Steam Tactics review for PS Vita, PS4, Xbox One, Switch

I can?t stop playing Steam Tactics, and I have no idea why.

It?s not like it has a riveting story. It?s a bunch of animals (literally, as in a frog and some dogs and a fox) flying around in steampunk airships, fighting with pirates on behalf of the queen. I lost track of the plot very early on, and I don?t feel like I missed all that much.

Likewise, it?s not like it?s got revolutionary gameplay. Steam Tactics is, as its name implies, a pretty straightforward tactical RPG. Your ships fight groups of enemy ships on a grid. It gradually gets more difficult the further into the game you get, so you need to continually keep upgrading your ships. If you?ve ever played a tactical RPG, you?ll know exactly what you?re in for here — and even if you somehow haven?t, this game is more than simple enough to pick up pretty quickly.

I suspect it?s that last line that captures why I?m so addicted to the game. Where a lot of tactical games will try and bog you down in complexity, Steam Tactics keeps everything as easy as possible. Even when I needed to start going back to grind through earlier levels at more challenging difficulty settings in order to improve my airships, it never felt like a huge hassle, since I knew what needed to be done, even if it frequently took me a couple of tries to get through the levels as they got harder.

To be sure, I wouldn?t say that Steam Tactics is a GOTY contender or anything. It?s far too simplistic for that. But when that simplicity is enough to keep me going back to the game again and again, even when there?s plenty of other stuff I probably should be playing instead, that?s more than enough to make the game worthy of a recommendation.

Sometimes You provided us with a Steam Tactics PS Vita code for review purposes.