iPhone Article Zone

Final Fantasy

It doesn’t get much more classic than the original Final Fantasy game. First conceived as Square’s last (i.e., “final) game, they planned to make it a great one…but Final Fantasy ended up doing much more than saving them from bankruptcy. Released in Japan for the NES in 1987, Final Fantasy has since spawned a massive series of spin-offs, sequels, and remakes. Some years back, Square Enix created remakes of the original two games for the PSP.

Now, Square Enix has ported those PSP versions of Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy II to the iPhone. The translation is a mostly smooth one, and the games are chock-full of nostalgia. If you’re not a dedicated fan of the series, however, you’ll want to think about this purchase—Final Fantasy might have been revolutionary at the time, but it hasn’t aged perfectly. That’s not to say that it’s a bad game—it’s not—but this is a decidedly old-fashioned RPG. If that appeals to you, well, read on!

The Port
I suspect that many of you already know if you like Final Fantasy or not, and are more concerned with the quality of the port itself. Thankfully, this seems to be pretty solid. First and foremost among the iPhone-sensitive features: auto-save! Get interrupted, close the app at any time…Final Fantasy will save your progress, so long as you’re not in battle. It’s a godsend, and makes the game great for pick-up-and-play.

When you’re travelling, a large, translucent D-pad takes residence in the bottom-left of the screen. It takes some getting used to and obscures the screen a bit too much, but you soon learn to deal with it. The bottom-right contains either a “dash”/action button, or a mini-box with your party’s info, depending on if you’re in a town or similar environment, or the world map. Tapping the mini-box brings up the menu, allowing you to do things like equip weapons or use items. (In a town-like environment, you let go of the D-pad to summon the mini-box instead of the dash button.)

The interface is a bit clunky, but it’s still workable. I do wish the menu text was larger. One minor shift is that in battle, you chose from a series of icons rather than text-based menu options. I suppose that’s supposed to compensate for our fat thumbs.

As for the game itself, almost everything is the same, except for the drastically reduced difficulty compared to the original release. The additional “Soul of Chaos” and “Labyrinth of Time” dungeons are also included. So, overall: the port is well done. It’s not perfect, but nor does it interfere with the experience, unless you want to suffer through the old version’s unforgiving nature. (There’s a Wii VC port for that, I believe!) I’d worry about the battery drain if anything…long RPG sessions aren’t suited to mobile gaming, though Final Fantasy doesn’t seem to be a huge battery hog.

The Game Itself
Final Fantasy is definitely a game of its era. When the game opens, you chose your four party members and assign them classes. You have six to chose from: Black Mage, White Mage, Red Mage, Fighter, Thief, and Monk. The black and white mages are pretty straightforward magic powerhouses, while the fighter, thief, and monk all focus on physical attributes; the red mage is a bit of a hybrid. Once you’ve created your party, it’s time to save the world.

The plot might have been revolutionary when Final Fantasy was released, but its age shows now. Your four Light Warriors must face dungeons and forests, pirates and witches, evil Elemental Fiends and eventually Chaos himself. And guess what? It’s all been prophesied. There’s no characterization, and while the storyline is epic in the true sense of the word, it’s obviously a vehicle for advancing the game.

Battle consists of mostly random encounters, which take place on the (enormous) world map. It’s a very simple affair. You never need to do anything more than chose a monster to target and pick between attacking and using magic. Unfortunately, the need to tap once on the Attack icon and once on the target monster slows the otherwise fast battle mechanic down, but it’s still the same simple, turn-based affair that old RPGs are known for.

Actually, “old RPG” is really the only way to describe this game. The graphics, though updated, still have a definite retro feel; strategy takes a backseat, and you spend a lot of time in random encounters. The world is wide open, and despite the linear plot, it’s easy to get lost in it. (Fancy things like “quest logs” don’t have a place here!) If it’s old-school you want, here’s the game to get. It’s worth mentioning that the difficulty is radically different from the original release; the ability to save anywhere is a godsend, and levelling up takes much less time. Random encounters have also been reduced, and it seems to be an easier ride on the whole. That’s fine with me: the iPhone is a mobile platform, after all.

