Ultimate Power

Ultimate Power is a short game, I clocked a little over 2 hours to finish it and I'm pretty sure I hit all the points. Everything about the game is summed up in the title. The bad guy has the Ultimate Power; it's your job to go get it.


See, told you.

As far as the story line goes it's the classic tale, hero sent on quest, gets a band of companions together, fights the good fight, and, well, no. Firstly it's just the one companion and she doesn't get asked so much as threatens you and another one later who really doesn't want to be there and hates you. Really HATES you, though she started off by loving you in a weird obsessive compulsive I want to keep you in a cage and take you out and play with when I'm bored kind of love, go figure. So it's not so much a band of brothers as a dysfunctional family with parental abandonment and sibling rivalry issues. Alright so not the CLASSIC tale then.


Ok, maybe serial killer issues too.


Fine, there is no maybe about it.

Confused? Good, let's continue.

I should probably say I liked this game, I mean I really liked this game. Not for game-play/graphics/ music, though they all work perfectly well together, and they fit the structure and dynamic. They should, they are the default and whether you like or dislike developers relying on that it doesn't change the fact they are designed to work seamlessly together. They do, but they are nothing to write home about.

I liked it because of the feel, as nebulous a statement as that it, it's the truth.

The battle system is the default as well and the early monsters are pretty easy but that may just be because I found the secret room (yes there is one) which gives you a huge chunk of change to buy the best weapons straight off the bat, so I may have skewed the battle balance a little there. Still as you play the first part on your own being able to take out the monsters in a couple of rounds is important, it's not like there is anyone one there to revive you.


Fourth wall, what fourth wall? Still - Yay, secret room!

I've written a couple of posts on the game-page and I'm going to reiterate a little of what I said because for me the fun of the game was the set-up more than anything else. This was a fun romp through what appears to be the final part of a game. It was like the developer decided, oh bugger all the lead up, the bit that players like is the final end battle, the showdown and dénouement so that's what they are getting. As a player we don't get the amnesiac hero's back story, the world falling under the sway of demonic hordes, his valiant fight and ultimate sacrifice, with one imagines a like-minded band of companions. No what we get is him being brought back into the world (from that unseen but imagined love-nest/cage combo thing) to fight yet again against the bad guys and just thrown in feet first. The whole being dead is not an obstacle appears to be a theme in this one, since of the three characters you control by the time you get to the end, two are dead, but walking around and one is enslaved and wishes she was dead.

The serial killer lady (sorry Kori) is also at the end of her journey, in fact the only reason you meet her where/when you do is because she like you is looking for the Ultimate Power ( I really want to add ™ to that), and even though she's certifiably nuts she works as a travelling companion. Just don't turn your back on her, at least not until after she dies.

There are a few puzzles, one is logic based and the other couple are memory. The first memory one can be a little challenging because the villain you are supposed to be copying is fast, as well as being a smart-arse, and the strobe light effects are a little off-putting but with a bit of patience you'll get there and then you can kick his arse and turn his corpse into something pretty and useful. I'm not kidding, literally pretty useful. Though he does wax lyrical before he shuffles off the mortal coil. That's also a bit of theme; most of the villains do in fact get that last dying breath speech. Usually designed to kick your ego in the teeth or make you rethink your preconceptions.

There aren't many places to visit, a single village/town with some interesting characters that mostly don't just say the same thing and actually grow during the course of your adventure.


Trust me, talk to the little girl. Then lean on the shift key.

There is also the destroyed sanctuary where you meet Kori, and that ruin in itself is almost the epitome of the game. Who destroyed it, how was it destroyed, when, where, why? It doesn't matter, and you never find out. What's past is prologue.

In addition there is the evil overlord's castle, an underground dungeon/hell mouth and the temple to the Goddesses.


Yes, you can get the chests, and no you never meet the spider that spun those webs.

But then again, there aren't supposed to be many locations, this is a fin-de-siècle game. Your job is to get the Ultimate Power and become, well something else. It's not to travel the length and breadth of the land. Think Frodo after Cirith Ungol not after the eleventy-first birthday party in the Shire - and if you don't get that reference, what are you doing playing fantasy games?

This game isn't going to sweep any awards, or be hailed as the best thing since fermenting potatoes to make vodka, but it isn't meant to be, it's meant to be fun, with a side order of deep concepts to make it better than average.

If you've got a couple of hours to spare and an open attitude give this a go. If for nothing else than to encourage a new game-maker, and we always need more of those.