Added: 28.07.2015 23:14 | 26 views | 0 comments

Nostalgia may help attract an audience for the new series of King’s Quest games, but you don’t need to have any affection for the glory days of Sierra On-Line to appreciate the fantastic first chapter in this renewed saga. Developer The Odd Gentlemen has absolutely nailed the fairy-tale spirit of the original franchise in A Knight to Remember, the first of five planned chapters. This is more than just a walk down memory lane, however, as Roberta Williams’ iconic creation has been reimagined for modern sensibilities. Old-time fans might find it tough to deal with some of the changes here, but the new approach livens up a series that has been mothballed since Bill Clinton was in the White House, and it certainly doesn’t shy away from offering up grueling puzzles that would have been tough to crack even back in the day.

Speaking as a member of the original Sierra adventure generation and someone whose very first PC games were , I really enjoy the way that A Knight to Remember looks back as well as looks forward. The story reboots the original epic while avoiding starting completely from scratch. While the protagonist is still Graham, king of the fantasy realm of Daventry, this version of the character is a grizzled monarch brought to life by actor Christopher Lloyd. The storyline of the whole series will actually skip over the original King’s Quest games to focus on Graham before he became heir to the throne, framing the adventures in each chapter as the recollections of the elderly king telling stories of his youthful exploits to his granddaughter Gwendolyn.

This narrative device does a fantastic job of setting everything up, respecting the original King’s Quest stories (even if some of the finer details have been retconned) while also allowing Lloyd to serve as an old raconteur spinning these tales with accompanying puns and hints. Anyone who loves Lloyd (and who doesn’t? he’s Doc Brown, people!) will immediately warm to his presence, which immediately makes the game more likable. The specific story being recounted here goes back to the beginning of it all, with the future ruler arriving in Daventry as a wanderer seeking fame and fortune in a pageant being held to name a new knight to King Edward’s court.

Just as this story mixes old and new, so does the game style, which is a cross between modern episodic adventures set on a linear path and old-fashioned adventures that force players to do a lot of exploring and sleuthing. Both design styles are well represented here, too, with neither being short-changed. So while there are a lot of button-mashing action sequences (the game is equally at home with a gamepad or a keyboard-and-mouse control setup), the majority of play focuses on gathering items, carefully examining the scenery, talking to anyone and everyone, and completing many deeply traditional adventure-game quests. There is even a dash of role-playing here, courtesy of occasional choices that need to be made between the three approaches of bravery, wisdom, and compassion (which very loosely equate to the old fantasy warrior, mage, and cleric archetypes).

This means that A Knight to Remember really does offer the best of both worlds. I thought the game hit a nearly perfect balance between arcade action with button-pressing brawls and wandering around trying to solve various puzzles to bypass obstacles and move the plot forward. Nothing here was particularly easy. This isn’t a Telltale-styled episode where you can breeze through it over a (admittedly long) lunch break. I spent a good eight hours here, having an extremely tough time with both some of the arcade challenges (the rope fight with Sir Cumference toward the end of the game drove me insane, and the closing chess duel wasn’t much easier on me) and the puzzles (which at times lived up to the infamous Sierra reputation for inscrutability).

For all of its newness, the game is actually a little too traditional at times. Some of the problems require leaps in logic, and the overall organization of the final section of the game leaves something to be desired due to a lack of structure. After following a pretty linear path through the opening couple of hours, the game then opens up to a fairly huge area loaded with clues and objects and screens to explore. As a result, I felt somewhat lost, especially given that there were few if any suggestions as to which order I should have been taking to deal with all of these options.

Even when I was frustrated, it was a good kind of frustrated. I always felt that I was moving forward, however slowly. And any sort of aggravation was always mitigated by the incredible charm of this heroic fantasy. A Knight to Remember has been adroitly scripted to mirror the whimsical nature of the original games, which were more like a little girl’s fairy tales than anything out of D&D. This is reflected in the light-hearted sense of humor maintained throughout, where even the villains aren’t really so much bad guys as they are misunderstood buffoons. This is even seen in the reactions to young Graham dying, which is often rewound almost immediately by old Graham serving as the narrator, who immediately says something like he must have misremembered things. Of course he didn’t die horribly—after all, he’s sitting in bed telling this story to his granddaughter, isn’t he?

