Hero Seekers - PS5 Review

Hero Seekers by developer Vanguard and publisher KEMCO—PS5 review written by Richard with a copy provided by the publisher.

 
Estimated reading time: 4 minutes 

---

Welcome to the New Year everybody. It’s time to kick off with a new Kemco title: Hero Seekers! A story set in a world of heroes who battle against the evil demon king to protect humankind. This is a turn-based retro style RPG with a blend of old Kemco title mechanics and some interesting twists, so let’s take a look at what Hero Seekers has to offer.

Our story follows Lunette, a girl who fought the Demon King along with her two companions. Unfortunately she awakens afterwards to discover the Demon King is alive and history has changed. As the only one who remembers the past, Lunette sets out to recover the forgotten past and to bring down the Demon King for good.

Hero Seekers is a fairly traditional turn-based RPG setup, where you have a party of up to four frontliners and a reserve unit that you can swap out in battle. Battle is done through a turn order based around unit speed, and every character can act once per turn, although enemies can have more than one action. You have your standard attack, skill, defend, and item options, but there are also some quality of life additions to combat mechanics. There is an autobattle feature as well as a speed of battle toggle where you can vastly increase the pace of combat, making those grinding sessions a little easier.

Hero Seekers takes an interesting twist as you explore the land trying to figure out what is going on with the Demon King and how reality is different than what Lunette remembers. She will discover former heroes trapped in a prison of memory, and then summon them forth to aid her. Yup, you can summon heroes in a sort of quasi-gacha system. In various chests, as well as occasionally from battles, you will get memory stones. Ten memory stones can be used at a monument to summon a hero of the past.

When you summon heroes, you can get multiple of the same hero, increasing their stats and passive abilities, as well as improving skills or letting you learn them earlier. Thankfully for me and anyone else with poor luck, the hero pulls are from a limited pool, so you can burn through the common heroes to get the rare ones. Furthermore you can select a hero to “aim for”, increasing the appearance chance, even if you haven’t gotten a copy of them yet.

The basic overarching gameplay will consist of Lunette and her party visiting a town, deciding to help out with something, and then going off to find a dungeon on the world map to get through, all the while getting into random battles. Pretty standard fare, and if you’ve played a Kemco game in this style before, you’re pretty sure about what you’re going to get. Equally fair warning where it’s due, a lot of the assets in Hero Seekers you can find in other more recent Kemco titles as well. They aren’t bad, and they do have a dynamic style to them, but they definitely are reused from other games. The music too. Unlike some of the other Kemco titles, there is no “shop” for special weapons or items, although there is a merchant who will trade memory stones for items if you’re so inclined. This means you can’t turn yourself into a chapter one walking nuke, but I think I prefer this to rolling a post-game strength weapon in the “store” and then rolling over all the enemies.

I say this to let you know that Hero Seekers is a pretty generic title, but that doesn’t mean it’s bad. I was actually quite fond of the storyline, and found the unique aspect of the Demon Lord’s power, how it’s applied, and the struggles of the past heroes to be rather well presented. While the theme around what most of the past heroes struggled with isn’t exactly unique, I’d say it’s often either underplayed or not utilized enough in most literature or media, so it was a refreshing experience.

I should warn you that some of the bosses can be pretty tough. When they do a sizable chunk to your health per hit and can take multiple actions, if they focus on one character you’re in for a bad time. You may need to pay more attention to the turn order that also indicates what the enemies will do in order to prepare yourself.

Overall Hero Seekers is a pretty fun title with some interesting themes about heroes and their struggles. While certainly not award winning, Hero Seekers also doesn’t fall flat in any major areas either. The hero lottery is surprisingly reasonable, the combat system is pretty fluid with some nice quality of life aspects, and the sprite and music is decent, although somewhat reused from other similar titles. Overall, I’d recommend picking up Hero Seekers if you’re looking for an older style RPG that doesn’t require heavy investment. 

