Faery: Legends Of Avalon

Have you ever woken up from being encased into a crystal for a few hundred years? The protagonist in Faery: Legends of Avalon has and that really messes with one’s memory. As the title may suggest, this RPG is heavy on the fantasy and throughout the game, this will present itself well, but not as consistent in any area as one might think.

It might be a bad omen that the game starts with a character creation panel that is both completely ridiculous and convoluted within many unnecessary submenus. Now, creation tools are usually unsatisfactory, but the best character I personally made was a mix between Gizmo from Gremlins and an undead Michael Jackson. Luckily, the overall visuals of the game are actually very decent, even with the horrid color choices of some levels. For instance, the pirate level is so insanely dark that the screen is mostly black at all times.

Barring that, the colorful and heavily cel-shaded universe of Faery does manage to captivate its audience. A few select levels offer a difference between lush greenery and more brownish deserts, but do so tastefully. Additionally, the deviant art style à la Salvador Dali creates an uncommon universe of strangely warped characters. Along with the music choices, this part of the presentation might recall a Harry Potter setting, even if the score can become repetitive at times. In general though, this part is the strongest sell and the main reason to remain engrossed.

Unfortunately, the further presentation points are lacking in every way. Menus are again user unfriendly or just don’t make sense, dust particles confuse the view from orange interaction markers and characters offer no voice acting. Not every game needs a strong vocal casting, but in a modern looking game where there’s a load of dialogue to sift through, this is basically a must. Especially since personas generate noises anyway, it’s inexplicable that the line is not pushed through to help entice players in an unknown universe.

Enjoy the black blackness of black in this Faery: Legends of Avalon level.

Further complications can be found in multiple areas such as in the map navigation, as flying always comes of awkward and complicates finding objects. As a sorry solace, only quest sensitive objects will be an issue, as any other object is barely useful throughout this 10 to 20 hour adventure. There’s equipment, but it hardly changes anything and with no real stats, there’s hardly a need for the simple leveling mechanic at all. Luckily, the visual alterations of the character when advancing has some amusing quirks; such as adding tattoos, horns or even a scorpion tail.

In more unfathomable decisions, this is only available to the main character and ally customization is rendered void; which is an RPG killer. Only once will your companions ask whether to pick one spell or the other, but otherwise they’ll just be fodder. There’s even an option to come into good graces with a heap of characters, but it isn’t noticeable anywhere and never has any effect, good or bad. Not even the very last world-altering decision has any effect on the outcome, so why have it there at all?

Luckily, there are also some regions that are fairy friendly, if you don't mind the mortician.

This only leaves one nail in the coffin, being the actual combat. As to be expected from aforementioned points, the turn-based attacks will be just as derivative as the rest of the game. In an extremely simplified fighting scheme, all battles will boil down to a choice of the same attacks over and over. There’s an element implementation, but it never leaves the most basic step and magic attacks are bound to action points per round, making them infinite and with no consequence. This doesn’t mean combat is broken, but it becomes so bland and boring, that only the most devoted fan might still enjoy such an archaic system. There are some added effects however and it’s nice to work out encounters where they happen, rather than on a generic plain, but this doesn’t save the game.

It’s a shame that the surreal first impression of Faery: Legends of Avalon isn’t pushed through to the areas that separates mere painters from people that can actually develop games. A good idea is only as good as its execution and in this case it’s clear that a game made by Spiders is only as comical as it sounds. With a myriad of inexplicable design decisions and overly simple gameplay, it’s safe to say that this developer should go back to the drawing board and play some classics to see how it’s done. It’s a pity, but RPG fans or any other players shouldn’t be fooled by the shiny exterior as the insides of this candy cane are tasteless.

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Daav Valentaten, NoobFeed (@Daavpuke).