Citadel: Forged with Fire was originally released for PC on 14th July 2017. It has now been released for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One on 1st November 2019. The game was developed by Virtual Basement and published by Blue Isle Publishing. Blue Isle Studios has had a hand in both the development and publishing of the game. Citadel: Forged with Fire is an online open-world RPG and can be played in either first-person or third-person.
About the Citadel
Citadel: Forged with Fire is set in the dangerous world of Ignus. When you first start the game, you will be able to choose between joining a game and creating a game. If you join a game, you will be presented with hundreds of servers filled with people. You can pick either a player vs player server or a player vs enemy server. If you decide to create a game, you will be creating your own server. If you are creating a new game or server, it is unlikely that people will just join it randomly. This is better for people that may want to play online or privately with friends.
After you have chosen to join or create a game, you will then be able to create your character. There are some limits to creating your character, such as the number of options for hair and what you can change about their body type. With that being said, there are a lot of options when it comes to skin colour, hair colour and even how your nails will look. I decided to make my character look quite alien with a very bright blue skin colour and long, flowing pink hair.
After you have chosen your character, they will emerge from a volcano-like pool, and you are thrown straight into the world of Citadel: Forged with Fire. When you leave the volcano-like area, you will happen upon an NPC with a few quests for you to do. This is just to introduce you to Citadel: Forged with Fire. It will teach you how to craft items and will give you some ideas of what you will need to do to survive within the world of Ignus.
The Map of Ignus
Ignus is made of one huge open-world map. This is the same across all of the servers. When you start the game, you can choose out of three areas of the map that you would like to begin your adventure. These are known as safe areas. If you are ever in trouble, or if a wild beast has bested you, these are the places to be. As you venture further away from these areas, the wildlife and enemies of Ignus become more difficult. The wildlife also grows in size. At the beginning of the game, you will face boars, pixies and the occasional direwolf. The further you go, you will find things like dragons and wonderful dinosaur-like beasts.
Crafting and Materials
As you fight off the wildlife within Ignus, you will grow in level. Each level you gain you will get points to use for a crafting skill line. When you obtain a crafting skill, you then have the ability to craft an item. It can be anything from weapons, clothing, accessories, walls, floors, furniture, food and a hell of a lot more. To craft the items, you will need to obtain materials that can be gained and found all over Ignus.
For some of the items, you will need a tailoring bench, a workbench or a forge. These allow you to create stronger and more powerful items as you gain the skills. One of the items you can craft is a broomstick that allows you to fly around the map at alarming speeds. Just like the other items, you will need to use a skill point to craft a broomstick, and then you will need to gather the necessary materials as well.
Building a Home
When you begin to craft stronger and more powerful items, you will need somewhere to put them. If you have used some of your skill points on crafting items that you need to build a house, you can find a place to settle and start building. As you move further across the map, you may want to start building multiple houses.
The reason that it is good to build a house is because you can install a throne in there that locks it and declares it as yours. When you have done this, you can use it as a safe space in which you can install all of the benches you need. You can also install a storage box, furniture and decorative items, like paintings and the like. If you spend a lot of time into creating an amazing place to put all of your stuff, you can really turn it into a home.
Spell Crafting
Citadel: Forged with Fire allows you to craft a whole host of different spells. There are multiple elements that you can use to craft your spells and multiple types of spells to match. The element you will always have available is Arcane, which allows you to craft your first spells. Throughout the world of Ignus, you will find pools or lakes with natural sources of magic. To obtain these, you will just need to attack them with your chosen weapon. Spells will not work on these sources.
Once you have the sources of magic you need, they are listed in your inventory as an “essence”. Some essences will be dropped by wildlife as well. You will have to get creative when it comes to crafting spells because there are a lot to discover. A little tip would be to try pairing the spells with different weapons. You can also add ingredients to your spells to make them stronger.
One of the spells I crafted quite early was call Pacify. This allows you to tame an animal, with pretty much any animal in the game being tameable. When you have tamed an animal, they will fight and die for you. Bare in mind that this is timed. You can also use them to store items as they have their own inventory. Food and drinks will maintain their loyalty for longer, so make sure you feed them by adding a food item to their inventory. Some animals can also be used for travel. Again, you will need to use a skill point for crafting a saddle and add this to your animal, but it will get you from place to place much quicker.
Insert Story Here
I was quite disappointed when I realised that Citadel: Forged with Fire doesn’t actually have a story. After you have completed the introductory quests, that’s pretty much it. There are daily quests that pop up around the map, but other than that, there is no real reason to keep playing the game once the novelty has worn off. With there being no story, the game plays more like a survival game that an RPG.
Another issue that the game presents you with is that there are very poor graphics for the characters. The environments and wildlife are perfectly fine, but the characters are quite shocking in comparison (not in a good way). I made my character look quite alien because no matter how you design them, they look quite alien. The movement of the characters is also quite strange, and they appeared to be kind of flimsy and all over the place.
One of the minor issues I had with Citadel: Forged with Fire was the loading times. I understand that these servers are packed with people, so it may take a little while to load, but the loading times are just as bad when playing solo and creating your own game.
Citadel: Forged with Fire was originally released for PC, as I have mentioned. This completely shows in the console version. It plays like a PC game. There are also too many possible button inputs for a standard console controller. Because of this, I had to assign some abilities to buttons that were already being used and just lose the original use of that button.
Wonderfully Strange World
One of the best things about Citadel: Forged with Fire is the world itself, Ignus. It is so creative, colourful and filled with life. The gameplay and environments feels kind of medieval but on a completely different planet. I absolutely loved exploring it, even without a story to follow. I was completely invested in the living creatures within Ignus.
As an example, a couple of hours into the game, I found a horse being attacked by a huge pack of boars. I felt so sorry for this horse that I got the attention of the boars and let the horse escape. I killed the boars and thought to myself, “I better check on that horse”. After walking towards the direction it ran to for about a minute, I found it. It was hurt, but it wasn’t too damaged, so I tamed, and I still protect it now. I feed it regularly, I even built it a stable next to my home. Now, that may seem a bit sad to some, but it is now a really tough horse that can deal some serious damage.
No Boundaries
Another major thing I love about Citadel: Forged with Fire is the whole crafting system. It knows no bounds and feels like they have covered absolutely everything you can think of when it comes to crafting. I have spent a lot of time creating different spells and matching the best spells with the best weapons. I also spent a whole two days just building my home. Citadel: Forged with Fire is completely focused and built on crafting and exploration and it delivers this in spades.
Developer: Virtual Basement/Blue Isle Studios
Publisher: Blue Isle Publishing/Blue Isle Studios
Platform: PS4, Xbox One, PC
Release Date: 1st November 2019
Do you agree with our review of Citadel: Forged With Fire? What are your thoughts? Tell us in the comments below.