Quick Look: Tiny Metal

Time for some cute wars!

"The war to end all wars" has not, historically, gone well...

Edit: Forgot to mention, Yoko Taro has some thoughts about this game:

Nice! curious if this is worth the time..

This is the game funded by stolen Kickstarter money. Fuck the devs.

@nemesis2k: What do you mean by stolen kickstarter money? Did the devs fund another promised game then switch to this when the original plan did not pan out?

so are artillery and anti-aircraft units the same in this game? those helicopters got toasted

@nemesis2k said:

They were accused of such, and it seems plausible enough (at a minimum, Project Phoenix seems to have been poorly managed), but nothing was proven AFAICT. It seems a little odd that Sony Music would pick it up if they were question marks over how it was funded.

(Disclosure: Sony Music Entertainment Japan sent me a review key for the game)

If you sucked all the personality out of Advanced Wars, you'd have this.

@sgtexo: basically they got more money than the expected for their kickstarter. Tossed the kickstarted game into the dirt and used the money to fund this game instead. The Kickstarter backers aren’t even getting a copy of this game.

Watch this video for more info:

https://youtu.be/0DmFs-zZaMk

Wait, shouldn't this be an Unfinished and not a Quick Look?

Edit: oh, apparently it's not ACTUALLY in alpha, but half of the Steam reviews say it is?

@sgtexo: Yep pretty much. The developers originally wanted to create an action RTS called Project Phoenix (I'm a backer). They ran over their Kickstarter budget and shifted development into Tiny Metal. They said that if Tiny Metal sells well, they'll use those funds to restart Project Phoenix. Also keep in mind Project Phoenix has been in the works since 2013.

This looks more tedious then the games it's based off of...also the attack and damage animations are not at all satisfying, like Jeff said the combat resolutions are pretty weak. Looks cute though and this would make for a very good Switch game on the go then say a console/PC game.

Am I the only one that constantly hears the theme song to The Simpsons in that little horn ditty that keeps repeating in the music? Over and over and over!

I definitely hear it in the loop!

As a Scottish Engineer not called Scotty, Can Confirm: Love that shit!

I have been hoping a for a new Advance Wars style game, but this has some weird jank and the aesthetic isn't for me. I also have weirdly angled cameras like this game has: just give me the straight on view. I think Wargroove might be more up my alley, but I'll have to wait and see.

that opening cutscene VN crap was dreadful and added nothing to the game ... why japanese developers do this

Boy, "Zipangu" you sure keep shitting out games where Japan was the innocent party.

I like Advance Wars, but this thing just seems to be 'Different, Not Better'.

I'm not sure if I'm the only one, but the motion blur in this game was making me a little queasy.

@yyninja: Correct me if I'm wrong, I haven't been reading my Project Phoenix backer updates much lately, but isn't it that the dev team received some amount of outside funding for Tiny Metal and were promised some sort of funding deal for Project Phoenix if Tiny Metal sold well.

I sure am glad I didn’t blind-buy this on Switch!

@fots: been playing it on the switch since launch and it is well worth it. Very addictive and the story so far has been pretty interesting.

@rdfed: it's actually really good. I'm an advance wars fan. And u can change the camera angle

I loved Advance Wars on GBA but I am not a fan of the art style on the maps in this. I can't quite say why, but something is off-putting. Those fog-of-war blocks are ugly af. I would've preferred some nice, detailed pixel art. Also why is it "tiny metal"? Are they toys or something? They should go further with that idea, and have you fight battles on a bedroom floor, and have events like "puppy comes in and knocks things over".

@nemesis2k: from my understanding they were developing project Phoenix and basically ran out of money when the main guy wasn't happy how it was coming along. He also stated it was his first attempt at making a game as the lead and he made mistakes. After he started working on tiny metal and got funded by investors such as unties. Gamespot ran an article and they say area 35 actually showed them documents where they got the money for tiny metal. So I'll give them the benefit of the doubt since they showed proof of there side of the argument and the accuser has showed nothing and actually admitted he was wrong in some of what he was claiming as facts.

Neither here nor there, but man the switch shop is chock full of games, a lot of them at first glance look to be of questionable quality. Let the 2nd era of glorious Nintendo shovelware begin!

I did just buy Enter the Gungeon though, but it seems a nice fit for the Switch and is a known quantity.

@nemesis2k: here's the article

https://www.gamespot.com/articles/facing-accusations-of-mismanagement-project-phoeni/1100-6455702/

Decline of Western Civilization part 2 is the metal one, not part 1

@vasta_narada: Ah yeah your right, I stand corrected. The gist is, if Tiny Metal sells well, a group of investors will help fund Project Phoenix. In the backer update it does NOT state that they will use profits from Tiny Metal for Project Phoenix which is how I interpreted it earlier.

always looking for turn based strategy games, love the look of this game, but afraid the missions will start dragging too long. The 7th mission(?) took over 30 min??

Ah yes,they successfully recaptured the last third of every Advance Wars match. "I don't want to move all these units around anymore, I just want to finish this."

That said, I like this kind of game and might check it out for cheap.

Pretty happy i didn't pull the trigger on this the other day, i would have regretted it pretty quickly it seems.

@engineno9: I hear it too, you are not alone.

Maybe the soldier names are slightly changed from real people names? Andrew Murphy is probably referencing Audie Murphy, legendary US soldier in WWII. Edward Kelly might be Ned Kelly, Australian outlaw?

100%

I like Advance Wars.

If they got more than expected for their huge RPG project than why would they make some dingy little indie Advance Wars with it? Seems backwards to me.

Can anyone else only hear the Simpson's theme when listening to the battle music? I don't think I can purchase this game anymore.

@hybridvigourous: This!

I came here to post all I heard was the Simpsons theme

DuoLingo is a really poor app to be using to learn Japanese. Unless they've updated it recently or something.

Use WaniKani for Radicals/Kanji/Vocab, Bunpro for Grammar and never look back. They both use Spaced Repetition for learning and it's the best way to drill that language into your skull. It becomes super addictive.

Anyways, on with the rest of the QL. Haha.

When you take a joke seriously and offer useful advice.

Thanks matey.

@hybridvigourous:

Oh man, at first I did not. Now that's all I hear. Thanks for that! :)

Did Jeff drop an Advance Wars reference with "ruining for days"?

Yeah, I think I'll play advance wars again instead. This doesnt look like fun.

Fairly certain the "grandmother had wheels" is a Star Trek 3 reference.

https://youtu.be/OnpQgeAmhnc?t=82

Though this one's pretty good too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-RfHC91Ewc

Haha, I definitely hear The Simpsons. Glad others have echoed that opinion.

The developers showed Gamespot internal financial documents to try and prove they didn't steal money from Project Phoenix. The accuser has offered no proof. Gamespot saw the documents and saw nothing out of the ordinary. Good enough for me.

I wish they animated incoming projectiles, it's weird watching the tanks sort of wince in pain with a few random explosions from nowhere.