The Final Verdict
So, what can you expect from this port? Final Fantasy is a prime example of old-school gaming, so if you’re not willing to invest time in grinding and wandering around, you won’t enjoy it. But Final Fantasy is still a classic experience that can be enjoyed even by those who have never touched the series before. Despite its lack of modern bells and whistles, it’s is a solid port of a piece of history, and it exemplifies what RPGs used to be. If you like classic gaming at all—or if you’re simply interested in starting—this Final Fantasy port should satisfy.

Fighting Fantasy: Deathtrap Dungeon. The Second In A Series Of Interactive Book Offerings from Big Blue Bubble

Ever played one of those fantasy-based board games? If so, you’ll probably like this. It’s not often you come across a truly unique concept for an iPhone app, but these digitally interactive RPG books from Big Blue Bubble definitely caught my eye today. Starting off with Fighting Fantasy: The Warlock of Firetop Mountain, and announcing today the release of the second in the series, Fighting Fantasy: Deathtrap Dungeon, Big Blue Bubble have launched an interactive book-like experience which is sure to delight fans of the modern fantasy genre.

Described by the studio as part book part game, and based on the 1982 fictional genius of Steve Jackson (and later Ian Livingstone), this interactive series takes the player down in the dark twisting labyrinth of Fang, where unknown horrors await you. Devised by the devilish mind of Baron Sukumvit, the labyrinth is riddled with fiendish traps and bloodthirsty monsters, which will test your skills almost beyond the limit of endurance. Countless adventurers before you have taken up the challenge of the Trial of Champions and walked through the carved mouth of the labyrinth, never to be seen again. Should you come out of the labyrinth alive, you will be wealthy beyond your dreams.

The game’s features are listed as follows:

• Tap the on screen buttons to flip pages (No papercuts!)
• Shake to roll the 3D dice using the accelerometer
• Inventory items selectable via touch-screen
• Game-save feature allows you to retrace your steps
• Includes both original illustrations by Ian McCaig and digitally re-mastered versions
• Integrated iPod music library access

There are three more books to come in the series. These include; Citadel of Chaos, Creatue of Havok and City of Thieves, although no release date has been disclosed yet.

Fighting Fantasy: Deathtrap Dungeon

Category: Games / Adventure
Released: 2010-02-10
Price: $2.99

Fighting Fantasy: The Warlock of Firetop Mountain

Category: Games / Role Playing
Released: 2010-01-03
Price: $2.99

Vanquish: The Oath of Brothers

Vanquish: The Oath of Brothers is a stylish hack-and-slash adventure, and Gamevil’s latest US release. Demolishing soldiers from horseback is a swift, fun experience, which is no surprise—I’ve always been a fan of combat in Gamevil games. The ink-style graphics are also a nice departure from run-of-the-mill cartoons. It’s a shame that autosave is entirely absent and that the game is so repetitive, because Vanquish is a lot of fun.

The game draws its story from the Three Kingdoms period of China. The basic premise is that three warlords once swore an “oath of brotherhood” to each other, and now the main character, Ghuan Yu, must lead his “brother’s” wives to safety. There is great potential for an epic, historically sound storyline here, but the bland dialogue leaves much to be desired. The only times you have to pay attention are when a strategic decision must be made, and then it’s easy to determine the other characters’ intentions. Thankfully, there’s more to Vanquish than its mediocre storyline, and the dialogue is easy to skip through.

Vanquish truly shines once you get into combat mode. It plays like a typical hack-and-slash, but with a good dose of flair. As Ghuan Yu, you must defend the wives’ carriage from the enemy armies, which attack in waves. The story is divided into stages (10 for Ghuan Yu, and 4 apiece for the warlords you unlock later). At the end of each wave, one of the enemy generals will show up, and defeating him ends the wave.

What makes Vanquish so much fun is the way in which you attack. There’s a basic slash as well as a “dash” that sends Ghuan Yu charging through a line of enemies. You can also press and hold on the basic slash button until the power meter turns red, thereby unleashing a storm of energy upon your opponents with the “Royal Flight” attack. Items like a lightning attack can also be equipped. There’s just a great sense of constant action and speed, and being on horseback just makes it better. Light RPG elements are also included in the form of being able to upgrade your horse and equip different weapons, but for the most part it’s a straightforward gallop to the end.

