Game Quicky: Inspector Parker in BeTrapped! (PC) ~ Minesweeping Mansion Traps

BigFish Games Store page

My parents aren’t that big into games and always thought that games downloaded from the internet contained either malware or crashed their computer. This was a disaster for me, because I really enjoy playing casual games from time to time. Now, a world opened to me when I discovered websites like Zylom, Gamehouse, BigFish and Alawar to name just a few. I mean, an overload of games that you were able to play 1 hour for free and then buy the game for 10 to 20 euro to own it. I discovered a ton of games through those websites, even through some websites that aren’t around anymore. One of these games is BeTrapped and that’s the game I want to talk about today. Is it still as good as I remember or is the game better left forgotten in my childhood? Let’s find out in this game quicky while I invite you to leave a comment in the comment section down below with your opinion on the game and/or the content of this article. 

Cleared Traps

In this game, you play as Inspector Parker on a quest to find out the mystery of who is trying to kill May Vandernot. She is the heir to the recently deceased Lord North Vandernot. Now, it doesn’t take long before you enter the mansion per request of a family solicitor to disarm the rooms and find clues. 

The story is told through a book and the introduction of the game is only one page long. Actually, it’s two pages long but the nice artwork make the story spread over two pages. Overall, the story is quite enjoyable. It’s generic for sure, but it gives a nice atmosphere for the puzzle game we are going to play.

Something I really love is the fact that you can review the story in the “Extra and Options” menu. Since I haven’t played this game in ages and that way I was able to get a quick summary of the story so far without having to replay the game.  

Now, let’s focus on the gameplay. Since that’s the big reason why I wanted to talk about this game. If you have ever played Minesweeper, you will feel right at home in this game. This game is basically minesweeper but with a few twists. 

The first twist is that you have lives. So, that means that if you step on a trap, it’s not game over right away. When you lost all your lives, it’s game over. 

The second twist is that you aren’t able to click around freely. You have to move the inspector through the room as if he is walking through it. So, you can skip over a tile or start from the other side of the board. 

And the final twist is that, you have to disarm all the traps and you are only allowed 5 “misses”. So, that means, if you miss the disarm location of a trap, you loose one of these “misses”. 

But, how do you find out where the traps are? Well, some traps can be found out by just looking at the room and some critical thinking. For example, noticed that piece of armor in the screenshot of this section? Well, there is a trap there. But, the easiest and best way to disarm these traps are by walking around the whole room and looking at the floor tiles. Blue tiles are safe to walk on and other colors mean that there is at least one trap one the adjacent tile. 

You disarm a trap by right clicking on the tile you think the trap is located on. When you are right, the trap is disarmed and when you are wrong, you get a strike. As said earlier, five strikes and you are out. 

During the adventure, you get your lives and misses restocked each level. When you loose all your misses or lives during a level, you have to restart that map. So, thankfully these mistakes or lives you lost don’t carry over. 

There are a few other mechanics like traps that you need to activate and dodge to disarm and the inventory system but the game explain these mechanics quite well. And if you have forgotten or want more information about one of these mechanics, the expansive and detailed help file that’s included in the game is a great way to have a refresher. 

The replay value of this game is through the roof. If you finish the main story, you can always try the puzzle mode. Where you get a randomly generated map with you have to beat it as quickly as possible with the least amount of mistakes. 

Missed traps

Overall, this game is quite good but it does drop the ball on a few places. The first thing is that this game doesn’t support wide screen. The game is around 16 years old, but by then widescreen existed. 

There is a mechanic in the game that is quite the double edged sword. And that is the quick walk feature. This feature can speed up the gameplay quite a bit, but you are unable to dodge traps that way. While that feature was on, it made my playstyle less careful and that’s just the idea of the game. 

The biggest issue of this game is the repetitiveness. Apart from some minor puzzle and investigation elements, there is barely any variety in this game. If you are interested in playing this game, I highly advice you to play this game in short bursts since otherwise this game can get boring. 

There are apart from that, a few minor things that you can overlook or keep in mind but they can get annoying from time to time. First of all, the controls. Overall, the controls work just fine but I feel that my right clicks don’t always register in the game. This caused some game overs since I right clicked several times on a tile and lost two or three misses in the process. 

Speaking of those misses, when you try to disarm the wrong tile, it doesn’t change color at all. It would have been great if it changed in the color of the tile. It would save some time and possible errors. 

Something I found missing is the fact that you are unable to “plant flags”. Remember that you can plant flags on tiles you think are bombs in minesweeper? Well, you are unable to do that in this game. So, when you think that a certain tile is a trap, you can’t put some sort of flag on it and avoid it. The mechanic works in minesweeper, so why not here? 

Visually, this game looks quite nice but the trap animations… Let’s just say that I can’t say if I like or hate them. Some trap animations make a lot of sense, like a poisoned drink or a gun trap in an old clock… But, giant spikes that rise up from the floor? I’m sorry, but no. That doesn’t fit at all here. Also, I find the knife trap animation quite strange. It almost looks like it’s thrown from somewhere while you would think it comes from the ceiling of the room… 

Anyways I’m glad that I can disable the music since I got bored of it after a while. The music in this game isn’t bad but there is just a huge lack of various songs in the game. And the track is a tad bit too short in my opinion to have it replay over and over again. 

Should you even try?

This game is a rough diamond in my opinion. The game has a lot of potential but it lacks the polish to be really enjoyable. Now, the game can get quite frustrating in the wrong area’s and it made me quite the game once or twice while preparing for this review. 

It didn’t take long before all those frustrating memories from my childhood came back while playing this game. I thought that I would have been able to beat this game more easily now that I’m older but I’m still struggling with this game because of some unpolished mechanics. 

Because parts of the maps are randomly generated, there is no difficulty scaling in the adventure mode which makes the game even more annoying to play. Yet, the game has a certain charm that pulls me in and makes me play it once in a while. 

I can recommend this game to people who enjoy casual and/or puzzle games but I recommend it with a warning, this game could have been so much better and it can be quite frustrating. And then I haven’t mentioned the lack of “investigation notes”. 

Since this is the conclusion of my article and look at this game, I have to conclude that this game isn’t the best. It’s mediocre at it’s best and frustrating at it’s worst. But, I want to mention that I really think that the core idea of the game is amazing and I would love to see another attempt on creating a game with the same mechanics and solving the issues that this game has. I think that would be amazing. But, until then, we have this rough diamond to enjoy. 

With that said, I hope you enjoyed reading this article as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care. 

Score: 60/100

 

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First Impression: Drawngeon: Dungeons of Ink and Paper (Switch) ~ Classroom Doodles Came To Life

Nintendo.com microsite – Drageus page – Official Steam Page

As somebody who works in a school as an IT guy, I’m interested when a game does something that is somewhat school-related. Today I’m going to talk about a game that does something of that nature. Well, the connection might be a bit far fetched but hey, it’s there if you look far enough. So, today’s game is Drawngeon. The publisher Drageus Games gave me a press code for the Nintendo Switch version. In this game, a drawn dungeon comes to life. Now, this game is rather cheap so it might turn people off. But, should you be turned off by this game or is it totally worth your time? Let’s find out in this 100% my honest opinion game quicky review of this game. And as usual, feel free to leave a comment with your opinion on the game and/or the content of this article in the comment section down below. 

Editorial note: During the play sessions and writing of this review, an update came out. It’s possible that some complaints might be fixed in a future version. This review is written on v1.0.3.

Classroom Doodles Came To Life

In this game, you play as a nameable character that is going to explore the drawn dungeons of this world. I think that the store page explains the story better then I can explain it.

The life went on as usual in the Inkland, until the Tower has suddenly fallen straight from the sky!
Many heroes tried to solve its mystery, but none of them succeeded! Maybe it’s your turn to test yourself?

Explore the procedurally generated game world of the Inkland – dungeons, caves, forest and, of course, the Mysterious Tower. Who can reveal all the secrets of the Mysterious Tower?

