 Main
|
Projects
|
Misao Awards
|
Reviews
|
Links
|
| Review of Love and War by Admiral Styles | Link: http://www.gamingw.net/games/420/ Reviewed by Ii Shenron Plot: ( 20 points ) After a long introduction to the political structure of "Terra", you meet Ryan Eramond, recent valedictorian of the academy in Davenport, a large port town in the nation of Galvenia. Well, now that he's graduated, he's a bit bored, and winds up doing deliveries for his father and falling into other mischief. Mischief that will gradually plunge him into the political machinations in the world ... Thumbs up for: Love and War goes to great depths to explain the different nations, cultures, and politics of "Terra". Hopefully in future demos we'll get to see these developed as well as Act 1 seems to have been. Thumbs down for: The storyline moves veeeerrrrrryyyyyyy slowly in some spots, so some patience is required as Admiral Styles builds the story. Total points: 14. Characterization/Dialogue: ( 20 points ) The strongest point and main focus of the game. Ryan, his friends, and the various people he encounters, from adversaries to random townspeople, are each very well developed. Hard to pile on more superlatives, ( and I don't really want to give any more away than I must ), other than to say that in this category, this game is easily in the top 5 as far as Rm2k/3 games go. Thumbs up for: The Hiei/Kuno fusion known as Juno. Yeah, that entertained me. :) ... More importantly, even in the more serious moments, Love and War manages to avoid the abuse of angst that many other games fall into. Total points: 18. Graphics: ( 10 points ) Love and War has nothing special graphically. It gives you a mixture of RTP and RTP-styled sprites, and chipsets and facesets taken from every source under the sun. Thumbs up for: Changing facesets to convey emotions are always a nice touch. Thumbs down for: While the map design itself is decent enough, the usage of tiles is amiss in many areas, and there are several places where there are pass-through errors. Also, there were multiple occasions where traveling from map to map became a chore due to unclear teleportation spots. Total points: 6. Music: ( 10 points ) The music in Love and War is your usual fare: midis from a variety of sources which are used fairly well, except ... Thumbs down for: ... for the fact that there are way too much RTP and CT tracks in this game. And Love and War tends to use some of the most odious of the RTP midis. Total points: 3. Gameplay: ( 10 points ) Love and War doesn't have any especially brilliant skill systems, but makes up for it with quite a few minigames. However .... there are issues ... Thumbs up for: Lavie's class. Brilliant. ;) Thumbs down for: Act I's focus is on developing the characters, and while that is accomplished quite well, as far as RPG mechanics go, frequently Love and War accomplishes this by doing a fetch quest. Fetch quests which often force you to wander big maps looking for that one little thing to advance the quest or plot. After awhile, it gets to be quite tedious. ( For starters, just try finding that first savepoint in Davenport. Good luck! ) Bug: The worldmap is set to a walkspeed of 3, but often that slow walkspeed will affect other parts of the game. Downright weird: The maximum level a PC can attain is 9, which I reached around the middle of the demo. Considering this is "Act I", I wonder what lays in store ... Total points: 4. Fun Factor:( 25 points ) Despite the problems outlined in the section above, I had pretty good fun playing this game. With some of the errors corrected above, this game will definitely be the first in a long time to take a Shura award. Total points: 16. Intangibles: ( 5 points ) Though this is a demo, it's very LONG ( My estimate is 10 hours, although I didn't time it ) for a game that just covers the first act. However, given the amount of work put in so far, I'm hopeful we'll see more from this game. Total points: 3. Overall: 64/100 This is the highest percentage I've given out in awhile, and for good reason. Though this game is underground, it definitely deserves more praise in this custom systems/ABS/light effects era for being an almost all-around solid project that with some tweaking may become one of the best games available for Rm2k/3. In other words, quit reading and play it! |
Reviewed Games: - Ara Fell- Iron Gaia - Legend of the Philosopher's Stone - Love and War - Naufragar |
|
Plot and character concepts presented on this site
Copyrighted to stated authors.
Design by Key-Designs.
|