Ravenlok is the third sport in developer Cococucumber’s self-described voxel trilogy, a sequence that’s largely unconnected other than its strikingly boxy visible fashion and some characters. Launching straight onto Sport Go, Ravenlok is an action-adventure aimed youthful players and informal gamers who need one thing mild and breezy. It’s the gaming equal of a bedtime story.
You play as Lily, a younger woman busy exploring the home that her Grandmother left to her dad and mom out in some unidentified rural haven. However within the barn a secret lurks, a mirror that drags Lily into one other world dominated by an evil queen that has cursed the land. In each nook and cranny, in each teapot and teacup, you’ll discover C.S Lewis’ Alice in Wonderland. Ravenlok is closely impressed by the basic story of Alice’s tumble into the rabbit gap, from its evil Queen guarded by card troopers to the Mad Hatter internet hosting a tea celebration. Like Alice herself, Lily has fallen right into a world the place the standard guidelines don’t appear to use, the place one thing unusual and fantastic lurks behind each nook.
In true fantasy fashion, Lily is the hero of this fable, taking on protect and sword because the prophesised Ravenlok who will slay the Queen and save the realm. Alongside the way in which, she’ll make buddies with a white rabbit, free the soot bunnies, assist out a witch and possibly even be again in time for dinner. All of this takes place in a beautiful, vibrant world constructed of tiny cubes that give Ravenlok a putting aesthetic. Whereas the degrees you wander by aren’t huge, they’re splendidly realised home windows right into a fantasy world that I’d like to see extra of, however alas Ravenlok solely supplies the smallest of glimpses. Using voxels is fascinating as a result of from a distance you possibly can’t inform that all the things is manufactured from squares. It’s not till you look intently that you simply discover how all the things is constructed from hundreds of cubes to create Ravenlok’s beautiful visuals.
The story is straightforward and charming, instructed solely by textual content bins. Whereas this implies there isn’t a lot depth to the story or to the characters, the simplicity is superb for youthful players who in all probability don’t need to spend a lot time studying by a novel’s value of wordy waste. The largest disgrace of the minimal storytelling is that the sport references Lily’s bond to the varied fairytale creatures she encounters with out ever actually exhibiting it. At one level she refers to all of them as ‘household’ and but she’s solely exchanged a number of sentences with them, and people have been principally expositional.
Accessible on: Xbox, PC
Reviewed On: PC
Launch Date: 04/05/2023
Developed by: Cococucumber
Revealed by: Cococucumber
That drawback extends to Lily herself. She has no persona, no actual motivations for doing what she’s doing. She doesn’t even seem like fazed that she has been pulled into a very alien and fantastical world, or that she is now busy slicing by a number of hundred enemies. I’m not saying she must be wracked with guilt or one thing, however some type of response can be good.
I need to be clear, although – I don’t assume it is a enormous challenge. Ravenlok is extra of a kids’s fairy story, one which doesn’t need to get in the way in which of really enjoying it. Contemplating that is geared toward youthful players or extra informal gamers the choice to give attention to preserving folks within the sport is comprehensible, and youngsters’s storybooks sometimes don’t spend numerous time crafting deep characters and tales.
Most of what you’ll be doing exploring the small ranges as a way to discover essential gadgets. It’s a basic piece of videogame design, actually: the gate to the Queen is locked and the one option to open it’s to search out three particular keys scattered internationally. In an effort to discover these, you want to assist out the inhabitants, often by doing a number of fetch quests after which duking it out in a boss battle, like preventing Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum. When you’ve ever performed a videogame in your life, it’s fairly acquainted stuff.
Within the evaluation information despatched with the sport, the builders point out eager to make Ravenlok’s fight accessible to everybody, they usually’ve definitely completed that. There’s a single assault button that makes Lily swipe her sword back and forth at a velocity which might make Tinder customers jealous. This will get augmented by 4 particular skills which can be progressively unlocked over the 3-5 hours journey, and these do issues like hurling some balls of frost that mechanically monitor targets or a flurry of sword swings which can be excellent for giant teams of foes which you’ll usually encounter.