For those who don’t know what “procedurally generated” means, let me quickly explain it. It means that every time you enter the game, the layout will be different. If you have ever heard about Pokémon Mystery Dungeon, it’s the same basic idea. I find this quite surprising in a good way. For a cheap game like this, the fact that you can replay this game multiple… well, it gives you even more bang for your 4-5 bucks (Depends if the game is on sale or not 😉 ).

This gives the game more variety as well.  Every playthrough will be different. There is a game that’s quite similar to this one in concept and that’s Delver and Eldritch.  These games throw you into a dungeon as well, where the layout and enemy placement is very different every time. And I enjoyed those two games quite a lot. What I’m saying is that I enjoyed my time quite a lot with this game.

The game looks amazing. It looks like somebody drew his whole ideal Dungeons and Dragons lay-out in a sketchbook during study hall or something of that nature. The little use of color makes the items you can interact with stand out that much more.

The further you get into the game, the more bonus material you unlock. These are mostly concept art but they are a nice view of the development of this game. Now, there is a collectable that makes a cat person like me extremely happy. There are a ton of hidden cats all over the map and they are a joy to collect!

The bad ones.

Now, the game looks quite nice. I mentioned that before. Yet, there are a few things that ruin the immersion a bit. For example, the game has a problem with slopes. You can look right through them from some angles. You can see an example in the screenshot here. The void or the textures from the block behind are clearly visible.

But that isn’t the only problem I have with the visual presentation of this game. The big issue I have comes with animation of especially the battles. During a battle, which isn’t turned based but rather in realtime, you get an indication that you got hit. But, there is no indication that you hit the enemy. Yes, the text underneath the playing field tells you that you did or didn’t do damage to the enemy but why isn’t this visually shown like hits on your character?

Now, I can totally understand that a game of this nature needs to have a certain difficulty curve. But this game’s difficulty curve is a bit too much. I have no problem with enemies taking 3 to 4 hits to kill when you start the game, but the damage you get versus the damage you can do is a bit too much. Similar games like Delver are more balanced and make the game a bit more enjoyable to play.

The controls are easy to get used to but I’m sorry, they have a few issues that I really didn’t like at all. The first big issue is turning. You can turn by using the left and right shoulder buttons. Personally, I would have used these as strafe buttons. So, basically switch the left and right arrows around with the shoulder buttons.

The second issue I have with the controls is inventory management. The fact that there is no tutorial section, makes it extremely difficult to easily figure out the mechanics of the inventory. It took me some time before I was able to throw items on the ground, move and equip them. This brings me to another issue with the UI. But more on that later.

The 3rd issue is the fact that there isn’t a run button. This makes exploring the map a bit boring. Especially when you are restarting for the 10th time. You have seen most of the early area and you want to get through it as quickly as possible.

When you equip a stat-boosting item, it appears that your stats stay unchanged. Your stats are displayed next to your character portrait and those stay the same no matter what you equip. In addition to that, I don’t even know or understand which stats are what. Now, the description of the items changes color when it’s an improvement but it’s in orange. Why not green or red like in any other RPG?

Not to mention, the inventory is a bit tricky to use. It’s extremely small, so you have to really think about what you take with you and what you leave behind. But, when you want to pick up an item and you don’t have enough room in your inventory, you get the same basic text: “Not enough room in your inventory.” So, you don’t know about what item you can’t pick up and how much space you need in your inventory.

The sound design is a hit and miss story. While the sound effects add to the immersion of this game, sadly there aren’t enough sound effects in the game. For example, the sound effects for most of the enemy’s movements are exactly the same for bats, spiders, and other monsters. This is a big shame since a lot of players use these sound effects to know which enemies are coming to properly prepare themselves. Now, the music or the lack thereof really adds to the atmosphere of the game. The music that’s present is really well done and gives off the tense atmosphere that the game has.

Something that I found, on one hand, interesting and on the other hand extremely annoying, is the fact that to level up or boost your stats, you have to go to a tree at the starting village. It’s an interesting way to level up your character but it’s annoying that you can’t do this in a menu like almost every other similar game.

And with all that said, I have said everything I wanted to say about this game, so I think it’s high time to wrap up this article with the conclusion and my thoughts on this game.

Conclusion

If you read this article, it might seem that this game has a ton of flaws. And I have to admit, this game has extremely rough edges that can frustrate a lot of players. But on the other hand, this game does have a lot of positives that make the game extremely enjoyable to play.

The big problem is that I have seen and played better games in this style. And even on the Nintendo Switch: One More Dungeon is an example. So, is this game a bad game? Well, yes and no. It has its problems and shortcomings but it also has a lot of strong points.

This game is like a broken phone screen. It still works and it’s still a decent way to use your phone but the more the cracks start growing and showing, the more you have to get used to the shortcomings or replace it with a better and more polished screen.

Honestly, I think that this game needed way more time to develop. Since the potential for an extremely enjoyable game is present in this game. But not in the version I have reviewed.

So, would I recommend this game? Yes, but with a disclaimer. Know that this game isn’t the best game you will ever play but it has a certain charm. To who would I recommend this game? To people who enjoy dungeon crawlers or games like Delver and One More Dungeon.

And with that, I have said everything I wanted to say about this game. I want to thank you so much for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care.

Score: 60/100

Publishing: Thousands dead in LostHero, new souls-like hardcore RPG

Prague, November 11th – LostHero public alpha strikes hard, with casualties reaching into the thousands. Body count rising each day.

“The recently released Public Alpha of the hardcore action RPG, LostHero, has been smashing all cherished institutions like no game before,” reports a T’grank informer with connections to the game. “We’re loving it. Instead of players smashing dozens of enemies with a single sword swing, they’re finding LostHero hopelessly difficult, dying left and right as they try to reach the end of the level. It’s glorious.”

The informer reports that the difficulty levels in LostHero are creating multiple hardships for players, but that the game itself has kept them foolishly coming back for more. The non-stop slaughter would appear to be an addiction, though independent sources confirm that’s likely not the case. The game is simply fun to play.

“We’ve been watching this very closely,” says the T’grank informer, “and our statistics don’t lie. We show that it takes more than 50 tries to reach the end, and this is just the beginning! Imagine the misery and chaos that will come with the Early Access release planned for December. And, God help these miserable players, imagine the final release!”

The informer, the unofficial representative of the T’grank, went on to suggest someone, anyone, must step in to stop the madness before their cemeteries overflow with bodies. According to the informer these so-called LostHeroes are in control of the power of reincarnation, so no real damage is done to their souls, but the smell of the bodies has become overwhelming. “Who could withstand anything like it?” he was heard to lament.

After almost three years of development, GoldKnights studio has started a Public Alpha of LostHero – a hardcore souls-like RPG with a sci-fi twist and co-op mode for up to 4 players. The Alpha is free to play to anybody who subscribes. Players can register and subscribe to the official LostHero site.

In case you are interested in becoming fodder for this brutal campaign, please visit LostHero.com to learn more. There you can also find a complete presskit with all the necessary resources.

Let us know if you need anything else and hit us with an e-mail if you’d like to check out our Early Access prior to its launch – we’ll put you on our preview list. Also, note that our currently available Alpha build will be undergoing huge improvements in the upcoming week or two.

Contact: Viet Tran – Junior PR Assistant @ LostHero.com – m.tran@lostherogame.com
Twitter @MarekTV

PS: December Early Access is coming and our goal is to attract as many players as possible to the free Public Alpha prior to that date. It is available now and ends before the Early Access launch. We appreciate any line you can drop about us and our Alpha program. We’re also looking for media coverage for the December release.

ABOUTLOST HERO: LostHero is about an outcast hero, a mercenary of a secret order, who fights against the dark forces of chaos in a world fractured by eternal war. Three dominant races set the stage for his journey. The game can be played alone or in 2-4 player co-op mode. Traveling the dark worlds, players destroy their enemies in a complex skill-based action combat system, collecting resources along the way to craft and improve their arsenal. The more deadly players become, the more successful they will be. And the longer they will survive.

