Price: $.99
Publisher: Big Blue Bubble
Buy now on
Let me preface this review with this statement: I have never been into or enjoyed Dungeons and Dragons, Magic the Gathering, or any other fantasy RPG. I did however read just about every Choose Your Own Adventure book when I was younger (my mom was a librarian).
Fighting Fantasy: Deathtrap Dungeon is an iPhone/iPod Touch game that consists of elements from both fantasy RPGs and Choose Your Own Adventure books. The game is just what the title states; a fantasy game where you try to escape a dungeon. The game play consists of reading a 'page' and making one of the predetermined choices. To make one of those choices you simply tap a link. Then, after a pretty cool transition of book pages turning, another page to read and another predetermined decision to make.
If you are first time player, which I was, you will need to read the game rules. This took me over 30 minutes. This includes me having to go back and reread some topics just so I could get a solid idea of what I was suppose to be doing. After you read countless pages of rules, you then set up your character's stamina, skill, and luck by rolling an on screen die. The dice roll is also how you fight adversaries throughout the dungeon. After you set up your character attributes you are ready to play! But first, you have to read the game's background story. Don't worry it doesn't take as long as it did to read the rules.
During the rule reading the creators suggest using a piece of paper to draw out the path you take because there is only ONE way out. And by drawing a map, you will help yourself not make the same mistake twice.
The graphics are pretty good considering the only motion in the entire game consists of the screen transition and rolling the dice. For this type of game the design, colors, and graphical themes are well done. The game starts out with a cool menacing song, but during game there is no background music, just sound fx of pages turning. Oh yeah - there's also music when you die. Get use to that music, you will hear it a lot.
Overall this game isn't for me. But like I first said, this genre of games in general has never caught my fancy.I should mention that at the $2.99 price point, this game is a tough sell no matter who you are. Wait for the inevitable price drop before jumping on this one. This game's is best for casual gamers that loves RPG elements within their Choose Your Own Adventure books. For all others, the difficulty, rule reading, and the role playing elements will likely be too slow and tedious.
Overall Value for it's $2.99 price point
Overall Value:
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Mostrando entradas con la etiqueta RPG. Mostrar todas las entradas
Mostrando entradas con la etiqueta RPG. Mostrar todas las entradas
jueves, 18 de febrero de 2010
viernes, 5 de febrero de 2010
Vanquish: Oath of Brothers Review
Price: $2.99
Publisher:Gamevil
Buy now on
In my time spent playing Vanquish: Oath of Brothers I have felt a wide range of emotions. At first I was bored, then I was interested and finally I ended up feeling somewhere in the middle. The game certainly has its strengths but has a few faults that counter balance them and keep it from being a classic. You play 1 of 3 characters in the story that takes place in the ancient Chinese empire (during the Han dynasty). In that role, you fight to the death over and over and over again. Gamevil calls this an action RPG and it does have elements of an RPG, but don't be fooled, this game is nearly all about the action.
The gameplay revolves around you riding on a horse through the countryside of China killing off whoever gets in your way. The game is divided into a number of levels that once you beat, you never return to. The actual gameplay is unusual because even though you are constantly moving forward (there is no way to stop entirely or go backward), you do have the interesting ability to slow or slightly turn your horse riding character left and right. This game is a side scroller so the ability to turn is intriguing.
On the left of the screen you have you d-pad control and on the right side your attack buttons. One button is your primary weapon, which you need to be ready to push a million times (literally). You will be killing 300-500 people in a single level and these things only take 5 minutes each at the most. The gameplay is really quick. In fact, it is really hard to see what you are doing on the screen at any one time. The problem is you aren’t just fighting foot soldiers. You are also fighting horse riding enemies and occasionally protecting a horse drawn carriage. Sometimes there are as many as 20-25 enemies on the screen at once including 5-10 horses. That is a lot of legs to see on a screen as small as an iDevice, making it extremely difficult to tell where you horse is, especially since the graphics can blend in.
The graphics in the game are interesting. They are hand drawn and sometimes quite beautiful, other times they end up looking drab and monotonous. In fact, when you start turning they can become very pixilated and truly look bad. It is worth mentioning that the blood you see upon killing your enemies flies everywhere and it is very satisfying to see. Especially after coming off playing Assassin's Creed 2 and seeing no blood at all. The music within the game is done well but unfortunately is not turned on throughout your playing time. While playing you simply hear the sound of your main weapon constantly coming up against your enemies which makes a clanging noise that gets old after a while.