Visuals and sound build this atmosphere even farther. The graphics have been smartly crafted to resemble a slightly unrealistic animated movie. All of the usual comic-book tropes are presented, from heroes with big blue eyes to hulking enemies who tower over the good guys to vaguely anthropomorphic animals. Almost everything here has been well calculated to bring a smile to your face. Audio also hits a Hollywood tone. As already noted, the dialogue is simply stellar and the voice acting even better, led by Lloyd but also bolstered by a cast of unknowns who ably handle the range of heroes and villains. Even heroes and villains who could have--even should have--devolved into cornball stereotypes impossible for the best voice-acting to save, like an outrageously French-accented bridge troll, are somehow rescued and made into believable characters. The score perfectly accompanies the action, and the music here would not seem out of place on a big budget movie production, with lilts and accents to play up everything taking place in the game.

Like the old saying goes--the king is dead, long live the king. Even though A Knight to Remember is not the King’s Quest of yesterday, this first episode in a new franchise ensures that the heart of the original series will live on for the current generation of adventure gamers. Bring on the new exploits of King Graham.

Added: 28.07.2015 22:55 | 21 views | 0 comments

Lost Dimension masquerades as an average, everyday JRPG. Spiky anime hair, teenage angst, and crater-inducing special attacks abound, but this turn-based quest to prevent global genocide manages to successfully pair the expected with the aberrant. The tactical combat and deep pool of weapons, armor, and abilities are robust enough to stand on their own, but there’s a twist. Within your 11-person troupe lives a traitor, and knowing of this mole’s existence but not his or her identity forces you to tackle otherwise straightforward situations in unique ways--altering who you take into battle and how you interpret one-on-one conversations. Should you trust the doctor with a checkered medical practice history? Is the lavender-haired vixen with her admittedly fake accent out to get you, or is it the shotgun-toting knucklehead you can only pray remembered to leave the safety on? What could have amounted to a throwaway gimmick is instead used to enrich both combat and story, and while the elimination of party members devalues some character progression, Lost Dimension pulls off its bold gamble.

The cast can be comically bizarre, but the story itself is both bleak and highly self-serious. In the near future, the fate of the world is threatened by the pale, moody villain all-too conveniently named The End. This archetypical evildoer rides in on a massive structure from another dimension called the Pillar and wipes out a significant percentage of the population to show that, despite the red-frosted tips in his hair, he means business.

To combat this threat, the UN sends a special task force wielding psychic gifts to reach the top of the Pillar, battle The End, and save humanity. Codenamed “SEALED,” this peculiar group is little more than a mishmash of colorful strangers with foggy memories. Bonds between each member and the protagonist, Sho, need to be built from the ground up, but working against that process is The End’s declaration that a traitor is present among the group. Before advancing from floor to floor of the tower, your team must vote to not only oust this fraud but also sentence him or her to death. Each subsequent floor establishes a new traitor, and the identity of the turncoat is determined by your interactions with each of the characters along the way.

Like in any good relationship, building trust takes time and effort--and Lost Dimension makes that a surprisingly enjoyable task. Without knowing anyone’s background, you quickly pick favorites and identify people you don’t feel too comfortable watching your back. Continuing to chat and adventure with a specific comrade improves camaraderie between your two characters, and beyond the social benefits, this often leads to more assistance in battle. It’s important to vary whom you bring into skirmishes, too, because Sho can hear the thoughts of those he fights alongside and note whether or not they seem suspicious. By switching different members in and out of your lineup and keeping track of these guarded thoughts, you can more easily narrow down your search.

This unique system forces you to care about otherwise irrelevant dialogue and experiment with different combat concoctions. The identity of the first traitor becomes clear before you’re asked to cast your vote, but from then on, you’re often wracking your brain over the choice. You accumulate Vision Points that can be used to dive deep into the psyche of any party member you’ve battled alongside to out the traitor, but if you use up three vision points only to discover three clear consciences, you and your team are left taking a shot in the dark when asked to vote someone off the island.

