Game Review: Elven Chronicles

Elven Chronicles by Big Blue Bubble

Dragoooon

Elven Chronicles is a turn based RPG, not unlike games from the Final Fantasy series. The game features epic battles against a wide variety of monsters, dragons and the elements. Story wise, you play a young warrior trying to figure out his past as well as a elf mystic seeking redemption.

The games anime art style offers a rich environment, and having large area maps with generally wandering monsters doesn't hurt either. The one thing I did find, is that monsters seem to tend to chase you around sometimes (wandering monsters are depicted by different coloured twisters). I also noticed that different coloured "twisters" tend to show the monsters level, green being low level, blue meaning close to or around your level, yellow being your level or a little higher, and red which is above your current level.

The main quests storyline seems to be around defeating evil dragons. Just don't expect a grand experience at the beginning of the game (I'd even go so far to say that the game is open ended).

Like so many turn based RPG's before it, this game has the same standard battle options. You can attack, use magic or items or run away. The developers were smart to implement this already proven system into their game.

Chillin with my dwarf hommies

The game boasts a massive 20 hours of game play time. As well as a wide variety of monsters, elementals, dragons and the like that respond differently to different magical attacks (a blue ice golem, for example will take more damage from fire spells). This game looks just like an early Final Fantasy clone, which in my opinion is a good thing. Large area maps add to the game as well random dungeon maps (each time you venture into a dungeon it will have a different layout, which is a nice feature). Also the game seems to offer a ton of new spells, armour, weapons and accessories.

The good: Great old school turn based RPG action, a wide variety of monsters, armour, weapons, spells, accessories and quests to keep you busy. Sounds and music are well done.

The bad: The controls are a bit of a hassle (at first, but give it a little time and you'll see they work fairly well). The story is fairly unimportant (for turn based RPG's it's usually very important to have a captivating story line). Personally I would like to see a virtual d-pad implemented instead of the current tap controls.

The breakdown: For $1.99 its pretty hard to go wrong with this one! Especially if you are a fan of old school RPG's. The amount of detail that went into the wide variety of monsters and whatnot is truly quite the accomplishment and really adds to the games overall polish. While the music tends to loop instead of change from scene to scene (which can get old, fast!), the sound effects are spot on. While this port does seem like it was a little rushed, with all the future improvements and additions, the developer has promised make this game a damn good deal at two bucks. 4/5