7 /10 12

Bad North takes real-time tactics and compresses them into tense, bite-sized island defenses, wrapping a roguelite campaign around simple controls and stark, stylish visuals. Critics praise its elegant design and atmosphere while noting limited long-term variety, so this review breaks down how its mechanics, difficulty curve, platform performance, and Jotunn Edition updates actually feel in play.

How to Play Bad North

Bad North revolves around rotating camera-friendly diorama islands, where you command up to four squads to repel Viking boats, protect houses, and decide when to stand, retreat, or sacrifice ground to keep your commanders alive.

1. Controls – You select squads, assign them to tiles, and trigger abilities with a simple gamepad or mouse-driven interface that keeps inputs light while still demanding quick repositioning.
2. Progression – Each island you save earns coins used to promote squads into swords, pikes, or archers, unlock abilities, upgrade traits, and slowly build a roster durable enough for the climactic final islands.
3. Combat/Mechanics – The core loop is about reading shoreline angles, ferry routes, elevation, and house placement, then countering specific enemy types with the right class mix, knockback tools, and choke points.
4. Tips – Prioritize preserving veteran commanders, retreat from hopeless islands, secure items early, and avoid overextending to extra maps if it risks losing an elite squad permanently.

Who Should Play Bad North

Bad North suits players who enjoy distilled tactics, short runs, and high-stakes decision making more than sprawling campaigns or deep tech trees, especially if they like playing in handheld or short sessions.

• Player 1 – Strategy fans who love positioning puzzles and unit matchups but prefer real-time tension over turn-based deliberation.
• Player 2 – Roguelite players who enjoy learning through failure, testing new item and trait combos, and chasing cleaner campaigns on higher difficulties.
• Player 3 – Newcomers to tactics games looking for approachable controls and short missions that teach basics without extensive menus or complex build orders.
• Skip if – You want deep economy layers, heavy narrative, or dozens of unit types; Bad North stays focused on minimalism and can feel sparse if you crave complexity.

Bad North Platform Performance

Bad North runs very smoothly on modern hardware thanks to its modest requirements and small battlefields, loading quickly and maintaining responsive input even when late-game islands fill with enemies and overlapping ability effects.

Bad North System Requirements

On PC, Bad North is extremely accessible, happy on older Windows machines and laptops, with low CPU and GPU demands and tiny storage needs, so almost any modern rig can max it without sacrificing fluidity.

Similar Games to Bad North

If you appreciate Bad North’s focus on tight tactical choices and run-based structure, there are several excellent alternatives that explore similar ideas with different pacing, presentation, or strategic emphasis.

• Into the Breach – Turn-based mech battles focusing on perfect information and positional puzzles rather than real-time reactions.
• Kingdom Two Crowns – Side-scrolling base defense with pixel art, slower pacing, and heavier emphasis on economy and long-term growth.
• FTL: Faster Than Light – Starship management roguelite where route choices, crew survival, and hard decisions matter more than moment-to-moment positioning.
• They Are Billions – Massive-scale base defense where you plan sprawling fortifications against enormous swarms instead of defending compact islands.

Bad North vs Competitors

Compared with other compact strategy roguelites, Bad North trades depth and campaign length for immediacy, clarity, and short-session play, which can be perfect if you value focused design more than sprawling systems.

Bad North Story & World

Bad North keeps narrative extremely light, sketching only the idea of a fallen king and a royal escape across a chain of stark, procedurally generated islands. The tone comes from its contrast of soft pastel palettes and clean geometry with brutal Viking incursions, burning houses, and panicked retreats. It feels more like a series of brutal vignettes than a traditional campaign story.

Bad North Multiplayer & Online

Bad North is strictly a single-player experience, so online features center on cloud saves and platform ecosystems rather than direct co-op or competitive modes, which keeps focus on perfecting personal runs.

• Campaign Runs – Solo campaigns where you chart routes across the map, unlock commanders, and test new squad builds under escalating pressure.
• Hard / Very Hard – Higher difficulties that demand sharper positioning, precise use of abilities, and more willingness to abandon unwinnable maps.
• Challenge Playstyles – Self-imposed rules like saving all houses or avoiding restarts keep veteran players engaged long after initial completion.
• Cross-Play – No direct cross-play, but cross-platform releases mean strategies and tips transfer easily between PC, console, and mobile communities.

Bad North DLC & Expansions

The pivotal post-launch update is the free Jotunn Edition upgrade, which substantially deepened traits, items, and meta-progression; there are no paid content packs, so the complete experience arrives in a single purchase.

• Jotunn Edition – Free update adding commander traits, reworked progression, new items, and quality-of-life tweaks that address early balance complaints.
• Cosmetic Variants – Minor visual variety in commanders and islands emerges through progression rather than separate paid cosmetic packs.
• Season Pass – There is no season pass; content cadence stabilized after Jotunn Edition rather than ongoing monetized seasons.
• Free Updates – Balance patches and small improvements focused on difficulty tuning, trait balance, and stability across platforms.

Bad North Community & Support

Bad North’s community is modest but dedicated, heavily focused on theorycrafting optimal squads, routing, and Very Hard clears across PC, console, and mobile versions through guides, videos, and discussion threads.

• Official Forums – The publisher and developers share major announcements via the official site and storefront hubs rather than bespoke forums.
• Reddit/Discord – Small but active fan spaces share strategy charts, commander tier discussions, and challenge ideas for experienced players.
• Mod Support – No official mod tools, though PC players still share run reports, seed ideas, and informal rule variations.
• Updates – After Jotunn Edition, support shifted toward occasional maintenance, with the current build regarded as the definitive version.