Vanquish is very proud of its graphics. The art is based on traditional ink and wash paintings, though you won’t see much of that beyond the conceptual pieces. In-game, everything is much sharper, with ragged edges and a pixelated style. Whether or not you like this look is a matter of personal preference, though I beseech you to look at the video; the still images don’t do it justice. What’s really stellar is the balance of monochromatic elements against small bursts of color. The colorful wisps of your victims’ souls and the dark-red flashes of blood become much crisper as a result, and the effect is really neat.

What I don’t like about the graphics is the strange parallax effect used to create a psuedo-3D environment. The joystick that controls your movement speeds and slows your horse as well as moving him up and down on the field, but the attempted use of sorta-kinda-3D means that the depth of field changes. This looks great, but makes for some awkward issues when you’re “zoomed out”—it’s hard to tell if you’re really hitting the soldiers, or just striking empty air.

That’s a minor gripe compared to my two major problems with the game, however. First and foremost is that autosave doesn’t exist. At all. And, more importantly, each level can take up to ten minutes to beat. With no way to save mid-level, even in the app itself, Vanquish’s potential as a pick-up-and-play game is completely demolished. This is the iPhone, not a dedicated gaming device, and we need fast ways to save our games. Secondly, the levels are simply too repetitive. Hack-and-slash is fun, but it won’t last you forever…especially with a mediocre storyline. With little variation between levels, there’s not much content here, and even less replay value.

Vanquish is a fun jaunt through a war-torn ancient China, and I’ll be the first to say that mowing down lines of soldiers is rather thrilling. But without more depth or a decent storyline, Vanquish remains a simple hack-and-slash. And who knows? That might be exactly what you want. Personally, I prefer more variety. At $2.99 Vanquish is an affordable, action-packed experience that’s still worth playing through…albeit one without autosave. There’s one feature you might want to wait for!

Sword & Poker

RPGs and card games? It’s an interesting combination to be sure, but Sword & Poker is a great bite-sized strategy game. The concept is simple enough to make it easy to pick up and the RPG elements aren’t overpowering, but the resulting game requires plenty of strategy. As you duel monsters and progress through the dungeon, it’s easy to forget how much time has passed. This quirky title is definitely a must-have strategy game.

In the world of Sword & Poker, the “Lord of Chaos” has captured the “Stone of Creation” and has formed a gigantic dungeon to protect himself. You, the hero, have to get the stone back—using the power of cards. The dungeon is divided into floors, and monsters block your path on each. It’s up to you to kill them…by playing poker. The premise is definitely frivolous and the plot is rarely touched upon, but the game itself is the centerpiece here.

You play Sword & Poker on a 5×5 grid, with an initial nine cards placed on the board. You and your opponent each have four cards, and two of your cards are always visible to your opponent. Each turn, you place two cards on the grid to form a five-card “poker hand.” Each hand deals a different amount of damage. (A flush is a lot better than a single pair!) Playing against the opponent means that you’ll need to use some extra strategy, however; you don’t want to leave a flush waiting for him! It’s a lot like Puzzle Quest in that respect.

As you progress through the game, you unlock more abilities and twists that pile on still more strategy. The most important is the ability to purchase different weapons. While your basic bronze sword deals damage in a logical succession, other weapons have strengths and weaknesses, favoring certain hands over others. Other will have effects that kick in if you play a certain hand—for example, equal points may be awarded for two-pair and three of a kind, but the latter will paralyze your opponent. Throw in shields and a magic system, and the game evolves even more. And that’s just the stuff inside the individual battles. Outside of battle, you’ll have to ration your “charge coins,” which can be used for healing or redeemed for extra points at the end of a level (you usually get only one or two) as well as chose which path to take: is the treasure worth facing this monster for? The result is a strategy game that’s insanely addicting and easy to learn while providing you with a good amount of challenge. There’s also a local multiplayer option, which is great—too few games have local multiplayer, and it works wonderfully in Sword & Poker.

As for the art and sound, Sword & Poker is solid in this area, too. The cartoonish graphics manage to be cute-ish without being nauseating, and the whole game has an air of humor to it. The background music is stereotypically epic and precisely what you’d expect from a title like this; while it can get repetitive, I still found it enjoyable.