Score: 7 / 10

M

T

G

Detect languageAfrikaansAlbanianAmharicArabicArmenianAssameseAymaraAzerbaijaniBambaraBashkirBasqueBelarusianBengaliBhojpuriBosnianBulgarianCantonese (Traditional)CatalanCebuanoChichewaChinese (Literary)Chinese SimpChinese TradChuvashCorsicanCroatianCzechDanishDariDhivehiDogriDutchEmojiEnglishEnglish United KingdomEsperantoEstonianEweFaroeseFijianFilipinoFinnishFrenchFrench (Canada)FrisianGalicianGandaGeorgianGermanGreekGuaraniGujaratiHaitian CreoleHausaHawaiianHebrewHill MariHindiHmongHungarianIcelandicIgboIlocanoIndonesianInuinnaqtunInuktitutInuktitut (Latin)IrishItalianJapaneseJavaneseKannadaKazakhKazakh (Latin)KhmerKinyarwandaKlingon (Latin)KonkaniKoreanKrioKurdish (Kurmanji)Kurdish (Sorani)KyrgyzLaoLatinLatvianLingalaLithuanianLower SorbianLuxembourgishMacedonianMaithiliMalagasyMalayMalayalamMalteseMaoriMarathiMariMeiteilon (Manipuri)MizoMongolianMongolian (Traditional)Myanmar (Burmese)NepaliNorwegianNyanjaOdia (Oriya)OromoPapiamentoPashtoPersianPolishPortuguese (Brazil)Portuguese (Portugal)PunjabiQuechuaQuertaro OtomiRomanianRundiRussianSamoanSanskritScots GaelicSepediSerbianSerbian (Cyrillic)Serbian (Latin)SesothoSetswanaShonaSindhiSinhalaSlovakSlovenianSomaliSpanishSundaneseSwahiliSwedishTagalogTahitianTajikTamilTatarTeluguThaiTibetanTigrinyaTonganTsongaTurkishTurkmenTwiUdmurtUkrainianUpper SorbianUrduUyghurUzbekUzbek (Cyrillic)VietnameseWelshXhosaYakutYiddishYorubaYucatec MayaZulu

EnglishPortuguese (Portugal)Japanese-------- [ All ] --------AfrikaansAlbanianAmharicArabicArmenianAssameseAymaraAzerbaijaniBambaraBashkirBasqueBelarusianBengaliBhojpuriBosnianBulgarianCantonese (Traditional)CatalanCebuanoChichewaChinese (Literary)Chinese SimpChinese TradChuvashCorsicanCroatianCzechDanishDariDhivehiDogriDutchEmojiEnglishEnglish United KingdomEsperantoEstonianEweFaroeseFijianFilipinoFinnishFrenchFrench (Canada)FrisianGalicianGandaGeorgianGermanGreekGuaraniGujaratiHaitian CreoleHausaHawaiianHebrewHill MariHindiHmongHungarianIcelandicIgboIlocanoIndonesianInuinnaqtunInuktitutInuktitut (Latin)IrishItalianJapaneseJavaneseKannadaKazakhKazakh (Latin)KhmerKinyarwandaKlingon (Latin)KonkaniKoreanKrioKurdish (Kurmanji)Kurdish (Sorani)KyrgyzLaoLatinLatvianLingalaLithuanianLower SorbianLuxembourgishMacedonianMaithiliMalagasyMalayMalayalamMalteseMaoriMarathiMariMeiteilon (Manipuri)MizoMongolianMongolian (Traditional)Myanmar (Burmese)NepaliNorwegianNyanjaOdia (Oriya)OromoPapiamentoPashtoPersianPolishPortuguese (Brazil)Portuguese (Portugal)PunjabiQuechuaQuertaro OtomiRomanianRundiRussianSamoanSanskritScots GaelicSepediSerbianSerbian (Cyrillic)Serbian (Latin)SesothoSetswanaShonaSindhiSinhalaSlovakSlovenianSomaliSpanishSundaneseSwahiliSwedishTagalogTahitianTajikTamilTatarTeluguThaiTibetanTigrinyaTonganTsongaTurkishTurkmenTwiUdmurtUkrainianUpper SorbianUrduUyghurUzbekUzbek (Cyrillic)VietnameseWelshXhosaYakutYiddishYorubaYucatec MayaZulu

Text-to-speech function is limited to 200 characters

Options : History : Feedback : DonateClose

Read More

Astral Takers - PS5 Review

Astral Takers by developer Vanguard and publisher Kemco—PS5 review written by Richard with a copy provided by the publisher.

 
Estimated reading time: 10 minutes

---

Hello and welcome! Today we’ve got another Kemco/Vanguard title for you: Astral Takers! You up for some old-school RPG action? Ready to explore a world fraught with peril and interpersonal challenges? Well, look no further than Astral Takers! 

If the title Astral Takers seems somewhat familiar to you, you may be thinking of a title I reviewed a while back called Dragon Takers. Yes, the games are related, no I won’t say how because of spoilers, but I would suggest playing Dragon Takers first if you care about potential plot spoilers, and if you care about that sort of thing. Astral Takers can still be played as a standalone however, so no worries if you aren’t picking up Dragon Takers.

In Astral Takers we follow the adventures of Revyse, Fio, and Aurora, a trio that developed when Revyse discovered Aurora who had lost her memories and Fio decides to help out. Plots will be uncovered, villains will be defeated, and the secrets hidden behind Aurora’s identity shall be revealed! You will visit many locations in a linear progression through the world while fighting random enemy encounters and tough boss battles (maybe).

