Time, it’s a funny old thing. Doing a Marty McFly and going back (or forward) in time by decades has never really appealed to me. But, time manipulation and being able to just tinker with time, is something that I find really interesting. Developer Action Squad and publisher Daedalic Entertainment bring you Iron Danger.

Iron Danger is a tactical combat puzzler with a unique time manipulation mechanic. A never before seen combination that blends the tactical depth of turn-based games with the exciting action of real-time games.

Originally released on PCs back in 2020, Iron Danger has now seen a release on PlayStation and Xbox too. This title is a mix of RPG, action-adventure, tactical combat and time manipulation. You (first) play as Kipuna, a young girl who ‘dies’ very early in the game. However, you soon learn that death isn’t the end. Given the power to rewind time by just 5 seconds, Kipuna is alive once more and heads out on a quest to discover more about this strange power to manipulate time and get drawn into a war between the Northlanders and the city of Kalevala.

Iron Danger has a solid story going on, but nothing all that unique. Good vs bad. Unexpected hero rising and so on. Along the way, you meet new characters and they’ll join you. Here you can switch between two characters and use their particular strengths to your advantage. Find enemies and beat them up. Some mild exploration in the linear areas. It’s all rather cookie-cutter so far, but where Iron Danger does have something more original is with the time manipulation mechanic.

Called a ‘trance mode’, as soon as any action kicks off, the trance mode auto-starts and you are then free to rewind and fast-forward time within a few seconds of real-time. Split into beats that appear along the bottom of the screen, you choose what action to do in each beat. Some moves take up 1 beat and some may take more than 1. This is where the tactical play comes in. As an example, one of the earliest instances of you having to use the trance mode has a cannon shooting at you. It hits you. So, rewind a beat or two and dodge the incoming projectile.

Fights with enemies work much the same way. They attack and if they hit you, just rewind a beat and use your block or dodge. Then, follow that up with a hit of your own. It almost sounds like some kind of cheat mode. Get hit, rewind time, avoid and hit back. Essentially, you can take out enemies without taking a single hit. But, things get trickier as the game progresses and your time manipulation skills will be pushed.

The trance mode can be used for the two characters you control too. Move character one to a position, rewind time and then switch to the second character. Time will play out the action you just did with the first character as you move the second. This is where things can get really interesting as you’re basically controlling two characters at the same time… but at different times. You’ll need to flick between the two characters to solve puzzles and win some of the more interesting fights too.

Boss fights become this ballet of time manipulation and tactics as Iron Danger throws up some pretty tricky parts, despite the trance mode feeling a bit like a cheat mode. It’s all about trial and error but instead of dying and having to reload a checkpoint, you can rewind time and try a new approach instead.

Priced at around £17 and available now for PC, PlayStation and Xbox. I have to admit to not really enjoying Iron Danger when I began playing it. The contestant stopping and starting as the trace mode auto-kicked in, it really started to annoy me. I just wanted to get on with the game and the stop-starting pissed me off. However, the more I played, the more the concept grew on me. As the game progressed, using the time manipulation became an utter joy as more and more ways to play around began to open up.

Iron Danger is a title that mixes action and tactics very well, coupled with a really interesting combat mechanic. I did play through on the default difficulty setting and honestly, it felt a bit too easy. If you are looking for a challenge, maybe ramp this one up to its hardest setting. The ending was also a bit of a cop-out. Without getting into spoilers, the game builds to an epic battle and a cutscene leading to the battle and then… end credits. It almost feels as if the devs just forgot to program in the ending.

If you are looking for an action-RPG with a twist, I don’t think that you could go far wrong with Iron Danger. No grinding, no levelling up and no experience points to manage. Just a really simple upgrade system that keeps things sleek and the game moving along.