
Foretales spearheads the card-based genre into an unexplored amalgamation of narration and choose-your-own-adventure though I wish it hadn't strayed from its card battler roots so much, which ultimately leads to a simple gameplay loop.
Foretales is a wonderful example of how creative the card-based genre can be. Marrying a gripping narrative with gameplay that really makes you feel in charge of your own destiny, this is an engaging and fulfilling experience that we whole-heartedly recommend.
Where stealing sometimes was the right answer in order to bribe guards and avoid a confrontation. While the switch version has a few gripes when it comes to the visual fidelity and the interface, I was very pleasantly surprised by the end product. If you like card games and want to play a narrative driven game with a refreshing approach, Foretales may just be exactly what you are looking for.
Foretales has a lot of moving parts to this card-based game. The narrative-driven mechanic allows the players freedom to select which path to choose and how to play their hand is a fascinating, albeit risky, take on the genre. However, it works. You'll enjoy your time with the game if you approach Foretales as a strategy game rather than a deck-builder.
How do you make a splash on the Switch eShop? You polish, polish, polish…
I don't consider myself a big fan of card games but Foretales offered such a convincing perspective that made me interested in the genre. Through ingenious gameplay concepts, exploring a complex narrative with freedom for progression, the title proves itself compelling, establishing the profetic journey of the mercenary Volepain as an excellent card game in the Switch library.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
Foretales manages to be both innovative in its gameplay and deliver an engaging story, a rare combination in the world of card-driven video games. It’s fast-paced, asks players to think about actions and consequences, and deals with the fate of the world and with more personal relationships.