Sword & Poker does have a few irritating quirks that need to be addressed. There’s no way to access multiplayer once you’re playing the normal game, unless you want to restart the app—hello, there, wonky menu system! Also, you can only have a single save file, with no obvious method of restarting your character. A few weird translation bugs are present in the help files, and it looks as though once the game ends your only option is to grind through until you earn the best sword & shield combo…at which point you can beat pretty much any monster. I’d like to see a “free-play” mode filled with random monsters that limits your strength, as well as more content.

Still, there’s a lot to enjoy in Sword & Poker. The gameplay is addicting and even with a clear end to the game, it’ll take you some hours to finish. Everything is well-balanced, and the evolution of the game as you progress just makes it better. The mash-up of two very disparate genres leads to a surprisingly entertaining game. If you like strategy games at all, Sword & Poker is a steal. Be sure to grab it before the price goes up!

Vanquish: The Oath of Brothers Trailer

It’s not surprising that Gamevil, makers of the Zenonia and Hybrid: Eternal Whisper series, would have another action RPG up their sleeve. What is eye-catching, however, is the art style of their new title, Vanquish: The Oath of Brothers. Billed as an “Artisitc Action RPG”, Vanquish features striking ink and wash painting graphics.

An initial teaser trailer of the game was released, and the presentation is indeed very stylish. Not much of the game itself can be seen, except for a brief glimpse of side-scrolling fighting on horseback. You can view the trailer below…

Along with the new trailer, Gamevil has put out a call for 25 beta testers. Anyone interested can apply on the Gamevil website. All submissions must be received before midnight January 17th.

Yipe 5

Yipe 5 is a simple old-school RPG that has quickly won my heart with its quirky sense of humor. It doesn’t have complicated skill trees or require too much strategy—indeed, you’ll spend most of this game grinding, and basic features like world maps are notably absent. Its incredible simplicity can be a feature or a flaw, depending on your tastes, but there’s no disputing the humor packed into every aspect of this game. Many mainstream gamers will be quickly bored, but others will love it. No loading screens, tiny penalties for dieing, and a broad, open world filled with a colorful cast of monsters makes it easy to pick up and play—er, grind through.

Let’s begin at the beginning, shall we? You name and create your character, choosing from the Sneaky, Superhero, and Brains classes. Superheroes are obviously stronger, while the intelligent benefit more from healing and can cast a magical shield; those who opt for the Sneaky path are harder to hit. Personally, I find Sneaky to be the easiest to play. There are also three difficulty levels. Once you’re all set up, your noble quest to save the land of Yipe begins.

Yipe is a wide, sprawling world, illustrated with simplistic but charming graphics. There are no load times, ever, which makes travel a lot less tedious. The king is quick to plead for your help. The town kids are turning into zombies, and he’s getting annoyed! The plot unfolds as you progress through the game’s five quests (yes, there are only five), and it’s always told with hilarious dialogue. In the developers’ own words, Yipe has “the usual trappings of an RPG…an apocalyptic crisis threatening to destroy the known universe, yada yada yada.” But it’s the way the story is told that makes it special; Yipe never takes itself seriously. Heck, your first quest is to destroy the evil zombie bunnies. It doesn’t get better than that.

Of course, the plot isn’t where you’ll spend most of your time. Yipe requires massive amounts of grinding. I’m not necessarily opposed to grinding, but Yipe’s gameplay is incredibly formulaic. You get a quest, find the monsters standing in your way, and realize that you’re not strong enough to blast through them. The solution? Kill a bunch of baddies until you can upgrade your equipment! Combat is very simple. You have a special move (magicians can cast a temporary shield, for example) but skill points are very low—I’m talking a maximum of one or two—and the moves aren’t particularly useful and never change. As a result, you mostly hammer the attack button (or, alternately, tap on the enemy monster) until one of you dies. Running away is also an option, although the monsters can strike you as you flee. So is combat dull? Yep. As dull as the rest of Yipe’s mechanics, which is to say…the simplicity is a double-edged sword. You’ll love it or hate it.

When you die, at least, it’s no big deal. You get sent to Yipe’s “Hell,” and once you pay a tithe to the gatekeeper, you’re back in business! Granted, this is annoying if you’ve racked up a lot of gold (the toll is proportional to your cash) but it’s a lot more forgiving than many roguelikes. It’s small things like this that makes Yipe more friendly towards newcomers.