The combat variation that comes with having 11 stylistically distinctive party members is both vast and delightful, even as your numbers dwindle over time. Any six members can be taken into a mission and moved within a restricted circle to perform group attacks, flank enemies, pick up items, or hit switches to open gates. You can both move and attack in a given turn, and because you’re often outnumbered, it’s critical to partner up with members of your team with whom you’ve become friendly to coordinate assisted assaults. Guns, blades, and magical gifts can all be used to clean out a given location, but even highly leveled and well-equipped SEALED members can be easily dropped when isolated.

Boosting stats and abilities is exceedingly rewarding, and Lost Dimension provides a healthy suite of techniques to learn. A character with basic fire-based Gifts can eventually learn area-of-effect attacks, abilities that drastically reduce enemy stats, or even devastating special moves that might smite a target in a single blow. It can be frustrating to build up an individual character only to learn that he or she is a traitor, but even fallen soldiers leave behind items that can be used to unlock even more powerful Gifts for those who are still standing.

What Gifts you unlock and whether you decide to invest more heavily in defense or offense can make the difference between earning the top S rank and limping to the finish line with just one of your six characters standing. Once you get a handle on the battle system--how to attack without constantly getting countered, maintaining your Sanity meter so you don’t lose control of a character, and taking out specific enemies to complete missions in a hurry--Lost Dimension becomes a smooth operation. However, the stuttering framerate muddies an otherwise even experience. Even the most basic attack animations can make combat sequences chug, and the dull, insipid environments and unspectacular visuals make for a game that rarely looks as good as it plays.

What’s also uneven is the difficulty. Even if you keep up with the side missions and special character quests, some battles ambush you with a disheartening level of difficulty. The final battle is the biggest culprit, forcing you to grind out old missions over and over again to even stand a chance at victory. It’s not enough to sully the otherwise rewarding combat, but Lost Dimension’s sporadic degree of challenge can make hours of leveling up and character building feel moot.

Dialogue suffers from having far too many cooks in the kitchen, and it feels like whoever was writing the lines was forced to include a quip from each of the 11 characters for every single occasion. What’s actually said is almost never more profound than “Who could the traitor be?!” The one-on-one chats are much teresting and actually reveal valuable information about a given personality, but watching the camera swing from character to character during the story only to hear empty, repetitive lines is wearing.

Sure, Lost Dimension is another RPG in which a group of teens need to save the world from a maniacal villain with wonderful hair, but Lost Dimension thinks outside that box just enough to feel new. The goofy characters, rewarding progression system, and tactical combat supersede the stunted dialogue and inconsistent framerate, and while the difficulty can be a bit overwhelming, the mechanics are fun and fresh enough to temper most frustration. What really brings it all to life, though, is the suspense that comes from never quite knowing who to trust, which keeps you wary of much more than just the enemies on the periphery. This is a JRPG layered atop a tactical strategy game layered atop a murder mystery, and somehow, the resulting structure holds up reasonably well.

Added: 28.07.2015 22:55 | 68 views | 0 comments

Lost Dimension masquerades as an average, everyday JRPG. Spiky anime hair, teenage angst, and crater-inducing special attacks abound, but this turn-based quest to prevent global genocide manages to successfully pair the expected with the aberrant. The tactical combat and deep pool of weapons, armor, and abilities are robust enough to stand on their own, but there’s a twist. Within your 11-person troupe lives a traitor, and knowing of this mole’s existence but not his or her identity forces you to tackle otherwise straightforward situations in unique ways--altering who you take into battle and how you interpret one-on-one conversations. Should you trust the doctor with a checkered medical practice history? Is the lavender-haired vixen with her admittedly fake accent out to get you, or is it the shotgun-toting knucklehead you can only pray remembered to leave the safety on? What could have amounted to a throwaway gimmick is instead used to enrich both combat and story, and while the elimination of party members devalues some character progression, Lost Dimension pulls off its bold gamble.

The cast can be comically bizarre, but the story itself is both bleak and highly self-serious. In the near future, the fate of the world is threatened by the pale, moody villain all-too conveniently named The End. This archetypical evildoer rides in on a massive structure from another dimension called the Pillar and wipes out a significant percentage of the population to show that, despite the red-frosted tips in his hair, he means business.