On the defensive facet of issues, you get two choices for preserving Lily protected: a fundamental block and a swift dodge. Each have their makes use of however I admit to discovering the block largely ineffective all through the sport and relied way more on the dodge. The explanation for that is that Lily’s sword assault additionally interrupts enemies, so it’s fairly simple to maintain even massive mobs in examine by swiping like mad and dashing round. Second, a lot of the assaults that the boss monsters hurl your approach are higher dodged than blocked.
When you’ve learn by the final couple of paragraphs and are available to the conclusion that fight sounds easy, you’d be proper. The hardcore gamer in me desires to scold the builders for a way fundamental fights are in Ravenlok, however I must preserve that half in examine as a result of the criticism simply isn’t particularly reasonable. In the identical evaluation information I discussed earlier, Cococucumber speaks about how “particular consideration” was given to youthful video games who had graduated from Riverbond, considered one of their earlier video games. As somebody who has been enjoying video games for one thing like 25 years, it may be onerous to place myself again into the mindset of somebody who hasn’t spent dozens of hours enjoying Satan Could Cry, so I did the subsequent smartest thing and handed the sport to my niece, who’s 9 years previous. She discovered the fight to be enjoyable and loved attending to slice up heaps of dangerous guys, and the abilities added only a contact of depth for her.
The enemy AI is a bit of unusual as a result of when you ignore them and run by areas, they gained’t react. I can’t fairly work out if it is a mistake or a deliberate design choice. It definitely makes backtracking easier since you possibly can simply choose out of preventing, and even when a number of of them do react to your presence they’re approach too sluggish to catch up. This might have been completed to cease the simplistic fight from turning into too repetitive. Or the enemy AI is dumber than a hedgehog on heroin.
Talking of dumb, there are a number of “stealth” sections within the sport. I really want you to think about air quotes dropping closely across the phrase stealth, there, as a result of enemies can’t truly spot you, per se. It’s potential to face in entrance of them and it gained’t rely as being caught. No, the one option to fail is to fairly actually contact them. Once more, this retains it easy for youths for informal gamers, however it may well additionally really feel like a bug somewhat than a part of the sport, nearly as if anyone forgot to program a cone of imaginative and prescient into the enemies.
Fallen foes will drop a foreign money that you could hand over to a particular character to stage up, rising your general well being and harm. On this approach, the sport has a barely customisable issue as a result of when you neglect to stage up then enemies will begin to take longer to defeat. In idea, then, you possibly can keep away from levelling altogether as much as make Ravenlok more difficult, though I feel that’s a nasty choice as a result of enemies turn into strolling harm sponges.
There are a number of puzzles sprinkled all through the sport, too, simply easy little mind teasers to assist break up the fight. These are sometimes a case of discovering a number of symbols hidden across the space or counting statues as a way to enter a code. Once more, for an skilled gamer, it’s all fairly commonplace stuff however for youthful followers I feel they’re properly judged diversions.
All through the varied locales, you’ll stumble throughout non-obligatory side-quests, and I like that the sport doesn’t attempt to provide grand rewards for them. In return for locating some teacups, scouring the realm for collectible figurines or participating in a mini-boss battle your reward is often a nifty hat or a number of well being potions or a little bit of coin that you need to use within the store to purchase some bombs. However in any other case, they are surely utterly non-obligatory.
Navigating mentioned locales generally is a little troublesome because of the restrictive digital camera. Though not utterly locked into place, you’ve got minimal management of the place you’re trying. You can’t, for instance, spin the digital camera all the way in which round. That may often make discovering issues hidden within the setting a bit of awkward as a result of you must blindly stumble towards the digital camera so that it’s going to shift. It bugged me a bit of, and on a few events resulted in me being unable to see or working headfirst into enemies I couldn’t see.
There’s an old-school design vibe to Ravenlok that I actually respect. The button-mashy preventing, the mounted digital camera views and the simple storytelling took me again to my days on the PS1, particularly the sound the little textual content bins make after they pop up.
Ravenlok delights in its straightforwardness. It’s not making an attempt to be an epic triple-A journey or a deeply significant story of morality. As an alternative, it’s content material to be an enthralling little gem that’s nice for youthful players or anybody simply on the lookout for some stress-free, relaxed gaming. Supplied you perceive what you’re leaping into, Ravenlok shall be a nice and cozy option to spend 3 or 4 hours hacking by a bunch of brain-dead foes and admiring the colourful panorama.
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