For it being the middle of Faux-E3, it has been quite a quiet week for news. Monday, I spoke about a Picross-like light RPG that is aimed at children or those bored on a bus. Tuesday, Jaydyn spoke about EA’s new Star Wars game and David ran down everything shown at the PC Gaming Showcase. Wednesday, Taylor spoke about Nintendo’s new free fitness game and I spoke about how you might be able to get another copy of The Witcher 3 if you already own it. I say might, as there is presently a bug not allowing some, myself included, to pick up the game as the banner you’re meant to click on isn’t showing up.

You might have noticed, last week in the Epic Games Store article I said there would be two games featured this week. This was the case, until two-minutes past the hour when they were meant to release and Epic announced that The Escapists 2 was having an issue. That means this week I’ll just be talking about Pathway, that interesting little turn-based game I was excited about playing because it sounded like that small film no one had heard of. It might be a game that I should have found and played before I finished up the article on turn-based strategy and tactics games.

I could have, but I’d be proving my own points. Pathway is much like others in the genre, you command a squad of people in a small battle arena taking turns to run across the room slapping each other across the face with a fish. In this case, you’re running across the room to shoot Nazis in 1930’s Egypt. It isn’t bad, but there is a lot to be desired. Speaking personally for a moment, accessibility with pixel-art games is always a problem. I don’t mind reading over being spoken to, but with dyslexia, pixel-art typography can be an issue to read comfortably.

Think of Pathway as a board game, each story within it is on a board that you are trying to get across. Some of these Monopoly streets are uncovered and you can know what is coming up, some aren’t. With each metaphorical street in this north African desert country, some scenarios take place, scenarios you’ll have to read.

Speaking of my very short experience of Pathway before writing: The balance of sitting to read and the turn-based gameplay fell in a 60-40 ratio. The story gives context for actions but the gameplay is what makes it a game. It isn’t a bad thing to do but with the uncomfortable nature of reading, matched with the story being fed to me every few minutes, there is a personal grievance.

The combat itself is passable. While it doesn’t try to bounce between squad members as Narcos did, it doesn’t prompt me into talking about issues with the genre. However, it can still feel slow. In what should be a simple case of “shoot the Nazis,” it turns out to be a few minutes of dancing with them until they fall down. You can tweak this for each story you play but the complexity never feels strategic, in fact, often it felt formulaic in fights. However, fights are in an interesting and beautiful location.

Pathway is available all week until the morning of Thursday the 25th when we’re meant to be doing another double-bill. Next week, as far as we know, both AER: Memories of Old and Stranger Things 3: The Game are both available for a week. The latter of which Lisa wrote a review for last year. There is no word on when The Escapists 2 will be available, though one might suspect it will be on a week that was not meant to be a double-bill.

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