Backpack Battles is my coffee break game
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A cup of coffee is foundational to my day. In the morning, I am often overwhelmed by all the tasks and errands for the day ahead, so every single day, without fail, at about 10 AM, I brew myself a cup of good coffee. I choose the beans, grind them, take out my aeropress, it's a whole thing. Maybe I even have something sweet, like a cookie, to accompany my delicious cup. For me, this is the moment when time slows down and I don't let the anxiety win. Doesn't work every time, but most of the time it does.
I've been watching less and less Youtube recently, so instead I often just pair my cup of coffee with a little gaming session that does not require both hands and an hour of time minimum (so no Metaphor, unfortunately). And you know, recently my game of choice has been Backpack Battles.
Backpack Battles piqued my interest quite a long time ago, but I kept forgetting to try it out. The concept seemed really interesting to me: you need to organize different items in your backpack in such a way that they synergize with each other as much as possible. Different items have different effects and react differently to the proximity of other items; not to mention that some of them can merge and transform into an entirely new item. It's like a Tetris game with a twist on it. When you finish organizing your backpack, the game finds you a suitable opponent who is roughly at the same stage of progression, and you fight. The battle itself is fully automatic and plays out without you doing anything. Whether you win or lose, provided you still have lives to spare and it wasn't the last battle of your run, you go back to the shop, buy more stuff and reorganize your backpack again before heading into the next battle.
I don't usually play games that are in early access; many years ago, I got burned by The Darkest Dungeon. Played it so much in Early Access that when it actually came out I was already over it and never touched it again. With Backpack Battles I thought I'd just try the demo and then put it on the shelf until it comes out of Early Access.
I played the demo for so many hours... it was stupid. It had only two classes available, no alternate starting bags, only some of the items, and the progression was sped up in a way that you'd get more exciting items quite early, and also lots of bags. A power fantasy demo, basically. I thought that I might as well buy the full game and enjoy all the content there is, because I clearly like it so much. So I did.
At the start of the game, you choose one of four classes and your starting bag, which usually has some kind of effect. For example, if you get a Vineweave basket for your Ranger character, your healing is amplified by 10% plus 3% for every Nature item you put into it. You get a few coins to buy something from the shop, and from there you build your backpack.
What I found really interesting, is that the Food items are really powerful in Backpack Battles, and sometimes a bunch of bananas and a couple garlic heads can turn the tide of battle. The Food items synergize with one another (but not with the same type of food: three bananas placed together will have no added bonuses) and make one another trigger faster. In my experience, having a lot of food that heals and gives armor points is often more important than having some sort of big sword that hits really hard. Of course, you want to balance your offence and your defence, but I can't tell you how many times I lost because my opponent had a couple bananas more than I did :D
Halfway through your run you'll get a chance to choose your subclass, if you want to. For example, the Ranger can choose to be a Beastmaster and start getting different forest critters from the shop to obliterate enemies with the combined power of hedgehogs and squirrels. The Reaper can choose to be an Alchemist and heal ridiculous amount of health by carefully placing different Foods around the Cauldron. The Pyromancer can become a Firebender, or, quite unexpectedly, a Cryomancer; and the Berserker can be a Blacksmith and benefit from crafted items. Getting a specialization usually involves reorganizing your whole backpack and building it from scratch around the specialization item.
As for the PvP system, since no input is required from you when you fight, you don't play against live players, but rather against the cached copies of the characters that other players created. So, technically, it's still something another player made, just maybe not right now. That is why you always wait just a couple seconds before the game chooses an opponent for you, fishing out a cached copy of someone's character who is at the same level as you are. That is why you are able to speed through the fight. It is a smart move; there is literally no point in a live queue in an autobattler. However, sometimes closer to the end of the run, or if I choose to fight extra hard rounds after my run has ended, the game throws at me builds so ridiculous I have trouble believing those are real and not just constructed by devs to add some spice to the pool of possible opponents.
Which brings us to the issues I have with this game :D Backpack Battles is very addictive and fun, but it is by no means flawless. As expected, the balance is all over the place. The developers add various balance changes with every single patch, and I know Early Access is very much an iterative approach, but some items and strategies stay so overpowered that you basically have no choice but to pick them every single time they are offered in the shop.
For example, there is a Fatigue mechanic: if you're fighting for too long, the night falls and both characters get fatigued, which means they take increasing damage every second. There is an item called "Power of the Moon" that has some synergy with Moon Armor and Moon Shield, but it also heals you for 40% of your HP as soon as Fatigue sets in. Many high-level fights just come down to who has Power of the Moon and will snatch that 40% of HP. I've never had Moon Armor, or Moon Shield for that matter, but I always grab this thing because it's just stupid not to.
Another problem I have with the game actually takes a lot of excitement out of it for me personally. The skill, or the specialization that you choose doesn't increase your chances of getting the specialty-associated items dramatically enough. As a Ranger, I often want to go in the bow direction and just have a bunch of bows. I get one, then when the time comes to choose a skill for the first time, I choose Markswoman that buffs ranged weapons. And then I proceed to finish the run without getting a single ranged weapon. I'd love it if the skill that you choose would actually impact the shop RNG in such a way that you'd have a higher chance of getting at least a couple of items that synergize with the skill. There were times when I chose a Piggy Pinata skill and then got 0 Piggybanks; or a Mushroom Farm skill that resulted in me not seeing a mushroom until another run. This is very frustrating, because some skills are so interesting and seem so powerful but if you don't get the items they require, it's just clutter.
The same unfortunately, can happen with subclasses too. A couple of times I chose Scalewarden, which is a Pyromancer specialization that is supposed to increase your chances or getting Dragon Eggs in the shop. Nope! Every time I'll get like one or two regular Dragon Eggs per run, which I usually get anyway while playing any class. That is why when I see my opponents having like 6 different dragons, I immediately think that those aren't real people because HOW DID YOU GET THEM?!
I still like to play Backpack Battles from time to time while having a cup of delicious coffee :D Now that I know every item and every recipe, a run doesn't take more than 15 minutes to complete. There is a big patch underway, and the game is supposed to leave Early Access in the coming months, which is also very exciting. While you certainly can get bad RNG which will result in your run being kind of bland, more often than not you can build an absolutely crazy backpack. Sometimes, the shop offers class badges that will allow you to purchase items from another class. This basically guarantees fun as you start blending Ranger's luck with Reaper's poisonous mushrooms or Pyromancer's fire that causes your items to trigger faster. It's always exciting to try out a new build or laser focus on one buff (or debuff) and see how far you can go.
Despite all its shortcomings, Backpack Battles is a lot of fun. Autobattler is not a genre I usually reach for, but the demo looked really interesting, and I do not regret trying it out. In case you have your own coffee break game, or something quick and satisfying that you play when you have a short break, drop a comment below. I am very interested :3
As usual, stay tuned here and on the Lair's YouTube channel not to miss out on anything. I also have a Parteon now!
Thank you very much for your time. Take care.
