Parents' Guide to

Tyranny

By Jeff Haynes, Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 18+

Embrace your evil side in this mature role-playing game.

Game Mac, Windows 2016
Tyranny Poster Image

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this game.

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Community Reviews

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age 16+

Based on 1 parent review

Jesse Roberge
Jesse Roberge Adult
July 10, 2020
age 16+

A lot of death and little respect for life

The graphic gore isn't there enough to drive the PEGI rating to 18, but it most certainly should be ESRB M (mature) / PEGI 16 (not ESRB T (teen) / PEGI 16). Tyranny does not have an actual ESRB rating. Lots of dead bodies everywhere and most of the NPCs have no qualm with murdering a person for a trivial reason. Voices of Nerat is loves impaling people and when you go to Scarlet Chorus camp, you see lots of impaled dead bodies everywhere. There are little monsters in the game, mostly magebane within oldwalls. You as the player will be killing 85% people in the game. In comparison, Pillars of Eternity or Divinity Original Sin, you're killing 50% people and 50% monsters or beasts. The factions you can side with - Disfavored - lawful evil, Scarlet Chorus - chaotic evil, rebels / Vendrien Guard - Neutral. Even the rebels of the tiers / the Vendrien Guard can be kind of murder-hobo-ish though they are the least evil of the ally-able factions. Kryos the overlord, the grand ruler you are supposed to be loyal to or at least pretend to be loyal to I would consider to be a deep nuetral evil, maybe with a lawful slant. The 'you will be generally evil unless you really try not to', 'nearly everyone interacted with is evil, neutral at est', combined with general non-value of human life, dead bodies everywhere, and the overwhelming dominance of people-killing over monster-killing (and not necessarily evil people) should be noted by parents that are screening intelligently rather than blindly following the ratings or the sex / violence / nudity / language descriptors.

This title has:

Too much violence
Too much swearing
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What’s It About?

TYRANNY is an RPG set on the war-torn world of Terratus, where a multiple-centuries-long conquest by the god-like Overlord Kyros is in its last days. You take on the role of a Fatebinder, a special agent of the Overlord tasked with bringing order out of chaos and acting as judge, jury, and executioner across the land. And your skills are sorely needed, because you're dispatched to eliminate a rebellion that's the last hurdle to absolute global domination. With the help of companions you gain along the way, you'll investigate the cause of the rebellion, uncover possible dissension in the Overlord's ranks, cast powerful spells that have life-altering consequences, and make decisions that change the entire world.

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say (1):
Kids say (1):

This dark, morally gray RPG has plenty of depth and replayability for players to embrace their inner villains, if they're willing to put up with some technical flaws. Tyranny is a unique take on the standard adventure theme because you're not the hero, nor are there any to be found in this game. Since evil has already won before the game starts, every action you and your squad of companions make has some dirt or blood on it in service to Kyros' terrible rule. While you wouldn't expect that choice has a large role to play under a barbarous lord, the decisions you make as a player throughout the entire game affects and determines the fates of the lives of thousands. For example, you can burn libraries full of knowledge or murder a queen in front of her subjects. Players can even choose to make the game harder on themselves by eliminating their own companions or facing off alone against enemies, fully taking on the role of arbiter wandering the wastelands. In fact, each faction or character will express a fear or favorability level based on your choices, which can actually unlock new abilities and powers that can be wielded against enemies daring to attack you. This reinforces the feeling that the world is constantly evolving in your wake, making you feel like a force of nature instead of a caricature of an evil figure.

Unfortunately, while you may want to fully engage in your darker fantasies, Tyranny has a lot of issues that interrupt the malevolent fun. It's plagued with an incredible amount of technical flaws. Saved games and progress seem to be disregarded frequently, forcing repeated loading attempts in the hopes that you don't have to completely start over from the beginning. Key items and characters will sometimes disappear in the aftermath of battles, so you may need to reload a checkpoint to advance the plot. Plus, as you get farther in the game, there's a definite issue with pacing, as if the majority of the development went into the establishment of the initial setting and factional conflict. As you get closer to the end (involving the use and awakening of some powerful artifacts), the story and action feel a bit rushed and passed over, as if the real explanation for what happened is being saved for a future expansion pack or a sequel. But, if you can look past these hiccups, you and your henchmen can truly enjoy wreaking havoc across a landscape that's tailor-made for you. After all, you broke it -- now it's time for you to rule it.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

  • Families can talk about violence in video games. Is the content of the game limited because of the focus on destroying your enemies, or does the top-down perspective on the violence reduce the graphic nature of combat? Does it really matter given the focus of the game making you a "bad guy"?

  • Talk about morality. You play a character who performs some unsavory acts during the game, but what is it about playing the role of a villain that's appealing? Since it's virtually impossible to be a "good guy," what do your in-game decisions say about your style of play?

Game Details

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