I will tell you right now that Astral Takers is very generic and very cliché. Is that a bad thing? Well, no, not really, but it doesn’t really set itself apart in any way that matters either. This also extends to adventure and combat, not just the storyline. Towns you visit are fairly generic, and you can expect the standard fantasy RPG tropes to come alive. Like I said, not exactly a bad thing, but certainly doesn’t stand out from the crowd.

Combat will occur either when scripted for boss fights or as random encounters when you’re on the world map or in a dungeon. Upon getting into a fight, we start up the old turn-based RPG gameplay. A little bit off from the common style, in Astral Takers you determine all your actions at the start of combat and then characters take action, rather than only when their turn comes up. Higher speed stats mean your turn will be sooner in the turn order.

Taking from Dragon Takers, enemies will have elemental and type weaknesses to exploit, which you can take a peek at in the turn order, and enemies of a single type get grouped. Grouped enemies cannot be targeted individually, but can be hit with attacks that hit a group of enemies or when performing a single target action on a group enemy will be decided in the group for you. It’s a little annoying when you want to focus down a single enemy in a group but the game has your damage split between the enemies.

Unlike Dragon Takers, there isn’t an interesting skill assimilation mechanic, so everything you get is based on your own progression, whether it’s from leveling when you get enough exp or from plot progression. Thankfully the game is pretty easy to farm exp in, as you can hang around a heal point, which are plentiful, and wander back and forth for a bit. With an auto battle function that’s usually good at “nuke the enemies ASAP”, you can build up levels fast if you are having a tough time.

One of the interesting background lore pieces is that Revyse is a summoner. Whenever he finds an echostone, he can bring it to a summoning circle to summon a heroic figure, thus expanding your party roster. While you still need to equip your extended party, they can be swapped in and out pretty much at will, allowing you to get the most out of their skills. Have an enemy that’s immune to magic attacks? Swap your mage out for a physical damage unit. Enemies dodge magic? Get more melee units. Pretty handy really. Worst case you can use some of their skills outside of battle to return to a dungeon entrance or to heal party members.

There is, unfortunately, a decently big complaint. This is the same complaint I had with Dragon Takers and has not been improved in Astral Takers, but the menuing system is arse.  Navigating menus is somewhat unintuitive, equipping gear when you aren’t buying direct from a shop is a nuisance, the gear in your inventory is automatically sorted by type not by recently acquired so you could lose stuff you’ve picked up in your infinite pockets, and good lord is the border around your selection incredibly tough to see. While certainly not game breaking to any degree, it is incredibly frustrating.

As for the graphics and soundtrack, I have to say they’re pretty good. The soundtrack is pretty much what was heard from Dragon Takers, so if you’ve played that be prepared. Also the enemy sprites will actually move in combat and ally characters during cutscenes will move a bit and express themselves. It isn’t anything next gen, but it is pretty decent. I mean, it is a phone game port, so you can’t really expect too much, although there are a few improvements that would be nice to see.

On a plus side, Astral Takers is very lenient about allowing you to save. Pretty much as long as you aren’t in combat or a cutscene you can save wherever you want. It’s really handy if you don’t particularly have the time to commit to an extended period of playing. The game also autosaves a lot so losing a lot of progress is basically a non issue, which is also really nice. Couple that with being able to swap out party members really easily and there are a lot of nice aspects to Astral Takers.

Overall Astral Takers is a pretty generic RPG but certainly not a bad one. While the storyline may be a little generic and the gameplay rather traditional, there’s something to be said for that nostalgic feeling it brings to mind. While Astral Takers may not be for everybody, and won’t really offer anything new to the genre, it has a solid base that makes it pretty entertaining.

Score: 7 / 10

Read More

Dragon Takers - PC Review

Dragon Takers by developer VANGUARD and publisher KEMCO—PC(Steam) review written by Richard with a copy provided by the publisher.

 
Estimated reading time: 7 minutes

---

Are you in the mood for some old-school RPG flavour with a bit of a new twist? Well then, perhaps I can interest you in Dragon Takers, an RPG with some pretty nostalgic vibes but with a few modern twists.

Dragon Takers is a story about a world of sword and magic. One where the Dragon Army led by Drake Emperor Tiberius leads a campaign of world domination against the humans. A world where humans are granted a type of skill at birth which defines their future. Well, except the main character, of course. Growing up ostracized in a remote village, where only a travelling magician and a childhood friend don't pick on him for his seeming lack of inherent skill, his life is turned upside down when the village is attacked and his childhood friend is kidnapped. Luckily, our hero Helio discovers he has the ability to copy skills from his foes. With the traveling magician Milena, he sets out to rescue the childhood friend, and maybe thwart the Drake Emperor while he's at it.