The actual storyline within the game is done fairly well. It is truly one of the bright spots in the game. It makes sense, develops your character and even made me laugh several times (intentionally I think). It certainly feels that some time was spent on the story and that is a very good thing. None of what is said is done by voice actors, closed caption only here, but that doesn’t really detract from anything in this case.
The main issue with this game again comes down to the pace, which is much too fast in most cases. While there is a slider in the options menu to speed the game up or slow it down, it doesn't really seem to help too much. There are still a ton of enemies in every screen and finding yourself is still a difficult proposition. If they could have made your character stand out more I would have given much higher marks throughout.
One other thing that also needs mentioned is the difficulty level. It gets too difficult, too quick. I was going through the levels as the first character in the game and moving through them quite smoothly until I got to level 7 and tried to fight the boss character. That battle took ages for me to win and repeating the entire mission over and over again to get to that battle was not fun at all. Normally, you could "revive" yourself with a purple gem in the game and go right back into the battle against the boss character. In this instance, things had been so easy up to this point; I was using the purple gems to upgrade my character. When I died, I had no purple gems left to use and so I had to restart the entire mission over and over again. Not fun.
The upgrade system for your weapons and all of the additional powerups you can find/receive/buy can make the game quite a bit of fun. Each has its advantages and disadvantages and knowing when to buy an item (with one of the aforementioned purple gems) is an important thing to learn. Overall, this part of the game feels entirely right and is done quite well. You can even buy a better horse (which seems to make the game go even faster).
In summary, Vanquish: Oath of Brothers has a strong story, a great powerup/item system and an interesting use of controls and graphics. It also gives you several hours of gameplay. On the negative side its difficulty level raises too quickly, is extremely difficult to find your character in the mass of enemies surrounding you, and can become repetitive. As an action gamer, I think this game is worth your time. As a fan of RPG's, you might want to wait until Zenonia 2. This game is probably not going to be a good fit for you.
Overall Value for it's $2.99 price point
Overall Value:
Graphics:
Sound:
Controls:
Publisher:Gamevil
Buy now on
In my time spent playing Vanquish: Oath of Brothers I have felt a wide range of emotions. At first I was bored, then I was interested and finally I ended up feeling somewhere in the middle. The game certainly has its strengths but has a few faults that counter balance them and keep it from being a classic. You play 1 of 3 characters in the story that takes place in the ancient Chinese empire (during the Han dynasty). In that role, you fight to the death over and over and over again. Gamevil calls this an action RPG and it does have elements of an RPG, but don't be fooled, this game is nearly all about the action.
The gameplay revolves around you riding on a horse through the countryside of China killing off whoever gets in your way. The game is divided into a number of levels that once you beat, you never return to. The actual gameplay is unusual because even though you are constantly moving forward (there is no way to stop entirely or go backward), you do have the interesting ability to slow or slightly turn your horse riding character left and right. This game is a side scroller so the ability to turn is intriguing.
On the left of the screen you have you d-pad control and on the right side your attack buttons. One button is your primary weapon, which you need to be ready to push a million times (literally). You will be killing 300-500 people in a single level and these things only take 5 minutes each at the most. The gameplay is really quick. In fact, it is really hard to see what you are doing on the screen at any one time. The problem is you aren’t just fighting foot soldiers. You are also fighting horse riding enemies and occasionally protecting a horse drawn carriage. Sometimes there are as many as 20-25 enemies on the screen at once including 5-10 horses. That is a lot of legs to see on a screen as small as an iDevice, making it extremely difficult to tell where you horse is, especially since the graphics can blend in.
The graphics in the game are interesting. They are hand drawn and sometimes quite beautiful, other times they end up looking drab and monotonous. In fact, when you start turning they can become very pixilated and truly look bad. It is worth mentioning that the blood you see upon killing your enemies flies everywhere and it is very satisfying to see. Especially after coming off playing Assassin's Creed 2 and seeing no blood at all. The music within the game is done well but unfortunately is not turned on throughout your playing time. While playing you simply hear the sound of your main weapon constantly coming up against your enemies which makes a clanging noise that gets old after a while.
The actual storyline within the game is done fairly well. It is truly one of the bright spots in the game. It makes sense, develops your character and even made me laugh several times (intentionally I think). It certainly feels that some time was spent on the story and that is a very good thing. None of what is said is done by voice actors, closed caption only here, but that doesn’t really detract from anything in this case.