 ABOUT GOLDKNIGHTS: LostHero is developed by GoldKnights. Founded in 2015, we are a small indie studio of 10-20 people situated in Prague, Czech Republic. LostHero is our first comercial title, although majority of team members has a previous game development experience, especially RPGs, dungeons and adventures. Some of us also have a background in medieval swordfighting techniques, which we use to give the fighting system more realistic look and feel.

Review: Blossom Tales – The Sleeping King (Switch) ~ Cloned To Perfection

Publisher’s website

I’m quite certain that since the success of The Legend Of Zelda – Breath Of The Wild, the next games in the Zelda series will be a more open world. But, 3D-Zelda games aren’t even my favorite games. My favorite Zelda titles are the Oracle games. So, when I was browsing YouTube and saw a video of this game, I grabbed my Switch and bought it without thinking twice. Now, thanks to the Switch, the developer of this game has been able to stay afloat. That’s quite impressive I must say. It raised the bar quite high for me, so I had high expectations. So, in the end, how is the game? Is it worth playing or not? Let’s find out. As usual, feel free to leave a comment with your thoughts on the game and/or the article. 

Note: This game is also released on Steam. So, if you don’t own a Switch and you are interested in this game, you can play it on your PC. I haven’t played this game on PC so this review will be focused on the Switch version of the game.

Cloned to perfection

In this game, you play as Lily. A character in a story that the grandfather of two grandchildren is listening too. I found it really charming that the heroine’s name is Lily since that’s also the name of the female grandchild. The boy is named Chrys.

At first, the grandfather wanted to tell the story of: “the brave elf boy who lived in a magical land called H-..” but the grandkids have heard that story a million times. So, that’s why the grandpa started to tell the above-mentioned story. During the story, the grandchildren don’t hesitate to intervene and give commentary, sometimes arguing between the two of them which enemy the heroine faced.

It also gives the game some minor replay value in some areas. Since you get the option to choose between which grandchild gets his or her wish when they are arguing about the enemy you are facing.

I’m not going to talk more about the story since it would spoil the excellent humor and charm of the writing. The writing pokes fun at the original 2D-Zelda games and the tropes of telling a story like that. While the story isn’t THAT unique, it’s executed so well and with so much charm, I really enjoyed it. The references and pokes towards the Zelda series also made me smile and enjoy it even more.

At the start, you would be under the impression that this game is a clone of the Zelda series. Almost completely copying the gameplay of the Zelda series. But, this game is cloned to perfection. This game has a lot of elements from different 2D-Zelda games and they all work perfectly together. If you didn’t know, you would say that this game is a spin-off in the Zelda series.

The gameplay can be compared to every 2D-Zelda game like Oracle of Ages/Seasons, A Link To The Past, The original Legend of Zelda, Link Between Worlds… I felt like playing a “best of” from those games.

Exploring the open world, trying to find all hidden areas on the map, upgrading your gear to do more damage… It made me come back for more and more. Too bad that this game is short. According to HowLongToBeat.com, this game only takes you 9-ish hours to complete.

Wake up Grandpa, I mean King!

It’s a shame that this game is so short. The dungeons are challenging to play through and the overworld is fun to explore.

I wanted this game to continue on for a while longer. Since, when I first started my journey, the visual design of this game gave me a wave of nostalgia. The game looks amazing. Vibrant and colorful, but most of all, nostalgic. The pixel-art feels almost like it would be possible on a Gameboy Color.

While exploring the swamp, I almost felt like my younger self again. When I was covered in a blanket, playing A Link To The Past at my cousin’s house on his SNES. The game mixes elements of fantasy and magic quite well.

Besides that the game looks amazing, the animations of this game are extremely well done as well. I really like the idle animation of this game since it fits the story so well. When you leave your Switch alone, the main character would nervously tap her foot. As if she is waiting to know how she needs to progress in the story. A small touch that would make this perfect is that sometimes the kids would yell at grandpa that “he fell asleep while telling the story.” But, that’s nitpicking at this point.

Now, you go on your journey to wake up the King. Now, the reason for that is something I will leave up to you to discover. During your journey, you get a rather big arsenal of weapons. Every weapon is quite unique and is used in various places in the overworld. So, experiment with your items.

There is also a collect-a-ton aspect to the game where you can pick up certain enemy drops. Enemies rarely drop coins or hearts; but they drop feathers, zombie brains, bee hives… and those can be traded in for coins or other great rewards. The game has a bit more depth besides the main quest. So, to tease the gameplay even more… I will mention that there are side quests like scroll collecting.

Now, this game has a great price. The game costs 12€, 15USD. It’s a great price for this game.

All of this sounds fine, amazing gameplay, great story, and excellent presentation. Are there negatives to this game or will I continue to praise it? Well, there are a few things that made me raise an eyebrow or two.

So close, so close.

Something I didn’t like was that you were unable to choose the sword button. This might seem like a nitpick, but I found it impractical that it was the “A” button.

Now, I only discovered that this could be changed after I finished the game. But, when you change your sword button, it also changes the button you need to press to accept dialogues. So yeah… Nitpicking much here. So, check your control options when you want to change that.

While the controls respond quite well, there are a few other things that I didn’t like. Like when you aim your bow, you are locked in the position you started aiming in. There is also no way to cancel the bow aiming. This is a problem since it takes a chunk out of your mana bar. And without mana, you can’t use your special items leaving you wide open to attacks.

If you have read other reviews I wrote, you know that I find the music and sound design pretty important for a game. Now, the sound design of this game is decent. While I would have loved a bit more sound effects for the monster grunts and people talking, it’s pretty okay.

The soundtrack, well, it’s good but some tracks are too short. And there are one or two tracks that I really didn’t like. The track for the race side quests worked on my nerves. On the other hand, it’s a great way to hear how much time you have left, but it made me just even more nervous while doing an obstacle course quickly. That said, the rest of the soundtrack is really enjoyable and I have to say that Visager did a great job with the music.

Now, there are a few things that could make this game even better. The first thing is the completion percentage. There are a lot of side quests and things like that, I would love to see a completion percentage or a sort of quest log so I can keep track of them.

A second thing that would improve the game quite a lot is polishing up the teleport system. Now, you step on the teleport stone and you choose in a lost of teleport locations you have activated. It would be amazing if you would see them on the map as well and instead of choosing them from a simple list, you would pick them from the map.

A third thing that would be nice is that there is a different sprite or some sort of identification if you have activated a teleport stone or not. This is a minor thing, I know, but it would be a great minor change.

The difficulty of this game is good. This game isn’t too hard or too easy. While it would be neat if the dungeon bosses have some sort of health bar, I think that the visuals give the health of a boss away.

Now, sometimes I felt like there was a bit too much going on with the dungeon boss. The more I have to keep in mind while fighting a boss, the more frustrated I get. There were two bosses that almost made me throw my Switch one or twice. Something that would help is an easier way to find the red potions. If that’s in the game, I overlooked it.

So, that’s everything I wanted to say about this game. I think it’s time for the conclusion and my final thoughts (which act as a TL;DR most of the time) for this game.

Conclusion

The good:

+ Amazing story

+ Excellent visuals

+ Addictive gameplay.

+ ….

The bad:

– Way too short. It’s over before you know it.

– Some bosses have a bit too much stuff going on.

– Locking in one direction when firing a bow.

– The soundtrack could have been so much more.

Final thoughts:

So, is this game any good? Yes! I never expected that this game was this good. While it’s highly possible that the nostalgia for the Legend of Zelda series overtakes me and makes me look over some flaws, but truth to be told, this game deserves all the praise it’s getting.

As mentioned above, this game isn’t perfect. But, the positives highly outweigh the negatives. This game is a lot of fun for casual and hardcore players. And because I finished this game and I want to see more, I’m well determined to support the developer even more. I want to see more of this developer.