Control are a bit jerky, but they’re functional. The right-hand side of the screen holds a virtual D-pad as well as the menu buttons. The D-pad works fine; your character moves quickly. The menu buttons call up things like your stats, your item pouch, etc. Items are a tricky thing, however. In keeping with Yipe’s simplicity, your strongest equipment is auto-equipped; however, you can’t resell items and stats aren’t displayed in the shops scattered throughout each town. The more expensive the better, but when is it worth upgrading? Omissions like these are annoying to say the least.

The “Search” button is also located on this right-side pane. Hit it. Trust me. It’ll describe your current surroundings, and the text is always witty and sarcastic. Sometimes the text changes, too, so it’s worth a second tap. The funny descriptions also extend to items in the shop and the characters’ dialogue in general.

Performance-wise, Yipe is also solid. It runs flawlessly on a second-generation iPod Touch—not surprising, considering the simple graphics. Buttons are always responsive…sometimes too much so. When you’re in battle, don’t tap the “Attack” button too much, as sometimes the action gets ahead of the display, so you’ll allow yourself to be killed without realizing it. That flaw aside, everything seems to work, though I would dearly like to see the ability to play my own music. The complete auto-save is much appreciated.

I could go on and on about the minutae of Yipe, but, well…I suspect that many of you already know if this is a game for you. The game boils down to an exploratory grind-fest with frequent and uninteresting battles, but it’s tempered by a terrific sense of humor. Add that to the nostalgia it generates, and you might be able to see why I’m hooked. If you’re willing to endure the grind, Yipe is a niche treasure that will surely please you. If not? Try a more mainstream game.

Oh, yeah…be sure to check out the official website. It’s a treat!

Seed 1 – Rise of Darkness

When Zenonia first came out, I was ecstatic. Here, finally, was a “real” RPG, based in a 2D world that brought back fond memories of Gameboy titles. Since then, the field has changed; as developers adapt to the iPhone platform, we’re seeing more and more similar games being released. Recently, Seed 1 – Rise of Darkness burst into the App Store, claiming to be a “Zenonia killer.”

Unfortunately, I have my doubts about that. If anything, it’ll be Seed’s price point that kills Zenonia; Chillingo just slashed the games “introductory price” of $2.99 down to free, choosing to rely solely on in-app purchases for revenue. And for a free game, Seed is absolutely fantastic. But price point aside, Seed is a port of a Japanese mobile game, and the transition was far from graceful. Blurry graphics, choppy animations, and a bad translation job make for a tedious and sometimes frustrating experience despite the game’s good points. Seed is a mediocre RPG, and while it may be worth the space on your iPod, it’s a good thing it’s free. If you want a more polished RPG that’s not a series of endless fetch-quests, try Zenonia or Inotia 2.

Seed begins predictably. You play as an overeager, annoying teenage boy named Litta from a small town who wants to “adventure in the Continent” and is desperate to leave his hometown. When you start a new file, Litta is magically trained in four different weapons: the lance, gun, sword, and (magical!) staff. The dialogue is either badly written or horribly translated, but at least you get exposed to one of Seed’s good features, which is that each character has no “class” and can instead wield any weapon family. A few more blurbs of atrocious text and you’re sneaking aboard a ship to the Continent.

Seed’s plot is actually decent, if you put a bit of time into it. Once you get to the mainland, you’re quickly assigned to a job as a spy, and political machinations are clearly at work. Sure, Litta annoys to me to no end and the English translation job is shoddy, but there’s a half-decent structure to Seed’s plot. As much as I loved Zenonia, it wasn’t exactly original. Seed gets some points in my book for trying. The biggest drawback with the plot is that your involvement is mostly limited to the endless litany of fetch-quests. Yuck. I’ve yet to accept a quest that didn’t involve me fetching ten of this or fifteen of that.

But Seed is still an action-RPG, and it’s the action that kills it. The virtual D-pad used in Seed is horribly unresponsive. At least Zenonia’s felt fast and fluid; in Seed, I spend most of my time running into walls and enemies that I’d meant to avoid. Combat is also a bummer. For one thing, it’s unbalanced; at early levels mages will die far too often, while at later ones, ranged magic is indispensable. The main problem, however, is how jerky everything is. I feel like the framerate was scaled way too far down for the iPhone, and as a result, attacking an enemy generates serious lag. (For the record, I’m on a second-generation iPod Touch.) On the bright side, being able to switch freely between all four classes of weapons at any time is an awesome feature, and I wish it was a more common one.

