Faery: Legends of Avalon (2010)

Faery, Legends of Avalon, for xbox 360

Rating: 5.5/10; Average

Not recommended. There are countless RPGs that are better and you would be better off playing free fan created campaigns for something like Neverwinter Nights. Still if you get it for around $1 like I did, it is not a complete waste.

Faery is a mixture of action-adventure, (as you can freely fly around the 3D environments) and traditional JRPG turn based combat. You play as a faery, and you and the majority of enemies and npcs are actually the size of traditional faeries (about the size of a song bird or smaller). Many of the enemies are normal animals that would be no threat whatsoever to a human. This is a very interesting take on the giant monster fantasy trope.

The story, setting and characters are interesting. Unfortunately, the game is incomplete. The story ends abruptly without closure, and it is obvious that there should be around 3 or 4 times the actual content, though its low price is reasonable for the content that is in the game. It may be a good thing that the game does not last any longer though, because the actual gameplay is not much fun. The worlds are quite small with a small number of inhabitants, each of whom has a limited number of things to say. What they say about certain topics can change as you progress through quests, and sometimes you can return to tell an npc that you completed a quest and get a reward even though they were not the questgiver. Most quests are simple; talk to each npc until you find the one who knows what you have to do next, find items lying around, or kill a specific group of enemies. Occasionally it will be a little more involved, but quests are generally solved in a matter of minutes. I did like how some quests can be solved through battle or an alternate non-violent approach.

There are only a fixed number of battles in the game, so no xp grinding, and each battle feels like a boss fight. One the one hand I like how every single battle is a serious affair, though on the other the high hp of enemies make the battles last a long time and they end up being fairly boring. Enemies are strong to either physical or magic, and sometimes weak to a specific element. Hp is restored after battle, and there is no mana. Instead, all but the basic spells have a cooldown. Each element has a specific status effect that can be randomly applied, though only air and water do something other than additional damage. The extent of the tactics in this game are whether to burn down one target at a time, or spread the damage and status effects out. For example, casting an area spell on 3 targets will do 3X damage spread out for the same cost as 2 single target casts. Is it better to get a free hit on an enemy you will not be killing for a while, or to focus lesser total damage on a single target to reduce your incoming damage sooner? There is also a front and back row, though the back row reduces all damage a character deals (including magic, so it sucks).

Overall, the game is an interesting concept though has a long way to go to match proper RPGs. Combat, quests and party management need improvement. It does not help that the game is pretty much a paid shareware version (think something like the first campaign of Doom), with nothing afterwards.

Pro

• Interesting story, characters and setting
• Leveling up the main character involves choosing from multiple options for a specific body part, which also changes your physical appearance. For example, what kind of wings or tail to have
• Npc dialogue can change as quests advance or are completed
• Save any time outside of battle

Con

• Boring combat where enemies have high hp and there is not a lot of tactics
• Difficulty only increases enemy damage. Easy is a joke and you only have a chance on hard because enemies target randomly
• No benefit for playing higher difficulty
• No option to switch party members in battle
• Party members cannot equip gear
• Party members are significantly weaker than the main
• When party members ask which of 2 abilities to learn, you are not given any kind of description to make an informed choice
• No option to learn Cyclone (the area wind spell) if you choose wind wings, which gimps the character and locks out later upgrades
• Third person camera is awkward in interiors
• No map
• A few spelling/grammar errors, and one name which was a reference to the string variable rather than the proper text
• Character creator that uses sliders without labelling each setting
• Mostly boring simple quests
• Quest log does not provide direction. Some quest objectives are difficult to find
• Choices that have little effect
• No currency, ability to get new potions, or anything to do with all the gear you will not use
• Incomplete and short