Dragon Takers plays very similar to the old-school Final Fantasy games, where you will be wandering on a world map, or dungeons, in a 2D top-down environment, and you will get into random turn-based battles as you explore the world. Dragon Takers as a game is incredibly linear though, so there isn't much exploring, at least on the world map, so forward is pretty much the theme of the game. There will be towns and dungeons you come across, and wild monsters to fight and steal the skills from.

When you get into combat, you enter into a turn-based system where your options are: attack, defend, skill, and item. You can see what order enemies and allies will attack in, and what enemies are weak to or resistant to. You can use this info to quickly dispatch your foes. At the bottom of the screen you will view your party members' stats, as well as a list of any buffs or effects they are under. Fun fact, status changes can be doubled up on, which I didn't learn until very late game. If enemies are mid to small sized, they can generally come in groups, where you can only target the enemy grouping, and single target skills or attacks will choose one of the enemies in the group to attack. Lone enemies are obviously fair game. Keep in mind that "enemy groups" are not the same as "all enemies" in this title.

Here is where it gets a little bit different from the standard fare. Based on world lore, everyone has a certain skill they are born with. This dictates what skills your party members will learn in combat based on their level. Helio, however, has to copy skills from the monsters he fights. For Helio, attack carries the same meaning as "attempt to copy a skill". Each enemy that carries a copyable skill has a percent chance to copy it when being normal attacked by Helio. The game handily highlights any skills the enemy may have, if you already have it copied, and what the chance to acquire it is.

Instead of learning skills as he levels, Helio unlocks more skill slots which you can assign the skills you've copied to. This is an interesting take that isn't used all that often, and it sort of speaks to my desire to collect things. Thankfully for both Helio and the player, Helio doesn't lose access to these skills, or have limited uses, and can reassign skills whenever out of combat and you are able to access the menu. Well, if you can navigate the menu.

I'll be real with you here, to be honest, this is one of the worst menu management choices in a game I've seen in quite a long time in the state it is at the time of this review. Is it unmanageable? No, but it's pretty close. The first and biggest issue is that it can be really difficult to visually discern what you have selected. The highlighted background border used to show what you have selected is doing a great job of blending in, which it really shouldn't. There have been many times I've leaned closer to the screen and squinted at it to see if what I selected is what I wanted or not. Honestly, I choose options based on what I think I am choosing rather than what I see half the time.

The other issue with the menu is that it's clunky and cumbersome. Now, you might be wondering "how is a menu cumbersome?". Well, let's go through how you equip new gear. You go into the menu, select items, not equipment, find the gear you think should be what you want equipped, there is a sort function at least, then you select the item and see if any characters can equip it and if it'll give better stats. Yeah, I'm not sure if you can change equipment from the status menu, but I found this way easier. Once you get used to it, it isn't that bad, but boy was I surprised when I first tried to equip a new piece of gear.

Dragon Takers does, however, do a surprisingly good job of keeping you invested despite some of it's setbacks in user interface. There are usually a few magic circles littered throughout areas you explore, providing a full heal at no expense and of infinite uses. This is quite handy when trying to farm skills off enemies, as some hit rather hard and only have a ten percent chance of giving up the skill, meaning you'll take a beating while trying to get their skills. There will also be treasure chests with gear, which also occasionally drops from enemies, with which to outfit your party.

Also, while I don't want to give spoilers for the storyline, I will say that Dragon Takers does a good job of lampshading a lot of standard tropes in fantasy games. Yeah, the plot is cheesy and corny and cliche a lot of the time, but it also avoids the pitfalls that standard fantasy writing usually falls into. For example, at the very beginning of the game, Helio wants to immediately charge after the enemy who had just recently kicked his butt in order to get his friend back. Milena essentially calls him an idiot for thinking he stands a chance, and says he needs to at least train and copy some better skills before he has even a chance. He very promptly agrees and essentially says "yeah, you're right. That was real dumb of me". He might not be exactly the brightest bulb, but he certainly has the awareness to realize when confidence and headstrongness isn't gonna get the job done.

Another aspect that is rather endearing of Dragon Takers is the aesthetic that has been chosen. While the field sprites and art are very old-school reminiscent, the character portraits, for both enemies and allies, are actually dynamic, which you don't see a lot of. They move and sway, which you can see in full body shots of the characters, or on the enemies in combat. The music direction is also pretty good, which is always a plus when you're gonna be hearing the battle themes a lot.

Overall, Dragon Takers gives a very nostalgic feeling of older RPGs, made in an RPG Maker style, but with it's own share of interesting aspects. While it may not be super long, and the user interface is rather rough, there is a lot to like, whether it be a well implemented combat system, solid graphic design, or a good sound direction. While the storyline can be quite cliche, it also has it's moments where it surprised me and were a good diversion from the usual plot points you would see in games like this. I would highly recommend checking out Dragon Takers if you're looking to live some of that original Final Fantasy type feeling.

Score: 8 / 10

Read More