This review contains spoilers, click expand to view.
Played for a few hours. I'll highlight the good and bad points based on my personal opinion of this game.
Narrative
- Weak and shallow. From the hours I've played, all I have been doing is going from town to town, castle to castle speaking to its queen or king to get permission to move on to the next region.
- Not 'punchy' enough, predictable story
- Family members all over the continent? Doesn't interest me at all one bit.
+- Play this game only if you like role-playing a dark, immature, silent, brooding guy for a main character.
+ Couple of interesting background stories sometimes.
Dialogue
+ Every single NPC has something different to say.
+ Once in a while you will get a choice in a conversation which could end with rewards,
- but dialogue mostly still shallow, loose and basically boring, uninspired stuff that you could skip through.
+- Once in a while you will meet someone who would talk back or bad to your main guy, causing you or one of your party member to cut him/her down. Like what...? I feel like a kid raging against the world again.
Art Direction
+ Great job on monster designs.
+ Nice graphic details in game.
Gameplay
+ Battles are fun, skills make a difference and enemies are challenging.
+ Interesting ideas employed in various parts of gameplay.
+ Hidden items that are fun to find (in barrels, wells, etc),
- but a lot of them are potions,
+- and also an elixir in every, and i mean, literally - every - single - well - that I came across in the game. Really..? but yay elixirs.
- Bosses... they are all humans/humanoids. Every - single - one of them... really mundane.
+ Sensible, good drops from bosses
+ Equipment progression is fun and really does make a difference in your strength,
- however, time between towns can be really quick and you can upgrade in every town you come to, making equipment bought in the last town obsolete. I feel like I'm playing three minute hero with a 25 hour long story.
Rating: 5/10
Personal opinion: What I think the designer of the game has done, is to take some fun, important elements of an RPG and mashed them together.
e.g. Towns, buying of items, resting in inns
Castles, treasuries to access for sweet loot
Boss fights, item progression
And basically you are just bouncing back and forth between these 'elements' with nothing much of substance in between.
I do not doubt that these elements combined together does form some sort of fun. However, there is only so much these can do.
I rate this a poor man's RPG at best.… Expand
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