The main issue with this game again comes down to the pace, which is much too fast in most cases. While there is a slider in the options menu to speed the game up or slow it down, it doesn't really seem to help too much. There are still a ton of enemies in every screen and finding yourself is still a difficult proposition. If they could have made your character stand out more I would have given much higher marks throughout.
One other thing that also needs mentioned is the difficulty level. It gets too difficult, too quick. I was going through the levels as the first character in the game and moving through them quite smoothly until I got to level 7 and tried to fight the boss character. That battle took ages for me to win and repeating the entire mission over and over again to get to that battle was not fun at all. Normally, you could "revive" yourself with a purple gem in the game and go right back into the battle against the boss character. In this instance, things had been so easy up to this point; I was using the purple gems to upgrade my character. When I died, I had no purple gems left to use and so I had to restart the entire mission over and over again. Not fun.
The upgrade system for your weapons and all of the additional powerups you can find/receive/buy can make the game quite a bit of fun. Each has its advantages and disadvantages and knowing when to buy an item (with one of the aforementioned purple gems) is an important thing to learn. Overall, this part of the game feels entirely right and is done quite well. You can even buy a better horse (which seems to make the game go even faster).
In summary, Vanquish: Oath of Brothers has a strong story, a great powerup/item system and an interesting use of controls and graphics. It also gives you several hours of gameplay. On the negative side its difficulty level raises too quickly, is extremely difficult to find your character in the mass of enemies surrounding you, and can become repetitive. As an action gamer, I think this game is worth your time. As a fan of RPG's, you might want to wait until Zenonia 2. This game is probably not going to be a good fit for you.
Overall Value for it's $2.99 price point
Overall Value:
Graphics:
Sound:
Controls:
jueves, 7 de enero de 2010
The Chronicles of Inotia: A Wanderer of Luone Review
Price: $7.99
Publisher: Com2Us
Buy now on
The Chronicles of Inotia: A Wanderer of Luone is everything you would expect from a Korean based developer that makes RPG's. It has anime based characters, horrible storylines, bad translations and Diablo-esque gameplay. If that doesn't sound like fun to you then this probably isn't your game. If you don’t mind the above issues, the game certainly will give you hours of gameplay.
Let’s start by looking at the graphics which are actually pretty good. The animations aren't great but the actual characters themselves look pretty decent. I would almost compare them to my all time favorite Japanese based RPG, ChronoTrigger, but I can't quite make myself do it. ChronoTrigger is a much, much better game. Nevertheless, the character models aren't bad and one nice thing is the models actually change depending on what weapons/shield you are carrying. It's a nice touch and something I didn't expect. The scenery and the backgrounds are all standard faire but that doesn’t make them bad. For the most part, the graphics are clean and help the game.
The sound is very ordinary. The music is your typical midi style RPG music. The developers could learn a few lessons on how to build up suspense from the aforementioned SNES classic. One nice thing is the ability to use your own music catalog for the in-game music. What I decided to do was download the ChronoTrigger music into my iPhone and play them on repeat during the game. That worked pretty well and gave the game a more epic feel.
The controls are one of the weirdest things about this game. There are two control modes. A virtual d-pad which is what most games on the iPhone have been using and also a point and click control scheme. Basically you hit where you want to go on the screen and your character walks there. Neither is very good because the d-pad control tends to not pick up your movements and the point and click can get annoying because occasionally when you are trying to fight an enemy it won't pick up your tap to fight. You end up getting hit over and over again because your character won't do any fighting until you click on each enemy individually.
The gameplay of Inotia involves fighting enemies in real time. There are no cuts to a fight like you would find in a Final Fantasy game. All fights happen when you walk up to an enemy (or they walk up to you) and begin hitting each other as fast as you can. When your character "levels up" you are able to pick from several different special categories that will allow you to either hit an enemy harder or protect you better. You are not able to pick specific stats for your character to level up in. These special power ups have a regeneration time period that will allow you to use them again and again during battles after waiting a certain period of time.
Besides the fighting there are also quests that a player can do through the game. These quests are generally pretty bad. For example, an inn keeper says to get him 10 wolf pelts. Then after you bring them back he asks for you to bring him 10 more pelts of a different wolf. After that he asks you to bring him 10 fangs... you get the picture right? Boring level upping and quests do not make for an interesting RPG. The main storyline doesn't make any sense and isn’t really worth delving into.
