Archive for October 2025
Sunrider Legends Tactics Review – From The Solar Sea To The High Seas
Genre – Fantasy, Naval, Strategy Play Time – 30 hours Developer – Love In Space Steam
Sailing The Seven Seas
Legends
Tactics marks the sixth title in the Sunrider IP and the second spin
off as it swaps out space for sail. After so many games it is hard
for new players to know where to start and, with the first game now
showing its age, there was a need to release something to remedy this
issue. As such Legends Tactics takes the main series story line and
remixes it into a new player friendly form with its own twists on the
story to carve out its own identity. The characters are still have
familiar personalities but have lived different lives and so differ
from their main universe selves in ways which inject new life into
them. Artistically it uses Sunrider’s visual language just passed
through a fantasy and seafaring filter to tread this line between old
and new. In terms of its sailing mechanics they are an iteration of
those from Sunrider 4 with momentum traded out for wind direction and this makes for some necessary improvements on that foundation. This attempt to
remake the old does run into some problems when it comes to its odd
relationship with its new fantasy elements and the lack of new cast
members it needed to create its own identity. Are these difficulties enough to
take the wind out of the Sunrider’s sails? Let’s assemble a crew
of fantasy races and find out.
Elves, Orks And The Undead – Narrative and Themes
In
terms of the plot, it broadly follows the same outline as the first
two Sunrider games with some elements brought in from Liberation Day
and Captain’s Return to spice things up. For example Cera is a
small island in a sea of other small neutral islands rather than a
planet in the neutral rim but its destruction by PACT is still the
motivating incident for the entire plot. Recontextualising familiar
aspects of the original storyline into a new setting forms the bulk
of the narrative particularly during the early game. This ensures it
can operate as its own stand alone title since it begins the story
from its origin and explains all its world’s concepts rather than
expecting the player to be familiar with them from prior entries.
Those new to Sunrider do not have to play four games worth of content
just to be able to have a fun time which is in the best interests of
a spin off aiming for a different genre. For those already invested
in Sunrider this shaking up of events gives these players a chance to
re-experience them from a new perspective and gives the characters a
fresh coat of paint to allow them to shine anew. The additions for
Liberation Day and Captain’s Return are more subtle than a
wholesale retelling and mostly aim to streamline the experience.
These are things like Lynn having her own distinct personality rather
than starting out as one of many similar prototypes or Crow being
tied to one specific area and only being important to Sola or Chigara
figuring out she is a sleeper agent. Each one allows Legends Tactics
to skip over the elements of the original story it does not want to
engage with while still include parts of them which fit within its
world.
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| Sailing on the high seas changes a man |
In terms of the new ideas Legends Tactics brings to the table,
they focus on trying to recapture the magic of the early titles and
making it feel fresh again. It takes full advantage of its naval
setting to dramatically change the way the player engages the context
of the battles and the structure of the world. No longer is the world
map some vaguely defined planets in a galaxy divided along nebulously
lines, one look at the solid continents and islands gives immediate
context as to the strategic value of locations. In the old games the player is told Far Port is an important choke point in the war but in Legends Tactics it is obvious from one look at the map why it is
even before being told. This adds a lot to the texture and
believability of the story since, despite its fantasy leans, much of
it operates on the same axis as our own world. Race also plays a role
in how the story unfolds with more existing than just the humans of the original with
elves, orcs and half-elves holding various levels of political and
social power. The arrogance and eternal life of the elves is the
pillar around which many characters motives rotate and puts emphasis
on the crew of the sunrider being a mix of all races working together
as key to their success. Binding all these narrative elements
together is a series of large and small choices the player gets to
make over the course of the story which feel weighty and offer unique
divergences. They put the player in the head-space of Shields as he
struggles with these dilemmas. There is a good variety to them with
some being big climatic choices where the crew can be consulted for
their opinions on what to do next and others being choices made
almost unknowingly during gameplay. By showing the player their
actions have significance, Legends Tactics gets the them invested in
the world and story they are influencing and keeps them hooked to the
end.
 |
| The Shields family are certainly a bunch of excentrics |
For
a title which shifts the Sunrider series into a fantasy setting, it
seems at odds with some of the fantastical elements of its world.
This manifest in the ways it fails to properly engage with certain
ideas it introduces and just moves on as if the subject is something
they do not want the player to think about. Orcs are presented as the
undesirable end for a fallen elf but little of what the player is
shown seems to back up this view. The only orc in the story appear
perfectly fine with their situation and before the rise of PACT the
orcs even had their own kingdom so they clearly were not as monstrous
as some characters describe about them. Their appearance is the only
aspect of note as they have a pig like face, and while unappealing,
it is hardly the horrific spectacle the cast seems to think they are.
This leads to a slight feeling of disconnect since it is treated as
this terrible punishment for elves to become orcs yet nothing outside
of their appearance changes so it is difficult to feel the danger it
is meant to pose. In the universe of Legends Tactics there are gods
and goddess who have the divine power to reshape the world and yet they
are never important or talked about outside of single example. This
one character is important to the Sunrider crew but is ultimately
minor in the overarching narrative but they provide the only example
of divine power and makes the player question why such beings are not
more involved in the world or worshipped more directly. No
explanation is ever offered to excuse this inconsistency and the game
moves on. In reality the existence of gods is simply an excuse to
give this one character their powers rather than a considered part of
the setting. There are numerous other small niggles like these
throughout the game. None are so large as to undermine the overall
story but they do show a lack of care and attention.