You really owe it to yourself if you enjoy 2D-Zelda or adventure/action games to play this game to the end. For now, this game is one of the best games I have played all year. Yes, I enjoyed it that much.

In addition to that, when I was testing out the Switch screenshot sharing feature, I tweeted out a picture where signposts still tell what’s on it:

And yes, that’s the actual WRITER of this game replying to my tweet. The developers of this game are very active on social media! I love what you are doing with the fans and players of your game! Great work! Now, if you make another game; please notify me. I would love to see more of you guys. Even when it’s a sequel to Blossom Tales.

Thank you so much for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading this article as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care!

Score: 90/100

Review: Monster Tale (DS) ~ Are You Ready, Chomp?

Wikipedia entry

Last week when I was writing about Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin, I wanted to reference Monster Tale. To my surprise, I haven’t written a review or talked about this game in full on my blog. So, that’s why I’m going to fix that right now. Let’s tell the tale on one of the best Nintendo DS games ever made. As usual, feel free to leave a comment in the comment section down below about the content of this article and/or the game. For now, let’s ready, set, go!

Are you ready, Chomp?

In this game, you take the role of Ellie. A young girl that gets dragged into a world filled with monsters. It doesn’t take long before she meets a monster that hatches right in front of her and follows her around as if she was the mother. She decides to name the monster Chomp.

Then, Jinx, a shopkeeper explains what the world is.  There are other humans in the Monster World and they are king of their own domain.

Now, Ellie and Chomp go on a quest to try and defeat these evil Kid-Kings and try to get them all home.

The reason I stay pretty vague about the story is simple. This game is a very nicely written plot and talking about it more would spoil it. The characters might be cliche here and there, but I really liked the chemistry between the characters. To this day, I still remember the characters and their role in the story by just looking at screenshots or hearing their theme.

The story is a blast to experience from start to finish. All 10 hours of it. Yes, all 10 hours of it. This game is criminally short. You can squeeze a few more hours out of the game when you want to fully complete it.

There is voice acting in this game, but no full lines are voice acted. Some of the major characters have some spoken phrases or noises but nothing really more. Which is a darn shame since the whole voice cast is extremely talented amine dub voice actors. On the other hand, it helps with the charm that this game has quite a lot.

I especially love the grunts of Ellie and the noises Chomp makes. They are so adorable and made me fall in love with this game. It’s still a mystery how the adorable and cute game can tackle serious subject matter like what’s presented in this game. So, I hope that you are ready since you and Chomp are going on an adventure.

Metroidvania

Back when I first played this game, I hadn’t really played a lot of Metroid or Castlevania games. I had heard about both series but I haven’t played them. That all changed when I started to play this game.

The gameplay is your typical Metroidvania game. You explore this world and fight monsters on your way. Don’t be fooled by the visuals, this game isn’t easy at all.

This game is unforgiving sometimes and you really have to learn how each move works and how to use the special items provided to you.

This game has a lot of depth as well. There are three enemy types; fire, water, and earth. These work on a rock, paper scissors theme. So, you will have to keep in mind which version of Chomp you level up and bring with you. Yes, you can level up Chomp. While it’s not 100% needed to unlock all versions of Chomp to defeat the final boss of the game, it’s highly recommended that you level up at least one form quite a lot.

During combat, enemies can drop various items like footballs, books, slingshots, ice cream, camera’s… to help Chomp level up. Some dropped items even have additional benefits, like the football bounces around on the top screen.

Now is a good time to address the top and bottom screen, since it’s used in this game to its full potential. On the top, you have the Monster World that Ellie is exploring. You can have Chomp with you for a limited amount of time. That’s what the yellow bar on the 2nd screen is for. This bar drains as soon as Chomp is in the Monster World.

You can let the bar recharge when Chomp is resting in his den, which is the bottom screen. Once there, the bar recharges and he can experiment and learn about the various items that enemies drop. There is also another catch, each version of Chomp has different attributes, abilities and special powers to play around with.

Now, I love the risk and reward system of combat. There are a lot of ways to handle the situation. One possible option is to let Chomp handle the enemies. Another possible situation is to shoot the enemies down and another is to melee combat. Now, you would argue that the melee combat sounds useless. Well, I would agree with you there but there is a limit to your shooting ability. When the 2nd bar on the 2nd screen, the blue one, depletes; you can’t shoot anymore. You can recharge this bar at save points or by finding rare blue orbs in the world or as drops. But the easiest way is to melee defeat enemies.

Now, there is a lot more done with the mechanics of the two screens and I have to tell that I really liked it. The combat is extremely challenging to do but in a fun way. Also, no playthrough feels and plays the same since you have so many different ways to tackle the situation.

In addition to that, you never get lost on what to do next since the next spot you need to go to is always indicated on the map. I have no idea if there is an option to disable this, but I think it’s a very useful feature.

Gameplay-wise, this game is extremely addictive. There are a lot of power-ups for Ellie and various forms for Chomp. So, this game quickly becomes a balancing act on who to power up with your hard-earned cash. Do invest in both, since otherwise, you will regret it later.

Control-wise, this game is solid. While in very few occasions, the ground pound move was a bit tricky to pull off, but that was a minor annoyance. Since, when you die in this game, you get quickly put back to the latest checkpoint. Now, if there is one thing I really disliked in this game is the lack of teleports.

There is a lot of backtracking in this game. That’s the biggest problem I have with this game. The Castlevania have teleport stones, but Monster Tale doesn’t have that. That’s the biggest flaw this game has. Besides being criminally short that is.

Save often!

So, this game doesn’t have an autosave. At certain locations, you come across a book where you can save. There, you can recharge every meter to it’s fullest potential. These rooms are highly needed since the lower your hearts, the more tricky this game can become.

Something I will never get tired of with this game is the presentation. This game looks amazing. It’s clear that a lot of love has been put in the creation of this game. The backgrounds of each zone look stunning, vibrant and have a lot of detail.

The colors pop and they build an amazing atmosphere. I especially love the beach zone since it has a lot of memories for me. As a kid, I took a lot of trips to the seaside with my family and I love to sit on the beach and watch the sea do its thing.

Besides that, the monster design is adorable. In some cases, I didn’t even want to hurt the enemies. They all have unique designs and patterns, it’s tricky to kill them. Both since they look so good and some have very unique killing patterns.

Now, the soundtrack of this game is good. While there are some tracks that I find mediocre, the overall package is a blast to listen to. It really pumps you up to continue. You won’t regret hearing these tunes during gameplay and even outside. I played the soundtrack in the background while I was writing this article and I actually heard the various enemy noises and the various other sounds in my head.

This proves that this game has an amazing audio design. To this day, I still remember sound effects and music from the game. And that’s what I mean with that this game will leave a visual impression on you. The game is not only pretty but also sounds pretty.

The animations are fluid and the game runs at a very stable frame rate. I actually don’t remember the game ever dropping frames. Also, I really like how there are two save slots. This way you have tried for two very different runs.

In terms of the UI, there is one minor thing I have to complain about. It’s actually extremely nitpicky but I really find the use of the start and select buttons to switch between the menu’s a bit too much. The start and select buttons on the DS Lite are extremely small. Besides, I wished they merged the map screen and the other menu into one option. Maybe an ability to select from the pause screen if you wanted to see the map screen or the evolution screen of Chomp.

So, that’s everything I wanted to say about this game. I left a few things unexplained for when you are interested in giving this game a chance. You will be surprised. But, it’s time for the section of the review of the people who need a tl;dr. Time for the conclusion!

Conclusion

The bad:

-The pause menu could be reorganized a bit better.

-The harsh difficulty could be a turn off for some people.

-The game is really short.

-No teleporting in the game.

The good:

+ Amazing Metroidvania game.

+ Great story.

+ Amazing visual and sound presentation.

+ This game oozes charm.

+ Great controls.

+ …

Final thoughts:

If you highly enjoy the 2D Castlevania games, the Metroid games or any other Metroidvania game and you are looking for something more light-hearted, then Monster Tale is your game. This game looks and sounds amazing.

