The Shotgun King - PC Game Review

 The Shotgun King is a roguelike strategy PC game rooted in chess.

What that means is that you get (mostly) chess pieces, moving in the usual way and in the usual board, but with the king you command with a shotgun, and rules being modified by cards, which can change the game completely.

Cards change rules - completely - some pieces may move in another way, kings might be replaced with a set of bishops you must kill, the king might have a hidden pawn heir (that only appears after he is dead), they can add/remove/change pieces, bishops may be able to heal other pieces, etc. This is roguelike part of the game.

You also get some unlockable guns and modes.

This gets quite clever, as the game you are playing can change completely as new cards are added, and so must your strategy.

Graphics are good, for what they propose, which is a retro CGA look (which works pretty well).

What feels retro too is the lack of pretty much any tutorial in the game rules. I'd say that was the weakest part of the game.

Overall, I really liked it - and I don't particularly like chess. Not sure if people who like chess would like it more or less, though...


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