izigame.me

Very interesting concept, but far from perfect. Please see the feedback breakdown below if you are employed by Gamera Interactive or a player interested in purchasing Alaloth: Champions of the Four Kingdoms.

PROS:
- Fresh (although figuratively two-dimensional) skill-based isometric combat system that could foreseeably prompt widespread evolution within the genre if matured to a greater level of complexity.
- Subjectively appealing old-school art style.
- Mount & Blade style map navigation (although day/night cycles move too quickly and encounters are mind-numbingly repetitious/tedious).

CONS:
- The story is a cliche cookie-cutter fantasy fiction tale of a mortal champion rising to oppose evil deities. There is nothing inherently wrong with that, but I chuckled on at least one occasion due to seeing blatant rip-offs of other works (such as "The Retreat" being a carbon-copy allusion to Tolkien's elves sailing into "the west" to live in "the land of the gods" and in the light of the "elder trees"). ChatGPT was obviously used to generate all story and quest-related dialogue, rendering it boringly superficial and unworthy of the player's time.
- "Fighting Zones" (basically "missions" from any mobile game) are exactly that -- small areas, each marked with a set difficulty, that you can enter from the map to explore (sometimes it lets you choose to go left or right!) and fight enemies. Once you enter a zone, you cannot leave it unless you either die or get to the very end. Any "loot" that "drops" is lost unless the zone is successfully completed. Fighting Zones can be entered multiple times, but they are static and always the same. Implementation of random generation (at least involving the mobs) would help to offer some measure of replayability.
- The loot (if you can call it that) is not satisfying at all. When you kill an enemy, "loot" will show up as obtained on the screen. However, you do not actually receive that loot (or the ability to access it) until after clearing the entire "Fighting Zone." Most of the items you receive are the same few crafting items over and over (leather, bones, metal strap, etc). Enemies do also sometimes "drop" weapons, but the hard-coded lists are incredibly limited. For example, you might kill 20 goblins during a mission, and afterwards receive five identical copies of a common-quality "Rusty Sword," five identical copies of a common-quality "Wooden Shield," and two identical copies of an uncommon-quality "Goblin Shield." Regarding individual weapon stats/upgrades -- despite there being several tiers of quality, you will likely not even notice the difference in time-to-kill between an "epic" quality sword and a "common" one. It would be great to see randomized and more meaningful items/loot, as well as a manual looting system a la either Diablo or Baldur's Gate.
- The progression system is overly linear, growth does not feel tangible whatsoever, and leveling up is only achieved by clearing every second "Fighting Zone." It is not possible to get stronger by "grinding" because there is no "XP" system, and the myriad quests are generally a waste of time because of that. A traditional formula involving either experience points or "souls" would have proven far superior here for both short and long-term gameplay. Furthermore, there exists only a small handful of skills/traits to pick from (some of which can only be used X amount of times per "Fighting Zone"), with insufficient variety to offer truly unique play-styles. The same can be said about choice of weapon type, which has very little impact on how you approach combat.
- The AI leaves much to be desired. Enemies just run towards you in a beeline and do not attempt to dodge your attacks.
Similarly, the allies you can hire just stand there and soak up damage -- providing a decent distraction but dying very quickly in the process. You can revive your allies twice per Fighting Zone, which will get you through maybe two or three groups of enemies before you are on your own again.
- "Hardcore Mode" is an optional difficulty enhancer that you can activate after beating the game once. It increases the health pool and damage of enemies by 50%, and decreases player damage by 25%. Even "trash mobs" were already far too spongy by default. Almost doubling the time to kill them makes this game the most boring slog-fest I've had the displeasure of experiencing since mid-2000's Maplestory (which at least did have more than a semblance of progression to keep players engaged/hooked).

Frankly, I would not have purchased this title to begin with had I known in advance how weak the progression and looting systems were. But I'm glad I did, because the Work In Progress combat system was a refreshing treat -- even in its current unripe state. That's not to say that I can justifiably recommend purchasing this game. Not yet, anyhow. Its description reads "Baldur's Gate and Dark Souls had a baby!" If only. I hope that such a thing can one day be realized!