Players learned to carefully balance their physical and magical attacks and take advantage of the environment and opponents. ![]() ![]() Players could even spend points that they had earned by defeating opponents to increase their stats and abilities. It was possible for gamers to have dozens of different experiences each time they played. Guardian Heroes game offered many paths to follow. But to be fair the fighting game Fatal Fury had featured a similar mechanic years earlier. No other brawler had ever offered this gameplay mechanic before. It could also be done to spread out the sometimes chaotic action. To give players some freedom, Treasure made it so they could jump up to two levels into the background to fight or escape opponents. However that also meant that wave of opponents would also be able to approach from the front and back on the same plane. Keeping opponents on the same plane eliminated those missed opportunities. In a typical brawler if a player did not properly line up an attack after entering the command then it was a wasted strike. Characters could perform complex combo attacks on opponents, similar to fighting games, which required advanced commands. The gameplay took place on a 2-dimensional plane rather than on an open field as in most brawlers. The pacing between story and action moments was well put together. Players had to quickly learn the control and magic system while a tavern they were staying in was burning to the ground. The game actually began right in the middle of the action where soldiers from the kingdom were trying to recover a magical sword that Samuel had gotten. Being able to know when to trigger the teammate abilities was crucial to beating some of the harder bosses. This character could be set to attack, defend or even go berserk by players. Treasure found a way to give single players that experience by providing them with a computer controlled Undead Warrior. The game, like the best brawlers worked best with multiple players. Players learned what character combinations worked best for them and their style of gameplay. Each of course with their own strengths, attacks, magic and weaknesses. Players could choose from one of five character types, a warrior named Samuel, a female knight named Serena, Genji the ninja, a magician named Randy and a cleric named Nicole. Despite the slow-down issues the game was so well designed and executed that it caught players and reviewers completely by surprise. ![]() Actually Treasure had pushed the hardware past its breaking point, as the game often allowed so many characters on screen and effects to be happening at once that the Saturn would slow down in the middle of the most frenetic battles. The game was released on the Sega Saturn and took advantage of the 32-bit processor and increased storage capacity that CD media had over the 16-bit cartridges. Guardian Heroes was their entry into the fantasy brawling genre. The independent studio was known for their original ideas and amazing animation. Treasure had a short but memorable list of games at that point in the market. Yet Shadow over Mystaria had a rival that year, a game that some would argue as being an even better experience and for many the greatest brawler ever released. No 3D MMO, with its point-and-click mechanics and canned animations could ever hope to match the actual interactivity and gameplay that the brawler provided. The artistic stylizations that sprites provided added an additional layer of appeal to the game. Players had real-time fights, real-time inventory management and reason to work as a team in order to survive in a fantastic but dangerous world. Shadow over Mystaria demonstrated how if the brawler were designed properly then it could be the perfect action-RPG.
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