All Around Me Are Familiar Faces – Characters
Sunrider’s
cast are as strong as ever in Legends Tactics and get the same new
coat of paint as the narrative. Everyone gets a few traits to
spice up their existing personalities and give them new angles the
game can push for dramatic and comic effect. Shields is now a
half-elf to push the idea of him as a neutral element who can see
beyond the conflict to what the different sides have to offer which
helps solidify his role as protagonist. These additions have been
carefully considered to both match the character’s existing traits
and challenge them in some way such as Sola being an elf allow her to
have a resolution about her past and Kryska being a religious zealot
rather than an Alliance one leading to friction when those beliefs
are shown to be flawed. By reframing the characters they can be
properly integrated into this new world without feeling like they are
just the old characters cosplaying and provide arcs for them the main
line entries could never achieve due to the direction of their
narrative. When it comes to the new character added by Legends
Tactics, they are few in number and lack impact on events. Each of
them are side elements to the main story and never step outside the
role of supporting the growth or characterisation of the core cast.
This results in the overall cast feeling very familiar, and while the
personality additions do spice things up, there is a disappointing
feeling of having already seem all the characters have to offer.
Leveraging more new characters to give the cast its own distinct
sense of identity could have been done without it coming at the
expense of the old characters so it is disappointing they did not
lean more into their new material.
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| Character skill points being tied to affection is a nice touch |
Trading The Stars For The Ocean – Visual, Audio and Technical
Combat
is an iteration on the foundation laid in Sunrider 4 with its
momentum conserving movement and emphasis on positioning. The vacuum
of space is traded out from the direction of the wind carrying the
ships in its wake and this change in context has allowed for the idea
to be expanded on in interesting ways. Having the wind decide the
direction of vessels gives the game the option to change its
direction during the mission and allow the player the ability to do
the same. This opens a lot of possibilities for outmanoeuvring the
enemy while having to constantly keep the wind in mind when making
plans for future turns. In order to utilise the winds a ship must
have sails and so it follows they should be able to put them away which the
game uses to present the player with the choice between faster
movement in the wind’s direction or shorter range but in any
direction. Maps now have a variety of terrain features from islands
to block enemy or allied cannons to shallow water that damages ships
passing through it. These make the ability to fold the sails
important since a ship cannot simply be left to the mercy of the
winds or it will just collide with the terrain and juggling the
overall status of the player’s ships is given a greater importance.
Legends Tactics is focused on giving the player options and this is
continued into the removal of unique character ships, outside of the Sunrider, in favour of allowing the player to capture any ship they
fight. As such the title offers the ability to fully customise the
weapon and armour load-outs for each vessel for whatever role the
player want them to fill. This brings us to the turn based person to
person combat that takes place during boardings and at certain points
in the story. If it had to described in one word it would be
unremarkable, it is a basic round based system with simple attacks,
skills and one use items that does exactly what it needs to and
nothing more. The problems which were present in Sunrider 4’s
ship battles return in Legends Tactics in the form of it running out
of new ideas in the late game and resorting to ship spam to try and
escalate the difficulty. Just like before this is more frustrating and
grindy than an actual challenge and sours what should be a grand
finale with a lack of inventiveness to match the game’s engaging
naval combat.
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| Positioning matters more than ever |
From
a presentational standpoint everything in Legends Tactics is in line
with the increasingly high quality of the Sunrider titles just passed it through its own fantasy filter. The shiny gleam of technology is
replaced with the wood, stone and magic of this naval world and yet
it maintains the same visual styling which made the older games so
memorable. Each character’s redesigned appearances preserve their
core appeal while making changes to capture how their personalities
would influence them in this new setting. Backgrounds sells the
locations as entirely novel places for the series with everything
from Japanese style wooden homes to grand stone temple built by the
elves. Supporting these visuals is a suitable soundtrack and SFX for
the setting which leans into the game's physicality and smaller nature as a
means of creating the feeling that the impact each action or scene
has as greater weight due to this contraction in scale. Overall, this
package comes together as one of Legends Tactics stronger elements
and works to support the tone and texture the game is aiming for.
Conclusion
When
making a spin off of a series with a strong identity like that of
Sunrider, it can be difficult to balance the expectations of old and
new players and yet it is this fine line Legends Tactics choose to
tread. It remixes the storyline of the Sunrider games into a fantasy
setting with a series of exciting changes to prevent it from being
too familiar while still making sense without any prior exposure to
the original titles. The cast remain their old selves and the change
in circumstances allows them to show sides to themselves not possible
before. Visuals and audio are similarly reimagined from the old for
Legends Tactics as the familiar art-style is put to work for sails
and sorcery rather than spaceship. There is an evolution of the
gameplay set out in Captain’s Return, the naval based nature of the
combat is take full advantage of to introduce new ways to control the
movement system and add terrain for the player to consider as they
plan their next move. The title is not without its own issues such as
its unwillingness to properly engage with its fantasy elements and
the combat falling back on ship spam in the late game, but, overall,
these do not detract from all that Legends Tactics achieves in its
play time.
Verdict –
A successful reimagining of the Sunrider series into a grand tale of
magic and naval battles which blends the new and familiar into an
exciting adventure. Unfortunately it also inherits some of Sunrider's
weaker elements such a reliance of ship spam for difficulty and
inability to engage with its concepts in a meaningful way.
Pros -
+ Remixes the storyline of the Sunrider series into a tale
of sail and sorcery with a few fun new additions.
+
The cast get a new injection of life as they are reimagined in this
fantasy setting.
+
Improvements to the movement system and the option to more freely
customise your ships make for engaging naval battles.
+
The presentation maintains the same high and improving standard as
the previous titles.
Cons -
-
Not quite comfortable with its fantasy concepts and often leaves them
awkwardly unexplored.
-
Lack of new characters weakens the game’s sense of identity as more
than just a rehash of old content.
-
The problems with Captain’s Return’s late game are also present here with unit spam being a common occurrence.