Besides a few minor flaws, this game comes highly recommended. It’s a big shame that the remake for 3DS actually fell through and that the original developers of this game went bankrupt.

If you see this game for sale, pick it up and play it. It’s one of the best games on the DS. I wish more people knew about it so another developer could pick up the IP and make a sequel to it.

On the other hand, the ending wraps up things extremely nicely and makes for an amazing package. Due to the various possible playstyles, this game is highly replayable. But, it’s the complete experience that will stay with you. And that’s what makes this game so memorable and unique.

Thank you for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading this article as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care.

Score: 99/100

Review: Yokai Watch (3DS) ~ Insprited Articles

Official website

I bought this game on the release date. But due to various reasons, I have never beaten this game. Also, I was quite sure that I reviewed this game back in 2016. Strangely enough, I didn’t. So, now that I have beaten the game since last week, I think it’s HIGH time to put my opinion into words and write them down into a review. Did I enjoy Yo-Kai Watch or were the breaks because I thought that this game is a broken mess. Well, let’s find out together. As always, feel free to leave a comment with your opinion on the game and/or the content of this article. 

Is this Pokémon?

In this game, you play as Nathan. A young boy wandering in the woods while he is collecting bugs. Then he stumbles upon a machine with a crank. He puts in a coin and outcomes a Pokéball with a strange creature—

While at first glance, it’s easy to compare this game to Pokémon looking at the screenshots and things like that. But let me tell you, this game is quite different from Pokémon.

So, the story. Out of the gashapon machine, Nathan gets a capsule that gives him the Yo-Kai Watch. With this watch, he can see different creatures roaming around in the city causes various issues from the people living there.

If you don’t already know what Yo-Kai is, let me briefly explain it to you. These monsters are based on Japanese folklore. These are phantoms curse people to give them a big temper, a bad hair day, unable to lie… That’s the real basic gist of it. At least, how they are used in this game. If you want to learn more about Yokai, the Wikipedia page is a great way to start.

Now, one thing I do have to say is that this game is structured like an anime series. There are various chapters wherein you learn about something strange going on, discovering that it’s Yo-Kai activity and then you solve it. I know that the story is written for younger kids to get into, but to be frank and honest, I found the story a bit bland. Mediocre even from time to time. Especially the ending is a mess. There was too little build-up to the overall final boss of the game and to be honest, the game ends abruptly.

This doesn’t take away that the dialogues can be very funny from time to time. It does pull off some jokes you have seen more than once in cartoons, but that doesn’t matter too much to me. Even with this bland story, it was able to put a smile on my face from time to time.

While I’m still a bit bitter that the credits froze for me and I had to redo the final boss fight over, I find the scene after the credits so; predictable. I can understand a younger child getting invested in the story, but most of the time, it didn’t click with me.

While I had beaten the main story at 18 hours, I had also beaten a lot of side quests. This game is pretty short and can be beaten in a day or two. Now, I have played short experiences that I enjoyed an awful lot, so I’m not going to be too harsh on the game for that reason. Besides, if you play all the side quests and try to complete this game, you are well into a game that will last you give or take 80 hours.

Too old?

While I was playing this game, I became well aware that I wasn’t the target audience for this game whatsoever. While this game has a type system set up with Yo-Kai being weak or strong to another type… and things similar like that, I rarely had to use items to power up my Yo-Kai.

Now, this game is a sort of adventure RPG game. You are allowed to freely explore the city to solve side quests and favors.

Sidenote, I don’t understand why they split side quests and favors since they are basically the same thing. Oh well.

During your exploration of the city, you can find various Yo-Kai roaming around the city. Under cars, under vending machines, in trees, in the water… They are everywhere in this game. Yet, always at similar spots. So, if your watch, that functions as a radar, picks up the aura of a nearby Yo-Kai, you know which spots to look at.

That’s the case for the overworld. You also have various caves and dungeons you can explore. In here, you see the Yo-Kai roaming free. You can easily pass most of them, but thanks to your very limited stamina, you will be unable to outrun them all.

Now, there are a lot of mechanics in this game that is underused in my opinion. What I mean here is that there is just no real need for some features. For example, the fusion of Yo-Kai is just additional content for the people who want to complete the game. In my playthrough, I was able to beat the final boss with ease without any fusion Yo-Kai.

There is a lot to do in this game, but I never felt I had to do it to progress in the game. Even without any leveling up, I was able to beat the harder areas. Yes, I’m saying that this game is pretty easy.

This could have been solved by introducing a difficulty option where veteran players could face a bigger challenge since the potential is there. I really enjoyed exploring and finding secret items all over the place.

Something I found a bit disappointing is when you start tackling various side quests near the end of the game instead of at the start of the game… Well, I almost always carried the items needed to solve the quest or favor. Or my  Yokai was so strong that I was able to easily beat the Yokai in the quest.

I would have loved to see a sort of Yokai-dex system in this game. Like a Pokédex where you can check the areas and things, you need to do to require their medal.

I know I might upset some people with this, but I found the battle system pretty lacking. I understand that it innovates in quite a lot of areas but, I find it a bit boring. The big issue is that you get too much money from battling Yokai & your Yokai level up way too quickly. Making them too strong so you barely have to use the special abilities of your Yokai.

Speaking about those, I found it pretty frustrating that whenever you purified a Yokai or started their special attack, the game would wait a few moments before the actual attack launches. The few waiting moments were, oh, so annoying. I wish they change that in the sequel.

Something I really dislike now is the map system. I already started playing the sequel to this game and the map system is improved so much in the sequel, I find this system pretty annoying to use. You can’t put a tracking arrow on side quests, the buildings aren’t labeled in the minimap and you are only able to see the map of the region you are in. This is improved in the sequel, so they learned their lesson there.

Another mechanic that is more fleshed out in the sequel is the “recruit” tactic. The way how you befriend other Yokai. This has been made a lot easier in the sequel. Now it’s a guessing game on which Yokai wants what. Also, I found it annoying that you weren’t able to choose which enemy Yokai to feed to try and recruit them. -sigh-

A city

Now, I could go on for quite a while longer about the gameplay; but there are other things we need to talk about in the review. For example, you can save your game anywhere from the pause menu. This game doesn’t autosave, so keep that in mind.

Visually, the presentation of this game is pretty good. I really like the design of the city and enjoyed exploring it.

There are a few things that could have been improved design-wise. First of all, the crossroad mechanic. This is dumb. There is this mechanic in the game where you need to wait for the light to turn green to cross. If you cross red lights too many times, a big Oni will come and wipe out your party. Now, there are no consequences for losing this fight. So, if you want to teach kids a lesson to watch both ways before crossing a street,  you aren’t going to do it with this.

In addition to that, most of the time, all the roads didn’t have any cars. While I know that they exist and drive around on the streets, but I barely saw them. So, I crossed the streets away from the crossroads. Besides, the cars do stop for you without any penalty. So, yeah. Unless mechanic.

Near the end of the game, you unlock a quick travel mechanic. Yet, you do have to “unlock” each travel point. I can see why they did it like this, but I would have preferred that I had all the travel points unlocked from the start.

Now, the soundtrack got a lot of praise from various other reviews. And I’m sorry, I don’t like it. I don’t hate the soundtrack either. The big issue is that it fits the theme quite well in the game but I don’t like listing to it outside of the game. As a matter of fact, I switched to a different soundtrack while writing this review. The biggest issue I have with the soundtrack is that the same melody comes back in too many tracks. That’s something I don’t like at all.

The sound design and the various voice clips are good. I enjoyed them. Each time I think about this game, I hear “PAWS OF FURRY” often in my head.

Now, something I find a mixed bag is the mini-scenes you get at the end of each side quest. I can see that some of them are fun for little children, but I hate the fact that they are randomized. Some of them are negative and don’t give you a bonus and others give you a huge bonus. But, the pool of usable cutscenes is too small. I have seen a ton of scenes too many times that I know after one second if I’m going to get a reward or not.