To combat this threat, the UN sends a special task force wielding psychic gifts to reach the top of the Pillar, battle The End, and save humanity. Codenamed “SEALED,” this peculiar group is little more than a mishmash of colorful strangers with foggy memories. Bonds between each member and the protagonist, Sho, need to be built from the ground up, but working against that process is The End’s declaration that a traitor is present among the group. Before advancing from floor to floor of the tower, your team must vote to not only oust this fraud but also sentence him or her to death. Each subsequent floor establishes a new traitor, and the identity of the turncoat is determined by your interactions with each of the characters along the way.

Like in any good relationship, building trust takes time and effort--and Lost Dimension makes that a surprisingly enjoyable task. Without knowing anyone’s background, you quickly pick favorites and identify people you don’t feel too comfortable watching your back. Continuing to chat and adventure with a specific comrade improves camaraderie between your two characters, and beyond the social benefits, this often leads to more assistance in battle. It’s important to vary whom you bring into skirmishes, too, because Sho can hear the thoughts of those he fights alongside and note whether or not they seem suspicious. By switching different members in and out of your lineup and keeping track of these guarded thoughts, you can more easily narrow down your search.

This unique system forces you to care about otherwise irrelevant dialogue and experiment with different combat concoctions. The identity of the first traitor becomes clear before you’re asked to cast your vote, but from then on, you’re often wracking your brain over the choice. You accumulate Vision Points that can be used to dive deep into the psyche of any party member you’ve battled alongside to out the traitor, but if you use up three vision points only to discover three clear consciences, you and your team are left taking a shot in the dark when asked to vote someone off the island.

The combat variation that comes with having 11 stylistically distinctive party members is both vast and delightful, even as your numbers dwindle over time. Any six members can be taken into a mission and moved within a restricted circle to perform group attacks, flank enemies, pick up items, or hit switches to open gates. You can both move and attack in a given turn, and because you’re often outnumbered, it’s critical to partner up with members of your team with whom you’ve become friendly to coordinate assisted assaults. Guns, blades, and magical gifts can all be used to clean out a given location, but even highly leveled and well-equipped SEALED members can be easily dropped when isolated.

Boosting stats and abilities is exceedingly rewarding, and Lost Dimension provides a healthy suite of techniques to learn. A character with basic fire-based Gifts can eventually learn area-of-effect attacks, abilities that drastically reduce enemy stats, or even devastating special moves that might smite a target in a single blow. It can be frustrating to build up an individual character only to learn that he or she is a traitor, but even fallen soldiers leave behind items that can be used to unlock even more powerful Gifts for those who are still standing.

What Gifts you unlock and whether you decide to invest more heavily in defense or offense can make the difference between earning the top S rank and limping to the finish line with just one of your six characters standing. Once you get a handle on the battle system--how to attack without constantly getting countered, maintaining your Sanity meter so you don’t lose control of a character, and taking out specific enemies to complete missions in a hurry--Lost Dimension becomes a smooth operation. However, the stuttering framerate muddies an otherwise even experience. Even the most basic attack animations can make combat sequences chug, and the dull, insipid environments and unspectacular visuals make for a game that rarely looks as good as it plays.

What’s also uneven is the difficulty. Even if you keep up with the side missions and special character quests, some battles ambush you with a disheartening level of difficulty. The final battle is the biggest culprit, forcing you to grind out old missions over and over again to even stand a chance at victory. It’s not enough to sully the otherwise rewarding combat, but Lost Dimension’s sporadic degree of challenge can make hours of leveling up and character building feel moot.

Dialogue suffers from having far too many cooks in the kitchen, and it feels like whoever was writing the lines was forced to include a quip from each of the 11 characters for every single occasion. What’s actually said is almost never more profound than “Who could the traitor be?!” The one-on-one chats are much teresting and actually reveal valuable information about a given personality, but watching the camera swing from character to character during the story only to hear empty, repetitive lines is wearing.

Sure, Lost Dimension is another RPG in which a group of teens need to save the world from a maniacal villain with wonderful hair, but Lost Dimension thinks outside that box just enough to feel new. The goofy characters, rewarding progression system, and tactical combat supersede the stunted dialogue and inconsistent framerate, and while the difficulty can be a bit overwhelming, the mechanics are fun and fresh enough to temper most frustration. What really brings it all to life, though, is the suspense that comes from never quite knowing who to trust, which keeps you wary of much more than just the enemies on the periphery. This is a JRPG layered atop a tactical strategy game layered atop a murder mystery, and somehow, the resulting structure holds up reasonably well.