THE FROZEN WORLD

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen (and people who are neither!!), to the publicly acclaimed The Frozen World!

Intro and RPG Maker history babble
I had played this game long, long, LONG ago. In my memory, it was a single character experience -- I never got so far as to getting the second character. So I decided to replay it, over 10 years later no less -- and what a pleasant surprise it was.
Dating from a time before XP even thought of being released, back then, RPG Maker was a wholly different scene. A commercial RPG Maker game was just... Unconceivable. Resource packs didn't exist, as people freely used Sprite rips widely available online, or ripped graphics themselves. And, of course, differently from the sea of professionally made, publicly available free plugins for RPG Maker MV, the concept of scripting within RPG maker didn't exist. That meant it was very common to see complex, creative RPG systems made entirely within events - with all he pluses and drawbacks that come out of it. Things like tile-based menus have an inherently very different, if clunkier, feel to things produced by scripts.
They also cater to limitations within the eventing engine that had devs be creative and think outside the box. All that together produces games that are a relic of time, much different from what we see today -- but still quality -- offering an insight on another era of indie RPG making, of which The Frozen World couldn't be a better quality representative.

Let me start with the star of the game:
The gameplay
The Frozen World features entirely custom systems made through events on RPG Maker 2000. It features an unique "plate" system, allowing you to equip commands on different levels, consuming more stamina but having higher multipliers the higher the level-; it also forces you to use a maximum of 5 abilities per characters, only. A good deal of the game is spent by yourself, and the trend repeats once you get the second character -- although each character contributes 1 stamina to the pool every turn (later increasing to 2) which means, for instance, that having 3 characters means you could attack with level 1 abilities with all 3, use a level 1 aility with one and have the others stock stamina for the next turn, or use all that stamina on a level 3 ability -- a quite flexible and inventive system.

I had a lot of fun out of it, it's very unique and works well around rm2k's eventing limitations, so I have to rate it highly.

Now for things of notice, though, it is very very hinderingly clunky. As in, you're teleported away from the battle and into the command selection map every turn. Selecting and equipping commands/items is bizarrely clunky, which is understandable as a product of tile-based menus and systems -; something not really done here in 2019 so it's something worthy of notice and even appreciation, as clunky as it may be.
Now saying so, the clunkiness mostly wears off by the end of the first dungeon or so and you won't even notice all of that.

Final Score: 4/5 -- It'd be a 6/5 (really), but the clunkiness detracted 2 points.

The Story
Now, the story took me by surprise -; initially the game's pretty light on story and has this sort of zelda-like map layout focusing mostly on fighting monsters, discovering things and having one-liners with NPCs. The game doesn't get a lot more complex in terms of plot, but it has a few great twists by the end, and I find the characters to be very well characterized and surprisingly endearing, something I wasn't expecting from the beginning. Also Lutine's character design is way cool, just sayin'.
I got moved by the finale!!! That doesn't happen a lot.

Final Score: 5/5

The Graphics

The Frozen World uses a mixture of RM2k's RTP (mainly for characters) with First Seed Material tiles and some SNES rips of games I don't recognize and are probably beat'em ups (and Chrono Trigger).
It is a very distinctly timed look, that dates back to that era of RPG Making. Pretty sure this was before the Great Mappers of History arose and the Legendary Three Tile Rule was born, also, so the mapping is all over the place.
It is entirely funcional and serviceable, but aesthetically ranges from very pleasant to just floating tiles with no support or incoherent elevation.

Now for the battles, I find The Frozen World's visual battle setup extremely endearing. Charactera face the enemies (which are really cute, distinctive sprites probably from Lufia) against very characteristic, "lush" (for an rpg maker game of the time) 3D backgrounds. I can't recognize where they're from. Now, it's a shame the game lacks animations for attacks and such, ubt in a sense I like the minimalistic pacing of the battles and if it featured huge RTP animations over characters and enemies, I would hate it. So the choice to use a simplistic flashing was wise; the characters all colorfully jump when acting so it's still engaging and interesting.

Final Score: 3.5/5 - Inconsistent mapping detracted from a 4, inconsistent graphics dectracted from a 5.



Verdict: A game that's both a product of its time and that aged refreshingly well, I recommend this game for anyone looking for dungeon crawling fun, as anyone wanting inspiration for their own custom systems, a sweet short story, or a look back at the old days of RPG Maker. Really, this game turns 16 years old this year iirc! That's the drinking age in a lot of countries.

Hope y'all enjoy it, and I may be beating around the bush reviewing a game that's already got plenty of reviews but I wanted to add my 5 cents. Also, I may go back and add screens later. Regardless, hope you all have a nice day!! And I'm off to check the rest of Lysander's stuff : D <3