In terms of the controls and the UI, this game is very good. There is one mechanic that I really dislike, but I’m happy that it’s in the game and I don’t want to see it get changed. That is the running mechanic. You run way too quickly out of stamina. Also, while you are running and you want to turn, your character first goes into a break animation before you bolt into the other direction.

This game can be controlled with the buttons on the 3DS and the touchscreen. Personally, I prefer buttons. Since I felt more in control with them. While, actually, the touchscreen controls are handier. That way you don’t have to take your stylus each and every time you enter a battle.

So, that’s everything I wanted to say about this game. I left a few things out to surprise you if you decide to play this game. But, I think it’s time for the conclusion.

Conclusion

Negatives:

– The game is too easy for veterans players.

– There are too many mechanics underused.

– The crosswalk mechanic is just meh.

– The soundtrack repeats the same melody a bit too much.

– The story is a bit too bland from time to time.

Positives:

+ Big postgame.

+ Really pretty game.

+ Even when the story is bland, the writing can be really funny sometimes.

+ …

Conclusion:

So, this game is a kids’ game and it shows. But does that mean it’s a bad game? No, not at all. This game can be really fun from time to time, but it really shows that this game has flaws. This game isn’t worth 90/100 that some outlets are giving it.

I think it’s best that, if you are interested in playing this game, give this game a shot. There is a demo in the eShop, you can play that first before you decide to buy the full game.

I can recommend this game but don’t set your bar too high. The game is very lighthearted and remember, it’s a kids game so some parts will be easy if you are a hardcore gamer.

Thankfully, a lot of the issues I have with this game are solved in the sequel. But even with all the issues talked about in this review, the game is fun to play and I’m glad that I experienced it. Now, on to the sequel to finish that one!

Thank you for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, take care and have a great rest of your day.

Score: 69/100

Preview: Griff – The Winged Lion (PC) ~ 5th Console generation inspired game

Developers’ Website

Another retro-inspired game? I know, we have seen quite a lot of them lately. But, this time, it’s quite different. Today, I want to talk about Griff the Winged Lion. A retro-inspired game by major titles from the 5^th console generation. Games like Spyro and Crash are two of the biggest inspirations for this game. So, in this preview, I’m going to talk about the released press and promotional materials, the provided demo and what my ideas are for the game. As usual, feel free to leave a comment with your opinion on the game and/or the content of this article.

If you want to support this game to see it completed, you can help the developers on KickStarter!

The promo & press materials

If you want to check out the press kit for yourself, you can do it right here. In the provided press kit, we can read the story. The story is about Griff, a king’s son who goes on a journey to find answers about his mysterious fate.

I think that there is a lot of potential in the story. Since my experience with gaming stories and writing stories myself in the past is telling me that there is going to be more than just that. I’m convinced that the story presented in the press kit is just going to be the tip of the iceberg. Something is going to happen that changes everything. I’m quite curious to see what it will be.

So far, the characters that get described are an amazing throwback at the characters from the games they took inspiration from. I can’t wait to see how everything will fit together into one story.

When I keep reading in the press kit, I see some features that get me excited to play the full version of this game. First, the fact that there will be 5 playable characters gets me excited. I enjoy adventure platformers where you have to switch between characters to solve puzzles.

Second, the fact that this game is based on mythological creatures, I can’t wait to see which mythologies get covered. I have a soft spot when it comes to mythology in games…

Third, the voice cast for this game is well-known actors in the scene. The 4 names that are listed are impressive. If an indie project like this has such a great voice cast, I can’t wait to see the result.

I really urge you to look at the press kit since there are a lot of screenshots to be seen to give you an idea of the final product. Also, check out the KickStarter page, since you can download the demo right from there. Speaking of the demo…

The Demo

I looked at the demo provided in the Kickstarter. While I know that the demo isn’t a great representation of the final representation of the game, but I would like to say a few things.

The demo of the game is quite short. Maybe a bit too short in my opinion. I think it would be fun if there were one or two levels available to play in the game. Since now I only got a basic understanding of how the controls will feel and how the game will look visually.

There was one issue in the demo that I found very annoying. The fact that the “enter” button was used to select and both go from full screen to windowed mode was annoying.

One thing I would love to see changed in some parts of the UI still looks a bit too modern and out of place in the 5^th console generation. Especially the character portraits in the top left corner. But then again, this is an early build so I can excuse that.

Something I really didn’t like was the swimming controls in the game. I’m under the impression that the camera controls flip under water. That moving the mouse up, moves Griff more under the water. While above water, moving the mouse up, moves the camera up.

Something else I didn’t like was the fact that you could get yourself stuck when you go to the king. There was no way back up, so I had to restart the demo to explore the rest of the game. There is a way to get out there, but it took me a bit too long to figure that out.

One minor detail that you could change but would make it a nice touch is to change the XBOX controller into a PS4 controller on the control screen. Since you draw inspiration from games that are published on Sony systems. See where I’m going with this? It is in the details.

And that’s everything I didn’t like about the demo. The music, the visual presentation, the controls and everything else looks quite promising. While there isn’t too much to do in the demo and you can “finish” the demo in 15 minutes, I really want more. I want to see more and see this game get fully developed. Since, after I played this demo, I’m bursting with ideas. Speaking about those ideas…

  My ideas for the game

Okay, it’s that time of the preview articles again. A time where I throw around ideas that I would love to see in the finished product. Keep in mind, that these might not even get implemented. These are three ideas I have after seeing all the press materials and playing the short demo.

I think it would be amazing if there is a level where you must use the “turn your enemies into gold” mechanic that is promoted. What I mean is, that you turn enemies into solid gold and must use them as platforms to reach other platforms.

Another idea I had was, give the game a speed run feature. What I mean is, build in a feature that speed runners can use to help them time their in-game time when playing the game. I can see a lot of potential in this game for speed running. So, seriously, grab that chance.

Since this is somewhat of a coming of age story, I think it would be amazing if there is a level where you must guide younger lion cubs to safety from hunters. From what I understand of the plot, the story is about Griff proving that he can become king when his father would pass away.

Overall, I’m quite excited for how the game is going to turn out. I’m crossing my fingers that they reach their Kickstarter goal. Also, if they are unable to reach that goal, I seriously hope that they don’t drop this project. This game has quite a lot of potential and it would be a shame if it died.

If anything interested you in this article, go and look at the Kickstarter page. I seriously think you will enjoy it. You can download the demo I used to base my article on. This can become an amazing tribute to the early PlayStation games and much more.

I have said everything that I wanted to say about the game for now. Thank you so much for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article on my blog but until then, take care and have a great rest of your day.

First Impression: Dungeon Kingdom – Sign of the Moon (PC) ~ Moon Time

Steam store page

Official site

A few weeks ago, I got a press key for a game sent to me. I’m so glad that the developer reached out to me since this game looks amazing. This game is being created by a small team based in France. It’s still in early access so a lot of things can change between what you read here and what is in the final game. I have played the June 2017 build in order to write this review.  While I got this game for free, the developer wanted that this article is 100% my opinion. I hope you are ready to dive into a new fantasy world since we have the sign of the moon and have to save the land. As usual in my articles, feel free to leave a comment with your opinion on the article and/or the game. 

The sign of the Moon

So far, I haven’t gotten too far into the game. I have only been through the first few areas of the game and been exploring and testing out different set-ups and just learning the ins and outs of this game. I could write a whole paragraph to talk about the story, but the press kit sums it up quite nicely.

At the dawn of the Fourth Age… You, a poor young man struggling to make ends meet, have been summoned by a strange man claiming to be a member of the prestigious Mages’ Guild, to join him on a great quest. In the hope for a better future, you accept his request, for who could refuse to follow such a seemingly eminent member of the Mages’ Guild?

A feeling in the back of your mind tells you that this is related to the strange symbol of a moon on you hand… Your quest will require you to explore the Dungeon Kingdom world, to uncover hidden treasures, solve puzzles and battle dangerous creatures in many areas, from dark dungeons to snowy mountains.

