Cyber Knights: Flashpoint is a tactical turn-based RPG with squad tactics and unique heist-planning. You will build your crew, build your base, and pull off some crazy cyberpunk heists.
This one’s got everything from cyberware to stealth, hacking, and character mods. Let’s jump in to see if it’s got everything to be a great game or if the devs should have spent a little more time on their cyberdecks.
In this review, I will be going over the following topics.
Story
You are a Cyber Knight, someone who has undergone illegal, military-grade cybernetic enhancements. You are living in a world full of megacorps, where artificial intelligence once lived, but was killed after an economic collapse.
Now, only 112 cities remain in the world. Most of which are under massive domes run by the megacorps. You must utilize your crew and your contacts to survive. You are going to need to call in every favor you have to make it through alive and pull off the ultimate heists.
Gameplay
Cyber Knights has a lot going on. It has four different elements between its character building, base building, combat system, and hacking system. Let’s start off by talking a bit about the characters and the RPG portion before we jump into the combat and hacking systems.
Characters
There is a lot of customization for every character in Cyber Knights. When you build your initial character, you have a full range of options, such as your background story, attributes, traits, your appearance, and even your starting weapon.
Each option has several selections to choose from. Especially your appearance, which has everything from hair and eyes to outfits and accessories. All of which have a wide range of colors to choose from.
You will also be able to select your starting team and customize their look and names as well. Selecting the right starting team is important, but if you have any gaps in the team as far as abilities go, you can always multiclass someone to fill the gap.
There are more than 40 multiclass combinations to allow you to make the perfect team for your playstyle.
Aside from the expansive talent trees for each class, your characters also grow and interact in other ways. They can develop relationships with each other.
Depending on their background, they might also have contacts whom they can call for a favor. They may also refuse to go on a mission to a certain megacorp facility if they have a bad history with that corporation. These are all factors that you get to keep track of throughout the game.
After selecting your initial team and a brief but detailed tutorial, you jump right into combat. This is a nice change of pace compared to a lot of other RPGs that have a wall of story before you get into the action.
Combat
The combat system in Cyber Knights has a lot going on. I won’t be able to touch on everything in this review, but I’ll provide a high-level overview of most of the elements. To start, it is of course a turn-based system.
The turn order is determined by the initiative per character. This can be manipulated by certain abilities and talents. Therefore, this order is not set in stone and can certainly change from one battle round to the next.
Abilities and movement in Cyber Knights consume action points. Other than attack and cover, each ability has a set number of uses and a cooldown.
As for movement, selecting a location will show you how many action points it will cost to get you there. The movement is gridless, which provides a lot of freedom for getting the perfect angle on an enemy.
It also means that they can get the same perfect angle on you, though. The enemy can be pretty intelligent, so watch your back.
Combat becomes quite strategic as you discover more abilities for your different characters. Learning how to use those abilities in your team can really make a difference in battle.
Cyber Knights provides a lot of valuable information during combat for you to be able to make those strategic decisions. It keeps a log on the side of the screen that provides data on everything that has happened in combat.
Aside from the damage dealt, it also transcribes all the things that have been reported to the security AI. Once the security AI reaches a certain level, it will begin sending reinforcements.
Stealth
Avoiding alerts to the security AI can be the key to a successful heist. This is where the stealth mechanics come in.
Some of the character classes have an ability to predict where an enemy is going to move next. Others have the ability to disable things like security cameras or other sensors. These are the characters you are going to want to make sure you have on your team if you are trying to take a stealthy approach.
Even then, you could get spotted by an unforeseen enemy. Don’t panic. If you are able to take them out before the end of the turn, then they wouldn’t have time to radio it in.
Make sure you are using something quiet like a sword or a silenced gun though. Regular gunshots can be heard from a distance and will trigger the security AI.
Hacking
Hacking is another action that you can take during a heist if you have a hacker on your team. Hackers can jack into a terminal to shut down the security systems or even steal valuable information that you can sell back at base.
The most interesting thing about hacking in Cyber Knights is that it happens in real-time on the timeline, just like everything else.
For example, you might spend two action points to get the hacker to the matrix terminal on their turn. Then, they will connect to the terminal and complete their remaining action points in the matrix.
Once they are out of action, it will jump to the next character’s turn just like normal. That also means that once they disconnect from the matrix terminal, they will have whatever action points are left when they are disconnected.
This can create some interesting interactions, such as being in the middle of a hack when one of your allies needs some cover fire. The hacker can disconnect on their turn, shoot the enemy for two action points, and then reconnect to the terminal and continue hacking from where they left off on the last turn.
It’s clear that a lot of thought went into designing this hacking system. Hacking in Cyber Knights could be its own game.
You have to manage the health, connection, IO, and memory of your cyberdeck (aka hacking computer). As you move from node to node in the matrix, you will run into different security software.
This software may attempt to damage your cyberdeck, disrupt your connection, or prevent you from loading other programs. You will have to load different programs on your cyberdeck to break through the different security software types.
Often, preloading programs is key, but you have to make sure that you have enough active memory in order to load the programs you need for the next node. It is a bit of a juggling act, but it all makes sense after you get a couple of terminal hacks under your belt.
Home Base
After a successful heist, you will head back to your base for a little R&R. Here, you will be able to level up your character, continue story elements, and even build out your base.
At each level, your characters will have a set number of training points that they can spend. They also have a set number of talents that they can unlock per level.
Once you have spent all the training points on the characters that have leveled up, you can advance the timeline to the next event. This could be a story element, it could be a character healing from their wounds, or even the next heist reaching its deadline.
There is a lot of flexibility in Cyber Knights, though. Most of these events, such as story elements or heists, can be manually triggered by you anytime before their deadline. This means you can go on a heist early if you have a team ready to go with nothing to do.
The last element, base building, is similar to that of XCOM 2. You will need to clear out areas of the base before you can build something there. You will also need to upgrade your main base elements before you can build certain rooms in your base, such as the cooling system.
There are many different rooms that you can build, so managing your base and building things in the right order can be crucial to your success.
Conclusion
So, with all that said, is Cyber Knights: Flashpoint any good? Absolutely. This is a prime example of how an indie studio can produce something of near Triple-A standards.
The graphics might not be Baldur’s Gate 3 quality, but the story, character depth, and combat systems are all top-notch. The developers at Trese Brothers Games really set the bar for what an indie studio can do.
Like any good RPG, there are a lot of elements to Cyber Knights to understand. Additionally, each element has considerable depth.
As I mentioned, the hacking system could be a game in its own right. I think that anyone looking for a high-quality game that they can really get into is going to have a lot of fun with this one. You can really personalize each character on your team and run the heists the way that you want.
If you are interested in checking out Cyber Knights: Flashpoint, please check out their Steam page. The game is out now.
A review key was provided by the developers at Trese Brothers Games.
