When comparing Puzzle Quest vs Grim Dawn, the Slant community recommends Grim Dawn for most people. In the question“What are the best PC RPGs?” Grim Dawn is ranked 21st while Puzzle Quest is ranked 74th. The most important reason people chose Grim Dawn is:
Basically you choose 1 class and select skills as you level up. At level 10 you can select a second class, which already gives you 5x5=25 character type possibilities. Each character has dozens of skills, plus you have this additional passive skill tree that you unlock through cleansing shrines. Then there is item customization with crafted "modifiers", adding additional unique stats and skills that you can use, all this adds literally to thousands / millions of character possibilities. Do you want to use a double weapon shooting lightning bolts? You can do that. Do you want to summon your creatures and support them with fireballs? You can do that as well, you can push it wherever you want.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Combat, perfected in a match-3 game
The core of Puzzle Quest comes down to its combat. You make a move, then your opponent gets a move. If someone runs out of life, they lose. If you matched four gems or more in a row by the time your turn ends, you get a second turn.
Gems have different colors. Matching gems of a color gives you that color mana, and instead of making a match, you can choose to cast a spell, which costs certain kinds of mana. Not too complicated.
Until you realize that your opponent is wearing an item that makes him regenerate life when his yellow mana is full. So you decide to steal all of the yellow mana on the board to fuel one of your yellow-colored spells and to prevent him from regenerating life. He casts a spell that siphons your yellow mana and gives it to him. You both go back and forth, retaliating against the other's strategy, until only one person is left.
The game is limited by your ability to play it. Not only does your chosen class dramatically effect your playstyle in the game, but so does your gear, often times changing how you play your character entirely.
Pro Good PvP implementation
The game supports PvP, where fighting an opponent who is just as smart as you can be challenging due to the great balance of play in multiplayer for evenly matched players. What is even better is that there are optional handicaps for matches between players that have different skill levels.
Pro Complex leveling system with thousands of possible builds
Basically you choose 1 class and select skills as you level up. At level 10 you can select a second class, which already gives you 5x5=25 character type possibilities.
Each character has dozens of skills, plus you have this additional passive skill tree that you unlock through cleansing shrines. Then there is item customization with crafted "modifiers", adding additional unique stats and skills that you can use, all this adds literally to thousands / millions of character possibilities.
Do you want to use a double weapon shooting lightning bolts? You can do that. Do you want to summon your creatures and support them with fireballs? You can do that as well, you can push it wherever you want.
Pro Great homage to old school ARPGs
This game is very dark, and grim. It harkens back to games like Diablo 2 or Titans Quest. While other ARPGs have come out since then, none have hit all the marks of what fans of the genre have been asking for. For those that wish for an updated version of Diablo 2, Grim Dawn is the game for them.
Pro Exploration
Pro Highly modifiable
Relevant in modern gaming because the community can keep products like this fresh and varied, even if the developers eventually decide to slow down their updates (which they have not!). The possibilities are great with modding, while the experiences in Diablo 3 and Path of exile are a lot more static.
Pro Drop-in co-op (online and local)
Co-op is pretty convenient as players can drop in and out of your gaming session at any time. This way there is no wasted time jumping out of ones game in order to find players to play with.
Cons
Con AI "luck" is unquestionably unbalanced
There are many instances that see the player questioning the insurmountable luck the AI often receives as it will skip obvious moves that any person would play that end up resulting in a match 4 extra turn when more tiles fall down, as if it knew that would happen. Sadly this can happen often and is how the game increases difficulty.
Con Only some builds are fun
There is a definite meta, with superefficient vs non-viable builds.
It's easy to mess up a build, and attribute and spec-bar points are non-respeccable (you can use a cheat editor, but devs want you to reroll a new char).
Con Difficult to move when fighting, especially when you are ranged
Con Static pre-rendered levels
This may cut down on replayability a bit as all the levels in the game are pre-rendered, meaning that each playthrough will have the exact same layout, making for something that can get tiring and too familiar. Similar games have gone with randomized levels, which can keep the game fresh. While Grim Dawn is meant to be a throwback to earlier games in the genre, some newer features found in more recent released would have been welcome.
Con Lots of trips to town
The majority of loot in the game can be useless, with odd stat restrictions or repeats of vendor items. This means the user will need to make many trips into town to sell it all off in order to have room for even more loot they will not necessarily need.