Video Game / Bastard Bonds

"Title Image" by Captaingerbear. Used with permission.

Citizen of the kingdom of Crest, you are accused of a crime and condemned to the worst punishment: being sent to Lukatt, an island filled with monsters and dangers, used by Crest as a dumping ground for criminals and inconvenient people. Whether you're innocent or not, you are not content to spend the rest of your life in a cell, and with the help of a stranger, you manage to get away from your prison and decide to rally other prisoners, inhabitants, and even monsters in search for a way to flee the island.

But how will you do so?.

Are you guilty or innocent of your crime?

Will you help those in need, or kick them lower?

Will you treat your "Bastards" like slaves, or nurture the "Bonds" of trust with them?

Bastard Bonds is a "fast-paced" Tactical RPG by CaptainGerBear. It has the honor of being his first steam game as well as his first delve into a true RPG. The game boasts hundreds of interesting location, many recruitable allies, and true customization of your character's look, story, and personality.

Per The Wiki Rule, this has a wiki, alongside his other games.

Note that the game, like most of CGB's games, is not safe for work, so viewer discretion is advised.

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This game provides examples of:

• Character Alignment: In-Universe, Lawful, Neutral and Chaotic. There's no Good or Evil alignment because in a place like Lukatt, they don't mean much, even though there are some clearly good and clearly evil characters.
• Character Customization: When you start a new game, you get to decide:
  • Your race: Human or Orc.
  • Your gender, if you're human. If you're an orc, you'll always be a man.
  • Your build and skin color.
  • Your clothes.
  • The crime you're accused of.
  • If you plead innocent or guilty at the trial.
  • If you actually are innocent or guilty.
    • The latter three determine who saves you from the Stocks and your alignment.
• Campfire Character Exploration: If there is enough binding trust from the other characters by interacting with them, there would be a cutscene of those characters sitting at the campfire sharing their stories and giving your character their token.
• Disc-One Final Boss: Frico, who you either have to pay to or kill to gain access to the eastern half of the island.
• Elemental Powers: There are five in the game, plus a Non-Elemental state. Some characters have a natural alignment to one of the five, but this can be overriden with items.
  • Arcus: Non-Elemental magic, your default state.
  • Lux: Light/holy magic.
  • Max: Raw destructive magic. Its appearance also somewhat resembles fire.
  • Nix: Entropy/spirit magic.
  • Pox: Darkness/poison/death magic.
  • Rex: Nature Magic.
• Expy:
  • Grant is one of CaptainGerBear's iconic character.
  • Bato is one of... Bato, a character of Fantasy Football Locker Stalker, a previous game by CaptainGerBear.
  • Barrod is one of... Barrod, a character of See No Evil, another previous game by CaptainGerBear.
  • Greening is one of "Greenendorf", a FurAffinity artist and friend of Capn.
• Fighter, Mage, Thief: The characters' skills are divided to 3 categories: Force, Guile and Magic. Each section is further divided into Attack, Defense and Utility, giving a total of 9 skills to put points into.
• Game Gourmet: The game is filled with food items that can heal your character when not in combat. They can range from simple soggy sandwiches to scrumptious Monte Cristos and Bacon Clubs; from plain cakes to delectable Black Forest Gateaus; from stale mead to sweet honey beer; and from burnt steak to smoked tenderloins. You can recruit Greening, a wizard who can cast food for your party.
• Game Mod: You can change your character (or anyone else's) sprite into anything you'd like, provided you place a specifically formatted image file with the character's name into a particular folder.
• Hellhole Prison: The Stocks. The guards are just as bad as the prisoners.
• Infinity+1 Armor: Nazar's Embrace, if you fulfill his romance sidequest.
• Infinity +1 Sword: TWENTY of them!
  • To be more accurate, for each of the ten weapon categories, there are two special weapons that are much more powerful than the normal ones. You can unlock them by upgrading weapons of each category until you create a Soul item, which can be used as an offering in specific locations.
  • There is a 21st one: the Chocolatier Rod, exclusive to Greening.
• Our Orcs Are Different: Orcs have their own nation, Tsarath, though there are some orc citizens in the human nation of Crest as well, and vice versa. Most orcs are male, and thus there are various laws concerning female orcs, ranging from forbidding them to take dangerous jobs to perks for giving birth to daughters. Relationships between races are illegal at least in Crest, and this is in fact one of the crimes the player character can be accused of.
• Our Werewolves Are Different: Werewolves come in different shapes and sizes in this game. There's the regular werewolves, the leatherbound Gevaudan, the magical Crinos, the Savages and Wildmen, and the Alphas and Patriarchs. They don't turn you into werewolves when they bite you. There are two Bastards who are lycanthropes. Most of them reside in the town of Hayill, where you can speak to the Alpha for advice on going to the eastern half of Lukatt, and where you can recruit Grant.
• Running Gag: The Sumptuous Garden books. They're clearly porn, can be found almost anywhere, and are useless. They actually have two uses. One where you need one to recruit Vankan, and the other where you eventually find a NPC who'll buy them to you at a MUCH better price than if you sold them the normal way.
• Shout-Out:
  • The game's magic system a nod to Magic: The Gathering.
  • Beauregard is one of Boerigar, a NPC of Wizardry VII
  • If you examine the inscriptions on some sarcophagi on Glamig's Tomb, and read it in reverse, you'll get "The World Is Square"
• Three-Act Structure: In a way, the game follows it.
  • The confrontation with Frico ends act 1.
  • The failed attempt to escape Lukatt with Logus' ship ends act 2.
• Underwear of Power: Even when your character is clothed, the closest thing for armour in this game is underwear.