Seed certainly does contain other much-appreciated elements, like the quick-save button in the top-left of the screen and the “hotkey” positions on the screen for triggering certain attacks or items. Being able to actually tap on menu items is a much-appreciated inclusion as well. But again, there’s a clear lack of technical polish, and the icons are often too small to comfortably tap. Other factors like skill customization and a day/night cycle (tougher enemies and more EXP can be found at night) add to Seed’s strengths.

One more thing: the Seed “Shop.” Seed was formerly $2.99, and is now permanently free; needless to say, this has ruffled quite a few feathers, but what’s done is done. The Seed Shop has always been included but is now the sole money-maker in the game, and includes DLC that can be added to your save file via in-app purchasing. It’s mostly bonus goodies rather than power-pumping armor, and included items vary from inventory expansions to warp gate cards. You don’t need any of it to play, but it’s a way to avoid grinding. Just keep in mind that paid items can’t be transferred between save files!

So, at the end of the day, is this a “Zenonia killer”? Nope, and it’s not really trying to be, though large chunks of structure are cloned directly from that game. Seed is what it is: a free, mediocre RPG that’s truly a mixed bag. Some will love it; others will hastily delete it. It wasn’t quite worth $2.99, but for free, every RPG lover should at least give it a shot. Then you can go for a more polished game like Zenonia or Inotia 2. (Normally I try not to draw comparisons, but when Seed boasts about “killing” Zenonia, I figure I might as well do so.)

One thing is certainly clear, whatever you think of the game: it’s an exciting time to be an iPhone/iPod gamer. Who knows what RPG goodness we’ll get next?

Ravensword

Ravensword is an ambitious, 3D RPG set in an open fantasy world. The developers have cited games such as the Elder Scrolls series and Zelda as inspirations behind the game, and the result is a noble attempt at a console-like RPG. Unfortunately, despite hints of greatness, it falls short thanks to a dearth of customization, a dull storyline, and a strict adherence to RPG cliches. Is Ravensword a huge achievement? Certainly, and I can’t wait to see what the future holds. But as it stands now, I feel like Ravensword is just mediocre once you get past its ambitious skeleton.

The cliches begin as soon as the game opens. You, a male warrior, have awakened in a village with a severe case of amnesia. You’re woken by a kind woman who suggest you go visit Donald if you want some gold. Guess what your first quest is? Yup, that’s right: kill some rats! The game progresses in a linear fashion from there. Take a quest. Kill some stuff. Gain experience. As you talk to the townspeople and take on more quests, you learn about the events in the world around you. The king apparently vanished years ago, and nobody knows where he went. It’s all typical RPG fare, complemented by a few boss battles and competent (though unexciting) storytelling.

Combat boils down to simple button-mashing. You tap on an enemy to lock onto it, and when you’re close enough, you mash the giant “attack” button. There are very few weapons, and the only one that adds variety is the bow. Still, there’s very little strategy necessary here. My main gripe with the combat system is that there’s no “auto” setting, so if you get attacked from behind, for example, your character will just stand there while you desperately try to spin the camera around.

Every time you kill something, you’ll gain experience; unfortunately, however, levelling is done automatically. You can’t assign points towards specific attributes. This isn’t really surprising, given how little customization is in the game; for example, you’re also bound to being a male warrior. Also, weapons and armor have no visible stats, so the auto-levelling isn’t as annoying as it might have been.

There is one aspect of the game, however, that shines: the open world. The graphics aren’t console quality, but they’re still good enough to give you a sense of wonder as you explore. I mean, jeez, is this an iPod I’m using? While we’ve seen great 2D worlds (see: Zenonia, Inotia 2, etc), this is one of the few iPhone games where you can roam around a true 3D world. Add that to fairly good movement and camera controls (well, besides how long it takes to turn around), and you end up with an immersing experience that might make you forget you’re on an iPhone.

