- Joined
- Dec 29, 2000
- Posts
- 13,156
So this is due next week. It's for the Vita, and the demo is currently available.
The great thing about the demo is that it is following the trend set by other recent games where it saves your progress if you invest in the full release.
You get the entire first chapter in the demo, along with a special ally to unlock that is only available if you complete the demo.
Basic gist is that you play someone marked for execution by an evil sorcerer named Magusar. While laying in your prison awaiting death, you find an ancient book among the piles of bones. This book is a grotesque, living thing with a cover like burnt skin, an eyeball and a mouth full of sharp teeth. It talks to you and explains that it is a chronicle of Magusar's life tales, and that if you want to live, you have to read it, study its secrets, learn how to use magic from it and then maybe, MAYBE, you'll have a chance to survive.
The book tells you you can change its events somewhat (clearly to allow for multiple paths and replay value) as you play, and this will also dictate how the people you interact with during the reading will act towards you. So the pages aren't set in stone, but are meant to allow you to 'choose your own adventure' as you relive Magusar's life.
In the book, there is lore for the monsters, background for the world, a section where you can customize your character's look and dress and also equip and upgrade your spells and weapons.
When you start a chapter, it's essentially a monster hunt with a companion, a woman who will change her reactions based on how you act and the choices you make. You have to hunt down monsters and rogue wizards and either save or destroy their souls. The companion wants you to kill everything, but you can choose as you go. Saving souls increases your life and destroying them increases your power on a sort of 'by the stage' XP track.
I'm not really sure how it all works just yet, I'm still tooling around with the interface and I don't know how the saved/destroyed souls atually benefit you. I know you can attach elements to your spells and then sacrifice them to gain greater power at some cost. You can also upgrade your existing spells with the loot you acquire upon successful completion of a stage.
The stages are arenas with all kinds of obstacles and temporary power ups for you to grab as you go. The terrain is nice and varied, with plenty of objects to hamper your enemies and you while you go. This is a nice change of pace from the standard brawling fare where you run into an open area to fight stuff.
There is no area exploration. When you choose to enter a chapter, you are brought right to the zone where the fight will take place. There is an initial staging area and then you're in the fight.
Between stages, after you level up and count your loot, you return to your prison and you can interact with the book some more or read through the book again.
So far, the game has a really strong 'dark fantasy' tone, although not quite as bleak as Dark Souls. The book and the companion in game have dialogue and a fixed narrative so you don't have to put the pieces together as you go or intuit what's happening.
You can tell that Inafune took some shortcuts to trim away the fat (no exploration, the book as a portal right to the fighting, dialogue and exposition handled as book passages rather than as rendered cutscenes) and get the player right into the playing experience.
The game's pretty gorgeous to look at and sounds awesome, to boot.
So far, my one complaint is that the user support is a bit lacking. I'm still not sure how the souls affect my character or how to 'sacrifice' my souls to gain power. There is a tutorial but it's not exactly clear how it all works.
It's fun so far, though, and I think it will definitely be a worthy addition to the Vita library
The great thing about the demo is that it is following the trend set by other recent games where it saves your progress if you invest in the full release.
You get the entire first chapter in the demo, along with a special ally to unlock that is only available if you complete the demo.
Basic gist is that you play someone marked for execution by an evil sorcerer named Magusar. While laying in your prison awaiting death, you find an ancient book among the piles of bones. This book is a grotesque, living thing with a cover like burnt skin, an eyeball and a mouth full of sharp teeth. It talks to you and explains that it is a chronicle of Magusar's life tales, and that if you want to live, you have to read it, study its secrets, learn how to use magic from it and then maybe, MAYBE, you'll have a chance to survive.
The book tells you you can change its events somewhat (clearly to allow for multiple paths and replay value) as you play, and this will also dictate how the people you interact with during the reading will act towards you. So the pages aren't set in stone, but are meant to allow you to 'choose your own adventure' as you relive Magusar's life.
In the book, there is lore for the monsters, background for the world, a section where you can customize your character's look and dress and also equip and upgrade your spells and weapons.
When you start a chapter, it's essentially a monster hunt with a companion, a woman who will change her reactions based on how you act and the choices you make. You have to hunt down monsters and rogue wizards and either save or destroy their souls. The companion wants you to kill everything, but you can choose as you go. Saving souls increases your life and destroying them increases your power on a sort of 'by the stage' XP track.
I'm not really sure how it all works just yet, I'm still tooling around with the interface and I don't know how the saved/destroyed souls atually benefit you. I know you can attach elements to your spells and then sacrifice them to gain greater power at some cost. You can also upgrade your existing spells with the loot you acquire upon successful completion of a stage.
The stages are arenas with all kinds of obstacles and temporary power ups for you to grab as you go. The terrain is nice and varied, with plenty of objects to hamper your enemies and you while you go. This is a nice change of pace from the standard brawling fare where you run into an open area to fight stuff.
There is no area exploration. When you choose to enter a chapter, you are brought right to the zone where the fight will take place. There is an initial staging area and then you're in the fight.
Between stages, after you level up and count your loot, you return to your prison and you can interact with the book some more or read through the book again.
So far, the game has a really strong 'dark fantasy' tone, although not quite as bleak as Dark Souls. The book and the companion in game have dialogue and a fixed narrative so you don't have to put the pieces together as you go or intuit what's happening.
You can tell that Inafune took some shortcuts to trim away the fat (no exploration, the book as a portal right to the fighting, dialogue and exposition handled as book passages rather than as rendered cutscenes) and get the player right into the playing experience.
The game's pretty gorgeous to look at and sounds awesome, to boot.
So far, my one complaint is that the user support is a bit lacking. I'm still not sure how the souls affect my character or how to 'sacrifice' my souls to gain power. There is a tutorial but it's not exactly clear how it all works.
It's fun so far, though, and I think it will definitely be a worthy addition to the Vita library
