Developer: Storybird Games, Wonderboy Bobi
Publisher: Look At My Game, PQube Limited
Platforms: PC
Tested On: PC
Aggelos – Review
Let’s take a trip down memory lane that will lead us to Aggelos, a throwback to the 16-bit era and NES days with a modern day touch. Fans of the Japanese retro game Wonder Boy can’t complain lately. After the release of Wonder Boy: The Dragon’s Trap last year, they are now treated with Aggelos, which reminds a lot of the Wonder Boy series.
On what seems like an ordinary day, you are drawn to the west woods. Within the first five minutes of the game, you stumble upon a damsel in distress. Answering her screams for help, you face the ‘fearful’ monster chasing her. After a minimum of hits, you claim victory and find out the girl is actually princess Lys of Lumen. She tells you the evil Valion kidnapped her some time ago and that she managed to escape. Her kingdom however is still in danger. While the princess is hiding out in your house, you begin your journey to Lumen. As far as saving the princess goes in this game, there isn’t much to it.
You soon meet her father King Gentel., who was blackmailed by our villain. If the king didn’t hand over the key of the kingdom, he would hurt his daughter. Seeing no other option, the king did as he was told, giving Valion access to the earth temple. The princess reveals how Valion told her he now has all four elements in his possession. The seer of the kingdom tells about the four elements in nature, which form the base of the world, the world of light. But where there is light, there is darkness. With the four elements Valion can transcend frontiers and open breaches between the world of light and the world of darkness. Now it’s up to someone to assimilate the elements’ essences. The seer has seen you in one of his visions. And so your real adventure begins.
We are introduced to the story after getting a first look at the game, which is nice. You can focus on the looks and feels of Aggelos a little first before listening to a king and a seer having a long conversation. While the story is interesting, it’s quite a simple one.
Graphics
Aggelos follows in the footsteps of its ancestors, making you feel rather nostalgic. Fitting into the 16-bit era perfectly, this game is bright and colorful through and through. All pixelated graphics of Aggelos are created with great detail, giving the players a beautiful, diverse world to discover, a good-looking character to play as and stunning enemies to fight against.
Sound
Aggelos stays true to the typical retro music of before, adding even more nostalgia to your gameplay. Even though the music is enjoyable, it doesn’t really stand out and even comes off as a little repetitive. The music changes along the way, adjusting to the challenges to come but is never very memorable. Nevertheless the game provides some cute tunes on your journey.
Gameplay
Aggelos is an action-adventure RPG. Move around using either your joypad or one of the three keyboard options (WASD, ZSQD or the arrow keys). Besides these controls you’ll only need to remember about four more controls before you master them. These will let you jump, attack with your sword and attack with the elements. So when it comes to this, the game is fairly basic and easy, no unnecessary difficulties here. Saving your progress is possible at certain indicated points.
On your journey you’ll encounter countless enemies. Defeating your opponents will start off easy. Since they show signs of repetitive behavior, it isn’t too hard to respond to their attacks. As you further progress in the game, enemies and bosses will have different attack patterns and weak spots, which will add a bit more of a challenge.
At the start you get a simple sword and some basic armor. Along the way you’ll be able to buy better swords and armor as you encounter stronger enemies. So money also plays a role in this game. Coins are easy to acquire, every slain opponent drops it. If you are in need of more money, just go back and play the same screen a couple of times as monsters respawn immediately after you leave a screen.
Besides using your sword to enter battles, you can also learn new abilities. Find items and gain powerful skills which will grant you access to new parts of the world. As you further progress in the game, you’ll find skills that can be used in previous parts of the world. If you choose to go back a little, you just might discover secret rooms you couldn’t enter before. Once you learn element attacks, you can smoothly switch between those and your sword attacks.
Leveling also plays a part in Aggelos. You probably won’t focus too much on it since it’s not that interesting but every time you level up, your health also refills. This comes in quite handy for example after fighting a boss. Speaking about your health, early on in the game you learn about herbs. These will automatically heal you when you’re out of health. This means that in the beginning dying isn’t one of your main concerns since you usually find a herb somewhere to help you.
Now if you’re a little lost and you need guidance, you can always travel back to the castle and find the seer. He will offer you some advice on where to go next. Don’t rely on him too much though, his help is always rather vague but if you’re completely lost he might give you a hint on where to go next.
Conclusion
Aggelos definitely succeeds as being both nostalgic and a tribute to the 16-bit era. The radiant graphics, throwback musical tunes and amazing gameplay will take up hours of your time on an end. Difficulty could be spiced up a little, certainly in the first part of the game. Even though there are lots of enemies to deal with, they are often too easy to defeat. As far as leveling goes, there isn’t enough to it. You barely pay any attention to it unless you’re almost dead, level up and regain all your health. It feels like the developers could do something more with this. Overall Aggelos is a beautiful game. Seeing as the game works best with joypad, the release of it for PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch later this year will most likely be a huge success.
Aggelos - Review,
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