It's not all bland; you do have the ability to bring additional party members along with you. These members can all have different abilities and you can level them up as you please. It's a nice touch for an iPhone based game. There is also a multiplayer component that allows you to do one on one battle with other user's characters that have been created and uploaded from the single player campaign. The characters you fight are user based but automated by the computer but the random fights make for some fun times. If nothing else, it adds a bit of variety to the game and allows you to unlock new items.
The Chronicles of Inotia: A Wanderer of Luone certainly does give you many hours of play time. It will likely take you at least 10 hours to go through the storyline and do the side quests, maybe more. For the price, that doesn't seem like such a bad deal. The unfortunate part is that this story was seemingly made for 10 year olds that play Pokemon Ruby (which is a better game by the way) and has no problem falling into the same old RPG pitfalls as many games before it. If you aren't looking for anything original and just want to hack and slash your way around a map for hours at a time, then this game is for you.
Overall Value for it's $7.99 price point
Overall Value:
Graphics:
Sound:
Controls:
Publisher: Com2Us
Buy now on
The Chronicles of Inotia: A Wanderer of Luone is everything you would expect from a Korean based developer that makes RPG's. It has anime based characters, horrible storylines, bad translations and Diablo-esque gameplay. If that doesn't sound like fun to you then this probably isn't your game. If you don’t mind the above issues, the game certainly will give you hours of gameplay.
Let’s start by looking at the graphics which are actually pretty good. The animations aren't great but the actual characters themselves look pretty decent. I would almost compare them to my all time favorite Japanese based RPG, ChronoTrigger, but I can't quite make myself do it. ChronoTrigger is a much, much better game. Nevertheless, the character models aren't bad and one nice thing is the models actually change depending on what weapons/shield you are carrying. It's a nice touch and something I didn't expect. The scenery and the backgrounds are all standard faire but that doesn’t make them bad. For the most part, the graphics are clean and help the game.
The sound is very ordinary. The music is your typical midi style RPG music. The developers could learn a few lessons on how to build up suspense from the aforementioned SNES classic. One nice thing is the ability to use your own music catalog for the in-game music. What I decided to do was download the ChronoTrigger music into my iPhone and play them on repeat during the game. That worked pretty well and gave the game a more epic feel.
The controls are one of the weirdest things about this game. There are two control modes. A virtual d-pad which is what most games on the iPhone have been using and also a point and click control scheme. Basically you hit where you want to go on the screen and your character walks there. Neither is very good because the d-pad control tends to not pick up your movements and the point and click can get annoying because occasionally when you are trying to fight an enemy it won't pick up your tap to fight. You end up getting hit over and over again because your character won't do any fighting until you click on each enemy individually.
The gameplay of Inotia involves fighting enemies in real time. There are no cuts to a fight like you would find in a Final Fantasy game. All fights happen when you walk up to an enemy (or they walk up to you) and begin hitting each other as fast as you can. When your character "levels up" you are able to pick from several different special categories that will allow you to either hit an enemy harder or protect you better. You are not able to pick specific stats for your character to level up in. These special power ups have a regeneration time period that will allow you to use them again and again during battles after waiting a certain period of time.
Besides the fighting there are also quests that a player can do through the game. These quests are generally pretty bad. For example, an inn keeper says to get him 10 wolf pelts. Then after you bring them back he asks for you to bring him 10 more pelts of a different wolf. After that he asks you to bring him 10 fangs... you get the picture right? Boring level upping and quests do not make for an interesting RPG. The main storyline doesn't make any sense and isn’t really worth delving into.
It's not all bland; you do have the ability to bring additional party members along with you. These members can all have different abilities and you can level them up as you please. It's a nice touch for an iPhone based game. There is also a multiplayer component that allows you to do one on one battle with other user's characters that have been created and uploaded from the single player campaign. The characters you fight are user based but automated by the computer but the random fights make for some fun times. If nothing else, it adds a bit of variety to the game and allows you to unlock new items.
The Chronicles of Inotia: A Wanderer of Luone certainly does give you many hours of play time. It will likely take you at least 10 hours to go through the storyline and do the side quests, maybe more. For the price, that doesn't seem like such a bad deal. The unfortunate part is that this story was seemingly made for 10 year olds that play Pokemon Ruby (which is a better game by the way) and has no problem falling into the same old RPG pitfalls as many games before it. If you aren't looking for anything original and just want to hack and slash your way around a map for hours at a time, then this game is for you.
Overall Value for it's $7.99 price point
Overall Value:
Graphics:
Sound:
Controls:
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