The story sounds quite interesting, so I can’t wait to see where the developer takes it. So far, I haven’t experienced the story too much. The writing is good. There isn’t a lot of world building at the start. You are thrown into a fantasy world and you expect to understand everything. While this could be seen as annoying to some people, I like it. Since you learn about the world in various scrolls and books scattered around in the world. I highly recommend that you read them since they might be useful to solve some puzzles.

The good exploring

Let’s talk about the things I think were really good in this game. The visual presentation of this game is really well done. The game looks amazing.

I loved to walk around in the dungeon and towns since they just look amazing. I really love the fact that you can hold the left mouse button down to look around at the position you are standing. The only minor complaint I have is that there is no button to quickly snap the camera back into place. Apart from taking one step. This snaps the camera back in the right place.

The music and sound effects are really quite well done. While there isn’t a lot of music in the game, the sound effects and sound design more than make up for it. You really feel that you are in a dungeon or palace and it helps to add to the atmosphere. There is one sound effect I didn’t like, and that is the sleeping sound effect. It didn’t click with me. I think something that would add to it is a sort of “waking up” sound where you hear a tent zipper go open or something along those lines.

Something that adds to the immersion is as well the voice acting. It’s really well done. The dialogue also changed depending on your course of action.

The only nitpick I have when it comes to the presentation is that the game doesn’t use its own custom cursor. It would be amazing if the game uses some sort of custom glove/hand icon instead of the white arrow that Windows uses. It would fit a bit more into the visual presentation of the game.

Something I found really impressive is the dynamic light system. You can pick up candles to light up your way. And they do, in a very pleasing visual manner. Something I didn’t like here is that when a candle runs out, it looks like you can still light it. I didn’t find a way to do that. Also, it would be amazing if you can light candles in the environment that have gone out.

The tutorial does an excellent job of teaching you the basic mechanics of the game. I highly recommend that you play through this at least once. The tutorial is really short and sweet. Also, it doesn’t hold your hand too much, it lets you explore at your own pace. And if you want to read the last explanation again, you click a button and it’s explained again.

The dungeons themselves aren’t randomly generated. They are all handcrafted and all the loot is placed everywhere. If you look around enough, you can equip yourself with all the weapons and armor you will need. The game also allows you to tweak the stats to each character in your party to your liking. When you have enough stat points to do so that is.

The gameplay itself is amazing. You explore and fighting through various locations. There are also various secrets to discover in each area. Those secrets will be really beneficial to you on your journey. It’s also wise to keep some items that at first serve no purpose since you can use them to leave them on pressure switches. You can throw items to anywhere you want.

While this game has permadeath, you can save and load anytime you want. There is also an autosave.

Something personal and minor I really like in this game is the fact that there is a feature to change the controls to an AZERTY layout. 🙂

The automap system is amazing. The only thing I miss is to be able to put notes on the map. Maybe I’m too much spoiled by games like the Zelda DS games and Etrain Odyssey.

The RPG elements in this game are great. There is realism in this game thanks to the hunger and stamina system. You need to give your characters a rest and a meal or otherwise they won’t be able to survive.

Things that need improving

Something that I didn’t like was how slow you were able to attack and how quick your enemies were. I died various times when I discovered the first secret to some enemies. There is a cool down time before you can attack again.

At first, I hated the controls of the combat. I had to use the right mouse click on the hand to attack. I thought this was the only way to attack. But then, I looked at the “Help & Shortcuts” menu and learned that there are buttons to attack. I think this would be really handy to mention in the tutorial.

I also think that the early game enemies are too strong. It just takes too long for you to be able to either counter-attack or use a spell against enemies. I lost two characters before I was able to slay one enemy. The combat system needs some polishing up in my opinion.

Speaking of shortcuts and controls, I think it would be lovely if you can rebind them. While the current control scheme does work for some people, some controls don’t work for me.

This game could use some polish here and there. This game could benefit from a lot of tweaks that seem minor but would go a long way. Like a bit more sound effects, like when you open a door. The game is good, but with these minor improvements, it would be great. But, I think that this is something they are working on since it’s still in early access.

While it’s challenging that you need to find your weapons in the wild, I find it very odd that when you hire an adventurer, he or she doesn’t have a weapon at their disposal. I think it would be an improvement if they have a basic knife or a basic weapon at the start.

Final thoughts

In conclusion, this game is amazing. I fell in love with the amazing visuals and the gameplay that this game has. I’ll follow the development of this game for sure. I also think that this game is worth your money. The asking price is perfect in my opinion.

The game is still in early access and the developer listens to the feedback that it gets. If you have ideas and suggestions on how to improve the game, open a topic on the Steam forums or write them an email.

I can’t wait to see where this game goes. I can’t say it enough, but I have to say that this game is worth your time if you enjoy dungeon crawlers. I do have to warn you that it’s still in early access, but report each bug or oddity since I think this game will become better because of it.

When this game leaves early access, I’ll surely take another look at the game and write a full review here on my blog. But for now, I enjoyed my time in the early access and will continue to play it. Before I repeat what I said too many times, it’s time to wrap up this article. Thank you so much for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, take care and have a great rest of your day.

Preview: Pillars Of History (PC) ~ Time for History!

Official website

Today, it’s time to take a look at a game that’s still in development. A game that interested me as soon as the developer emailed me about it. Tritan Studio presents an Action RPG in medieval Europe. And in this article, we are going to take a look at the game and I’ll tell you my wishes for the game as well. As usual, feel free to leave a comment with your opinion on the game and/or the article. 

Personal note

Before we start, I want to stress that this isn’t a paid article. This game interests me so much, that I decided to write an article about it.

Also, the studio is going to start a KickStarter campaign for this game. I advise you guys and girls to take a look at it. Since this game is going to be worth it from what I have seen in the trailers and screenshots they released on Facebook.

Check their website/facebook page on the 20th June 2017 for more information about their KickStarter.  The KickStarter will run for a bit more than a month. So, please support them. Game development is hard and costs a lot of money.

You can also follow the development on their YouTube channel and their Twitter.

What is this game about?

So, you choose between one of seven characters that each have their unique storyline and background. Since this is an RPG, the actions you take decide the fate your character.

Your character development is based on your level progression. There will be also a class-system. Each class has its own basic stats, perks, and weaknesses.

But, you can also develop skills. You can improve these skills with skill points you earn from leveling up. So, you will have to choose wisely on which skills you spend them on.

There will be an exploration system. Since this is an RPG, this is a given.

Remember, like I said in the introduction, this game is set in the Medieval times. What were we doing back then? Of course, we were exploring new territories, nations, acquiring knowledge and such things.  In this game, you will be able to explore settings based on the Balkans and Eastern Europe. And here comes the first interesting catch. When you treat somebody badly, he or she can be serious trouble if you enter their homeland. So, be careful who you anger.

Of course, since we didn’t have the same technology back then, then we have now, exploring is a risky business. You will have to take care of yourself, your horses and your stock. Also, you might have to rely on a pathfinder or other people. So, that will be interesting.

What would an RPG be without interactions? A boring one, no? Like I said before if you anger somebody, it’s quite possible that you aren’t allowed access to a rich town that sells strong weapons or great items. Also, it will be possible in this game that if you play the nice guy, you will receive great rewards and serious discounts.

You will also have to survive from the land. That’s why the Tritan Studio focused heavily on this aspect. There will be a stamina system that can be recovered by rest and food. Nowadays, this might sound easy, but remember, we are back in the time of castles and knights.

So, what happens when you die? Well, you get robbed. Sort of. You lose part of all of your belongings. It’s better than losing your life isn’t?

Finally, let’s talk about the equipment. This will be quite important to your quest. Since, what’s the point of putting so many points in a sword skill, if you aren’t carrying swords? That’s common sense. But be careful, since the class that you choose can change which equipment you can use. For example, priests can’t use the heaviest armor, since they lack the training for that.

