I haven’t played that one when it came out, because frankly I thought $20 was a bit high for something I really wasn’t sure about. But it recently went on special on Steam for $5, so I thought I’d take a gander and check it out. And at $5 it’s more than reasonable.

It got some pretty good reviews when it came out, so let’s see if it actually deserves all the high praise it has been getting.

Read on!

Developer: Frozenbyte, Inc
Publisher: SouthPeak Games
Date of Release: October 7th 2009
Platforms: PC, PS3 (PC version reviewed)

Genre: Side-Scrolling Platformer
Players: 1
Rated E for Everyone… though by the ESRB’s usual standards it would be a T normally… weird

Presentation
The graphics are pretty nice. It looks mystical, it’s flashy and… every area looks almost exactly the same, with the only differences being “Now you’re in a cave instead of outside!”. While there’s a few minor difference in every level, every place is basically the same. It’s not a really big problem, but it would be nice if there was variety in the visual design. And there’s only one enemy design, other than the mini-bosses, and it’s skeletons… yeah, just skeletons. So there’s not a lot of variety there either. The game looks okay, but it’s rather stale.

Sound-wise it’s not too bad, but stale again. The music is rather boring, and there’s not that many tracks. The voice acting is way over-acted. The rest of the sounds, such as sword strikes, arrows and skeletons appearing are good, and make it easier to follow the action. But overall the sound here is just there because it needs sound and… that’s it.

The story is barely worth mentioning, there’s no depth whatsoever. At first the three characters come together and are “combined” because of an artifact, and then they just go through various locations until they find another artifact that can separate them again. The ending is terrible as well. I was expecting a boss battle, but the death of the final enemy is done through a terrible cutscene… lame.

Gameplay
The game is basically a puzzle-platformer. You get control of 3 characters: the Wizard, the Thief and the Knight. Each of them have different powers. The Wizard can materialize blocks, planks and floating platforms, and he can use a form of telekinesis to move almost any movable objects: planks, blocks, platformers, just about anything. The Thief can shoot arrows (hurt enemies and giving momentum to movable objects), and has a hookshot that can attach to any wooden object, which you can use to haul yourself up to higher places or swing from platform to platform. The Warrior can slash his sword to attack enemies and break weak wooden planks, hold up his shield to block attacks, and swing his hammer to destroy certain obstacles and enemies. And each character can jump, just around the same height.

To properly progress through the game, you need to use all three of the characters to get through different obstacles that not all of them can go through. A platform is too high and there’s nothing to grapple to? Use the wizard to build platforms up to that place. There’s various types of puzzles, though most require summoning blocks with the Wizard, or use the Thief’s grappling hook. You have to dynamically switch between each character to get through every situation. That’s really cool. Kinda like Lost Vikings but a bit less unique.

An element here is that you find experience points, both through searching every nook and cranny of every level, and through defeating skeletons (or the very rare Goblin). Each time you get 50 Experience points, each character get one skill point. They can be put in any of each characters’ 3 skills (which can all be brought up to level 3), each time getting new capabilities or boosted power. Each character starts with only 1 skill, the rest are found through the game in treasure chests.

Speaking of treasure chests, multiple are found through the game in addition to experience points. They either have new skills, or equipment. The equipment can be given to any character, unless it’s a character-exclusive item. Equipment have various effects: boosted defense, more HP, better attack, automatic revival if your health goes to 0, and various other things. So you can kinda customize every character. The differences aren’t huge, but it can be helpful to have a little bit of extra HP or defense.

If I have one problem with the game, it’s the physics engine. Since most of the game’s puzzles are centered around the physics, they should work near perfectly. But I have seen tons of glitches with the physics. Enemies passing through floors, blocks sinking through solid surfaces, and the occasional “being sent flying through the air when jumping on an object that isn’t moving”. It’s not frequent, but there’s multiple parts where the physics engine just screws up at random, from time to time it makes your life harder.

Overall
This is quite a fun game. The platforming is good, some of the puzzles are really fun, having 3 characters to switch between on the fly is really cool, and it’s overall really fun to play.

The combat isn’t too good and the game is really short and easy, but it’s still quite worth playing.

I don’t feel the game deserves all the super-high reviews it got when it came out, but it’s still a high-quality game that people should check out.

Pros and Cons
Pros
- The gameplay and platforming is fun
- Having 3 different characters to play as adds lots of variety to the gameplay
- Some fun puzzles

Cons
- The physics are rather bad at some points
- The visual design isn’t too interesting
- The story and ending is lame
- Rather short

The Save Factor
The starting price of $20 is a bit too high. $10 would be a fine price.

jobocan Console, Games, PC, ps3, PSN, Review