Dot. Dot. Dot. If you play a lot of Japanese games, you’ll be acquainted with their use of ellipses – JRPG favourite Xenogears is said to have almost 7,000 in its main story alone. However, rarely has that pregnant pause been quite so effectively (or frequently) deployed as in Square Enix’s tactical roleplayer. Every other line during the many dialogue exchanges can be accelerated, but those three dots, tapped out in a similar tempo to the speaking clock’s pips, refuse to be hurried. It’s annoying at first, but it’s a device whose value soon becomes clear. It helps you settle into the game’s unusually measured cadence, while encouraging you to take a moment to collect your thoughts: the decisions you make here, on and off the battlefield, shouldn’t be rushed. That thinking time might make a big difference.

If you downloaded the eShop demos, you will already know that the balance between strategy and story is weighted towards the latter – this isn’t quite 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim in that regard, but it’s fair to say if you’re here for the grid-based skirmishes you’ll need to be patient. Good job, then, that the fluctuating tensions between the three territories that compose the continent of Norzelia make an absorbing backdrop. There’s more than a hint of Game Of Thrones in the political machinations that splinter the alliance between the kingdom of Glenbrook (where your adventure, as protagonist Lord Serenoa of House Wolffort, begins), the duchy of Aesfrost and the holy state of Hyzante – and in its pitiless treatment of the wider cast. Characters you assume will play key roles are suddenly, brutally dispatched, and while there’s no permadeath (units cut down on the battlefield will return for the next encounter), it isn’t giving too much away to say not all allies will still be by your side 40 hours later.