Have you ever wished that the pieces on a Dungeon & Dragons board could move? Instead of rolling dice to initiate attacks the pieces would defend themselves and fight when threatened? Then wish no more, WARTILE has come to save the day! Embark on an adventure as you move the pieces and watch as they do battle. WARTILE allows you to play a board game, a RPG and a strategy game all in one neat package.

WARTILE puts players into the role of both dungeon master and gamer. Guide your miniature warriors across grid like maps to defeat enemies and complete various quests. Move your pieces near enemies and watch as they fight on your behalf. Help them win against their opponents by using various spell cards to aid them and thus increase their chances of survival. Welcome to the future of miniature statue games in WARTILE!

Inspired by stories straight out of Norse mythology, WARTILE tells a tale of epic battles and honor fulfilling quests. Guide your units across various landscapes to explore new locations and find treasures. Defeat powerful enemies to prove your worth as a true Viking warrior. WARTILE is a story that aims to deliver an epic experience with you being the guide for your soldiers. Put your name on the annals of time in WARTILE.

In comic book shops all over the world, you can usually find a small room or section dedicated to Dungeons & Dragons. In these places, you’ll see tables set up and occasionally find a few friends or strangers picking up small miniature figures—often painted by them—and rolling dice to see where their next move will take them. We here at Honey’s Anime remember these days vividly and even now we like returning to a comic book shop or going online to witness a Dungeons & Dragons story unfold. Then we here at Honey’s Anime HQ got a copy of a game called WARTILE by developer Playwood Project and found ourselves quite intrigued with the gameplay ideas found within. How does WARTILE capture the beauty of Dungeons & Dragons? Let us find out in our review of WARTILE for the PC.

WARTILE takes the beautiful world of miniature statue adventures found in many board games and breathes a new life into them. Players take a band of various Viking warriors as they explore heavily detailed environments to undertake quests. WARTILE gives players a mixture of strategy and RPG focused gameplay elements and surprisingly both elements work quite well. We will begin by talking about the strategy mechanics.

Similar to most real-life board games, WARTILE has players move pieces on a hexagonal board. You must move your warriors around the map to find items and defeat various foes. Players will need to monitor their pieces life and location to not get swarmed by hiding foes and face utter obliteration. You won’t be able to constantly just move pieces willy nilly as each piece has a cool down so once they are placed you will have to wait several seconds before they can be moved again. WARTILE will take your utmost attention as if you’re not careful you’ll make a move or two that you may regret later.

The RPG elements of WARTILE appear in the actual mechanics of WARTILE itself. Each piece has the obvious stats of most RPGs like strength, defense, health and so on. Before each map you’ll have to equip your heroes with new pieces of equipment, buy new warriors from the in-game tavern and change what cards you go into battle with, though more on this in a moment. WARTILE doesn’t reinvent the RPG genre but in this case that’s a good thing. WARTILE adherence to the common RPG world helps keep things simple for those unfamiliar with RPGs and common for those who live and breathe the genre.

Now, we mentioned cards a brief moment ago and that is because it’s an integral part of WARTILE. While in combat, players have cards that can be used for things like stunning a foe or healing a teammate. These cards can be played if you have the amount of energy—indicated by an icon at the bottom center of the screen—which is gained from accomplishing specific tasks and killing enemies. It adds a nice secondary element of how to approach a battle and equally survive when things get a bit dicey.

Presentation wise, WARTILE truly impressed us here at Honey’s Anime HQ. We loved the amount of detail in not only the different maps you will find yourself question on but the sizeable amount of detail in the figures themselves. When they move, it’s as if a real miniature statue has come to life and has been given motion which never got old to witness. WARTILE also has a nice OST and while there is barely any voice work—aside from grunts and yells—the ambiance really makes WARTILE immersive for fans of Dungeons & Dragons-like game.

Honestly, WARTILE is nearly perfect, but if we had to complain about something, it would be the grind that it can be sometimes. Many of the maps in WARTILE have numerous quests to accomplish and while most are skippable you might want to reconsider as they give you extra means of leveling up, gaining gold for new recruits and items. Trust us folks, we took some time to pass some levels but once we went back to previous areas to grind a bit we found most missions to be easy enough. WARTILE is still enjoyable even level grinding but it can be a bit repetitive to most.

WARTILE brings to the gaming world a new way to look at Dungeons & Dragons-like board games. Seeing your miniature heroes battle it out on various maps that feel reminiscent of real hand drawn locations is a treat. WARTILE can sometimes feel a bit grind heavy as you will find yourself redoing some levels to complete various goals and gain more experience/items. However, even replaying levels is enjoyable as you can always find ways to move around the maps better and more efficiently. WARTILE is a ton of fun and honestly, we here at Honey’s Anime love it and we know you will too. We fully recommend WARTILE especially if you’re a fan of miniature figure board games.

Here at Honey’s Anime HQ, many of us have fond memories of dabbling in the world of Dungeons & Dragons that’s why WARTILE appealed to us so greatly. However, we’re confident that even those who aren’t huge fans of board games like Dungeons & Dragons will love WARTILE as it is a solid RPG and strategy title. What are your thoughts on WARTILE now that you heard us praise it? Are you thinking of picking it up or are you still going to pass on WARTILE? Comment down below and be sure to keep stuck to our hive here at Honey’s Anime for more game reviews and articles!