Fable of Heroes II: The Dark Ritual

I very recently finished playing this game, and was quite surprised to discover that it has no reviews! Well, let's remedy that now, shall we?

Disclaimer: I will try to avoid any major spoilers, but there will be a couple as I have to cover some aspects of the later game.

Graphics:
Mostly stock VX, as far as I can tell, I do like the map design and some of the towns/dungeons, even if they are stock tilesets.

Gameplay:
Battles, movement, and party interactions are pretty standard VX stuff, nothing too terribly adventurous from my perspective, but solid and worked correctly. Balance was just a little off in the beginning, I got creamed very early on, and needed to grind a little more than I would have liked, but the balance became a little better as the game wore on, and especially once you got a fuller party.

Where this game stands out in this category is the auto-use of acquired features/tools, somewhat similar to a Zelda-like experience, in that you cannot get to certain areas without finding tools - which adds a nice touch. The tools themselves are required to advance and complete the storyline, and there is the standard 'broken bridge' use of them, but they do offer a notable additional value-add to the game; you can go back to previously done caves and get to places (and loot!) that you could not before. This is well implemented, and completely optional, and as in many games, can get the player some great items - often well worth the backtracking. Once you get the airship, this relic-hunting process becomes far easier.

I also appreciated the extra high-value grinding area with good exp/drops. The fact that it is completely optional added value to the game for me, although the reward for killing the optional boss in the alternate dimension did not make sense, I only got money, was there supposed to be a nice item drop with a percentage chance ? If so, make it a 100% drop, as by the time players can kill that boss (arguably as tough as the final boss), money is not really much of a reward, a nice item drop would have been better received.

Sound/Music:
Nice mix of some stock tracks with some well-chosen borrowed music from other games, most notably for me was the use of Dream of the Shore from Chrono Cross for the overworld map. The fidelity is consistent and there was no point for me where the sounds conflicted or seemed out of place. As far as I can tell, mostly stock sound effects for battle, which is fine as they are appropriately used.

Story:
One of the weaker points of this game, as it is pretty much the standard "Evil magic is re-discovered and threatens the world once again, oh no!" - I grant that just about every video game ever produced in a fantasy setting, commercial or not, has borrowed at least some of this theme, but the storyline and its execution was too predictable at times; in order for evil to be effective it has to be nefarious, meaning that the bad guys need to do something unpredictable at some point, or you really can't take them (it?) too seriously. Adding a few unexpected twists and turns can make a game go from average to good (even great) in the player's mind and make a game more memorable.

Replay Value:
Can't honestly say I would want to go back and replay this right away as there is pretty much only 1 way to progress through the game that I could see.

Overall:
Really not a bad effort, especially considering that this is the developer's first game solo. I enjoyed playing this game.

Please take any criticism as constructive, and I look forward to seeing what you can do with #3!

Score: 3.5/5