My wishes

So, this game has elements from games I really like. For example, the survival and stamina mechanics reminds me to the stamina and survival mechanic in The Legend Of Zelda – Breath Of The Wild. The losing of money and gear upon death reminds me of Pokémon Mystery Dungeon games. Other games that come to mind are the Elder Scroll games, FallOut, Europa Universalis IV and others.

The reason why I’m so interested in this game is that it mixes elements from games I like to play. So, I’m quite sure it will turn out quite fun.

Another reason is that I’m interested in the history of Europe. When I go on a city trip or on vacation, I love to visit historical sites. As a child, I often imagined living as a sort of superhero in those times. Yeah, those were fun times.

Because the concept of this game interested me when I read the mail, I wanted to write an article about this. But as soon as I saw the screenshots, development videos and other released material… Well, I think I’m getting somewhat hyped for this game.

So, here are something I hope that will happen in the game. The following things are my suggestions to the developers. This might or might not be in the game.

I think it would be amazing if there was mod support for people to create their own quests. This would be an amazing way to give the game some love and make it more alive.

Also, I think it would be great if there is a system to “sort quests”. The mechanic in The Legend Of Zelda – Breath Of The Wild is perfect in my eyes. You have a list of main quests, a list of side quests and such. And you can select a (side) quest and this will give you a marker on your map.

If there is a map system in place, it would be amazing if the map system looks like a map drawn on old parchment. Maybe even a feature where you can draw on the map. But you can’t erase your mistakes, since how are you going to erase ink in those times? So, that would mean that you have to buy a certain map again if you messed up.

A fast travel system would be interesting as well. But make it risky. I think it would be an interesting mechanic if you gave the fast travel mechanic seen in this kind of games a spin. For example, you might loose a horse traveling to a far off location in the mountains. Or, that you need a certain amount of resources to travel to a certain place.

The developer told me that this game will help you to learn a thing or two about history. I think it would be a great idea if you were able to play through some of those stories instead of finding scrolls of those tales.

What I have seen so far, the game looks amazing. The game will be playing in a 2,5 top down view. I can’t wait to play a demo build of this game. This game is certainly going on my wishlist.

Check out their social media and their website if you think that this game looks interesting. Help the developer out by sharing and giving a like if you like the content. I’m looking forward for more screenshots and maybe even a demo. All their links are at the top of this article. But, here they are once more:

Website – Facebook – Twitter – YouTube

So, that’s is everything I wanted to say about this interesting game. I hope you enjoyed reading this article as much as I enjoyed writing this. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, take care and have a great rest of your day.

Review: Kirby – Return To Dreamland (Wii)

Wikipedia entry

It has been quite some time since I looked at a console game. Well, honestly, I do play console games here and there… But mostly, I play games on my handhelds and my PC. In any case, a few days ago, I have finally beaten a Kirby game I have been playing on and off for the past few years. It’s called Kirby’s Return To Dream Land on the Nintendo Wii. Before I begin the review, I first want to address something about the name of this game. In Europe, this game has a different name. It’s called Kirby’s Adventure Wii. This is really annoying to me since the first Kirby game on the Gameboy is called Kirby’s Adventure. Why didn’t we Europeans got the same name as the Americans? Such a shame. In any case, enough stalling. Time to get into the review. And as usual, feel free to leave a comment with your opinion on the game and/or the content of this article in the comment section down below. Thanks in advance for that. 

The story of Kirby

In this game, Kirby’s adventure has two big parts. In the first part of the game, Kirby helps a stranded alien to repair his ship. In the second act, Kirby helps to defeat the evil overlord in on the alien’s home planet.

That’s all I’m explain about the story. You rarely find deep story lines in a Kirby game. From all the Kirby games I played, the story is just there. Yet, the twist at the end is nice. While I honestly saw it coming, I didn’t mind. The story is fun enough to play through. In my opinion, the story isn’t that memorable. It doesn’t bother me since the game has a lot more to offer than just the story. I found that the journey was more fun than the actual story.

The writing of the story was great. I’m so glad that they used text boxes in this game since I feel that’s how Kirby stories shine the most.

4 players

A moment of honesty here, I haven’t played this game with 4 players at once. But I have played this game with two players at once.

Together with my cousin, we have played this game a lot. This game is what I call a “sibling game.” The difficulty of this game is just right. It’s challenging for the younger players but it’s not too hard. Yet; it can be challenging to the older sibling if (s)he let’s his or her guard down.

Speaking about the difficulty, the last boss battle is rather brutal in my opinion. Since it’s mostly in a totally different gameplay style which I’m not an expert in. Then this game can become rather difficult.

In any case, the gameplay of this entry in the Kirby series is what you can expect from any other Kirby game. It’s a fun platformer where you can copy (some of) your enemies powers. The powers in this game are fun to use and every single one of them are useful. Apart from one, the sleeping one. Still as unuseful as ever.

In certain points of the game, you can receive a special powerup. This one transforms Kirby into a powerhouse. The way this powerup is used makes for some fun(ny) situations. But, that’s something I’m going to leave up to you guys and girls to discover.

Also, in each level, you can find some wheels. With those wheels, you can unlock power-up rooms. In these rooms, you can easily get any copy ability you want. On the top of those rooms, you have a doll where you can practice them.

With those wheels, you can also unlock challenges. In these challenges, you have to complete a course using one copy ability in a certain time.  These are fun to play since I love that kind of challenges.

Actually collecting the wheels can be rather challenging since some of them are very well hidden. Also, in some levels, you have a sort of bonus stage where you fight a boss at the end to receive two or more wheels. Those are really difficult and some of them, I wasn’t able to beat in few tries.

Since this is a Kirby game, I have to mention the mini-games. And man, they are a real blast to play. I have lost hours playing those with my niece. Mostly the ninja star throwing one is a real blast to play in my opinion. I had a lot of fun with it.

In any case, I think I prove my point that there is a lot of fun gameplay in this game. But I still have to talk about different aspects of this game so let’s do just that.

Kirby and more Kirby

So, first of all, the length of this game is perfect. This game has 7,5 worlds. Each world contains around 5 levels, with the final level being a boss.

The 8th world is actually a long level with the final boss of the game. It doesn’t have multiple levels. That’s why I count it as a half world.

In Kirby tradition, each world gets a funny name. And yes, most of them have to do with food.

The presentation of this game is one of the strong points of this game. I really love the art style in this game. It’s very bright and colorful, yet sometimes the game uses a way darker pallet to suit the story.

The animation is really top notch. I have no complaint about them. The world design and the animations are really well crafted. Combined with some amazing level design, this game is almost perfect.

The music in this game is really catchy. I wish I was able to buy the soundtrack somewhere since it’s that good in my opinion. But hey, I didn’t expect anything less from Hall Laboratory.

The controls are very responsive and I have nothing to complain about there. If you doubt about the controls, you can see them in the pause menu.

Up until now, it seems that I haven’t anything bad to say about this game. Well, there is one nitpick. That’s that the first player always leads. When the first player dies, the second player dies as well. That’s the only negative I have with this game.

It’s time to wrap this review up. Here comes the conclusion!

Conclusion

The bad:

-The first player dies -> Everybody dies.

The good:

+ Amazing presentation. (Visuals & animation)

+ Very nice controls.

+ You can play with up to 4 players.

+ While this game can be rather easy, some challenges can be challenging to veteran players.

+ Great level design. And it’s fun to play more than once through some levels.

+ …

Final thoughts:

If you are looking for an amazing Kirby game, look no further. This Kirby game is one of the best in the series. The gameplay returns to its roots (like in the first Kirby games) and it’s a blast to play.

I had so much fun playing this game with my family and friends that I would love to recommend it to every Nintendo fan.

When you like what you saw on the screenshots, give this game a shot! I also heard that this game came out on Wii U Virtual Console, so there is no excuse to not pick up this gem of a game. It’s released in the summer of 2015. So, go ahead and pick up this game. It’s totally worth it.

Score: 100/100