All told, there’s a lot of promise to Ravensword. More variety and a departure from fantasy tropes could have made it a stellar success. As it is, exploring the world is still fun, and there is definitely a “wow!” factor at work here—Ravensword is undoubtedly a historic App Store game.

However, all the shiny graphics and technological feats in the world can’t make up for the fact that Ravensword feels more like a beefed-up proof-of-concept demo than a full-fledged game. Yes, you can easily spend a lot of time immersed in the world of Ravensword, but I can’t shake the nagging feeling that something’s missing, and the limited scope of the game makes it a lot less fun than it could have been.

This has been a hard review to write. I really, really want to celebrate Ravensword for what it has accomplished, but at the end of the day, it’s the gameplay that matters. All but the most hardcore of RPG fans will probably want to wait and see what the future holds for 3D iPhone RPGs.

Chronicles of Inotia: A Wanderer of Luone Trailer

Com2uS is set to release a sequel to its popular title Chronicles of Inotia: Legend of Feanor. The initial Chronicles of Inotia game arrived in late 2008, and was dubbed by Com2Us as “the first touch action RPG” available on the app store. Although reviews varied, Legend of Feanor enjoyed success for being one of the first in its genre to grace the iPhone.

Chronicles of Inotia: A Wanderer of Luone looks to up the ante in many regards, and to address the perceived rough spots from the first game. The following trailer was unveiled, which highlights much of the new gameplay:

Chronicles of Inotia: A Wanderer of Luone is being described as “a heroic journey through a land of magic, companionship, and a never ending battle against evil.” It shouldn’t be long before we can see for ourselves just how magical things get, as the sequel is currently being reviewed by Apple and is on schedule for a December release.

Garters and Ghouls

Top down action games are nothing new on the iPhone, and neither are dungeon romps, but for whatever reason, we really haven’t seen a combination of the two. Garters and Ghouls sort of fits into this gap with what seems to be a lovechild of iDracula and Underworlds.

The game starts with you as the “newly-dead Marie Dupois” set forth on a quest to battle the Thrum. Each level has you going deeper and deeper into the battle, clearing all sorts of various stages of their vile presence. The story is fairly well done, but without an epic setting that would rival Diablo (I mean, how cool is it to go to hell to fight demons!), I didn’t really get too wrapped up in it. All the levels really boil down to is repetitively destroying Thrum portals so no more bad guys can appear.

My big issue with this game is that I’m just not entirely sure of what the intended genre of the game was. As a reviewer, it’s tough to me to figure this one out, because its almost like an RPG, and almost like a shooter, but not quite as good as a full blown version of either. My gut instinct is that the game wants to be an RPG, but there are no truly unique weapons player classes, and there are no character stats (strength, magic, constitution) that you can upgrade. Sure, you can walk into a shop and upgrade your speed, but you are spending randomly dropped money to buy stats instead of using EXP. On the other hand, the game could’ve completely been designed as an action shooter. I do really liked the fact that the controls were well done (I would say well thought out, but the two joystick thing is almost industry standard at this point). The aiming could be a bit easier (you will definitely miss things at point blank range), but it doesn’t detract from the game too much. My problem would be that if the game really was meant to be an action shooter, the game kind of falls short on action and the weapon variety within the levels is fairly weak. Typically, you get two weapons in each level, but there is really no consequence to running out of ammo or worry that you will do so because your base weapon is pretty devastating. With this fear gone, all you have to worry about is firing and running, but the enemies in this one are so slow and dumb that you never really feel like you are in danger.

Aside from the gameplay and the identity crisis, the graphics and sound are not too bad. I’m testing the game on a 3G, and the animation all works well but is a bit choppy at times. I’m not sure if the choppiness is by design or not though, because once I upgraded my speed, things tended to pick up and seem normal. The sound is your typical rock opera style zombie shooting music, but if that’s not your cup of tea, just put on your own music from your itunes.app.

The game has some flaws, most of which to me are by concept design, but its a fairly fun action romp. If you really liked Alive 4-Ever or Underworlds, or hopefully both, you will probably get a kick out of this one. You’ll certainly wish that there was more action or RPG elements, depending on your genre of choice, but you wont find too many dull moments, which is the sign, to me, that a sub $5 game is worth it. If you want to kill some bad guys, you won’t be too disappointed.