Avalon Code Review
Avalon Code, a new game for the Nintendo DS, presents a rather strange twist on the typical story-telling that's found within role-playing games. The developers, Matrix Software, decided that the idea of saving the world doesn't always have to be about preventing its end, and with the help of Rising Star Games this rather unique story has finally been brought to the Europe for players to experience.
After watching a very anime-esque intro sequence, players are able to begin their new adventure. The first decision they must make is whether to choose to play as a girl or a boy, and the second is whether they wish to rename their character. Should they choose not to, they will either take the role of Yumil or Tia and instantly be greeted by the Fire Spirit, Rempo, who introduces them to the Book of Prophecy. He informs them that the world is coming to an end, but they shouldn't bother trying to save it. Instead, they should record everything worth saving so that when the new world is born they can start afresh with all of the previous world's useful information. It's certainly an interesting formula and it adds a lot of choice and interesting gameplay elements for players to experiment with.
The game is played at a slight angle from a top down view on the top screen, while the book is available for players to use on the bottom screen with the stylus. All combat is real time and players are encouraged to roll to evade attacks, while attacking back with either one of two attack buttons; one controls the right hand weapon and the other the left hand weapon. The system works rather nicely, but the game is nowhere near as simple as it initially seems. Every enemy a player encounters can be scanned into the book, which becomes one of the main fundamentals of gameplay. Each page in the book is lined with boxes and each box contains a few words. These words can then taken out, moved around with other entities, and replaced to make monsters different for better or for worse depending on which way a player wants to look at it.
This is what makes the game interesting, as certain dungeons have bonus conditions. For example, kill fire-type enemies. By altering their DNA, players can actually generate fire-based enemies and fulfil the objective. Of course this is only one aspect of the game as mostly it simply revolves around defeating enemies, hitting switches and lighting torches. That said, even with a limited amount of challenges available, no one challenge is the same and some will even have players completely stumped. Occasionally some dead end rooms require a certain amount of speed to be obtained in order to receive a reward and it all just builds to the depth the game has on offer.
