The Red Wizard Did It

Okay, those of you that have seen the title screen will get the irony of this review’s title (though you may not appreciate it). In Angel Sword you play a guardian angel sent to recover a weapon – amazingly enough known as the Angel Sword – that will allow you to defeat the Red Wizard. It seems that the Red Wizard was infected by the evil of ultimate power that the sword afforded (Lord Of The Rings, anyone), and in order to keep this threat from taking over anyone else the power of the sword was broken into 20 pieces and scattered across the land. Now you must solve many quests and fend off hordes of enemies in order to reclaim the pieces of the sword and ultimately vanquish the Red Wizard. Pretty typical, but it still sounds interesting enough, right?

Unfortunately, this game doesn’t even come close to its potential. The game has a strong Zelda like feel to it, as you traipse around the world from an “overhead side†view. In other words, you are looking down on the environment, but you can still see the sides of objects instead of just the top. To further fuel the illusion that you’ve journeyed to the land of Hyrule, your health meter is represented by hearts that you can replenish when you slay monsters. And of course, your weapon of choice – in other words, your only weapon – is a sword.

Gameplay in Angel Sword is quite simple. To talk to someone you approach them and press the Talk button on the screen (or you can use the “enter†button on the D-Pad if your device is so equipped). To scroll through dialogs press the D-Pad. Aside from the last dialog of the game there is absolutely no interaction in the dialogs. You basically read what the NPC has to say and go on your way. Most of the townspeople give you a quest, as does the first lady you meet outside of town, but this still adds up to less than 10 quests for the entire game.

You collect the items for your quests either by opening treasure chests, defeating monsters, or in one case actually finding the items lying around on the ground. When you get an item you will be notified as such, but there is no actual inventory screen to look at to see the items you have in your possession at any given time. There are also no stats to build up in this game, though there are a couple of times that you get a boost to what might be perceived as stats. The only real measure of building up your character in this game is that every once in a while you get an extra heart added to your life meter, which starts out with three hearts. Of course, this doesn’t make much difference in the game, because you never really die. If you lose all your hearts you just end up back in the Elder’s home and continue on your quest.

The game’s features boast of 2 major lands to explore, but the truth is that the sum total of area that you can explore probably amounts to 10 240x320 outdoor screens and a handful of one room dungeons. There are 3 types of monsters to fight, none of which prove to be too much of a challenge. Combat is a simple matter of pressing the attack button while facing the direction of the monster you’re attacking so that your sword can make contact. One other tactic to note is that when you’ve killed enough enemies, the meter below your health bar gets filled up, and you are able to cast magic. The magic attack will clear the screen of all enemies and empty your magic bar.

The features also claim the game has “re-playable interactive alternate endingsâ€. There are two endings, only one of which is interactive, and adds maybe a minute or two to game time. All told there is maybe 2 hours of gameplay to be had in Angel Sword, and a good portion of that is time wandering back and forth collecting the items necessary to receive the power ups which enable you to complete other tasks in the same area.

The graphics are quite retro, but that’s okay with me. While nothing special, I did like the style, though a little naked angel with big blue eyes is a bit… weird. Overall everything blended well together to create a cartoony, Nintendo style atmosphere.

The sound effects were cheesy, but seemed appropriate given the old school feel of the game. I actually thought the music was pretty decent, but was a bit surprised by the fact that there was no music played in the dungeons. Overall the audio suited the game just fine.

There were several things that could have made Angel Sword a much more rewarding experience. First of all, the game could have been much longer. 2 hours is not a whole lot of bang for your buck. Second, a larger variety of monsters with a greater level of challenge is required. Make me feel like I’m earning the parts of my sword that I’m trying to retrieve. Third, come up with a unique idea for the health bar and weapon. It might sound silly, but it really did seem like they were trying to copy Zelda in that respect. Finally, throw in some puzzles. “Please get X for me†quests are fine, but not overly exciting. Even if it’s cliché, make me do something like rearrange boulders to get through a path or cover a switch to open a door. Of course, I suppose one could argue that I’m trying to make the game too much like Zelda then, but at least there would be something more to do than there is now.

If you can overlook the hefty price tag and need some mild amusement for a couple of hours, you might just enjoy this game. If you’re looking for a hardcore RPG or any other type of lengthy exploration style game, Angel Sword is not for you. Hopefully the developers will consider suggestions by people such as myself and create a larger, more intricate sequel to Angel Sword. Until then, you might want to wait.

Overall Rating: 5/10