Untold Legends Review

30 Jul 2008 at 00:52:16 by Jim Diaz
Systems used to review this title: (PSP)

With the recent launch of Sony’s highly anticipated, portable PlayStation game machine PSP, we were excited to get our hands on one of the marquee launch titles so we could put the system through its paces.  Our title of choice was the first RPG game for the PSP – Sony Online Entertainment’s Untold Legends: Brotherhood of the Blade and we are happy to report that it proves to be a perfect example of how easy it is, to get pulled into the PSP gaming experience.

The most obvious appeal of the PSP is its beautiful LCD screen and graphics engine behind Untold Legends does a commendable job of taking advantage of the graphical power of the system.  I kid you not but it feels like you’re playing a handheld version of Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance.  It’s not identical in terms of the graphical prowess of the Xbox or PS2 but it’s still pretty impressive for a handheld system.  The first thing that came to my mind when I started playing Untold Legends on the PSP is that I am way overdue in getting an LCD TV for my Xbox.  The PSP screen is that good and Untold Legends shows that the dawn of next generation handheld gaming is truly upon us (sorry Nintendo DS fans) and it’s coming from a new challenger in the handheld space, Sony.

Untold Legends follows the basic RPG formula of ridding enemy creatures from the land so don’t expect any more than a straight-up hack and slash RPG.  The good thing is that the same can be said about the RPG structure, which retains all of the detail that you would find in either your console or PC.  Untold Legends has more than enough weapons, armor, spells and enhancements to satisfy any hardcore RPG fan.  You get a choice of four playable characters to choose from – Knight, Alchemist, Druid, or Berserker.  The major difference between all four characters comes down to the types of weapons or spells that each class is able to use.  The Knight obviously favors heavy combat, while the Alchemist is all about spells.  The Druid uses a combination of both heavy combat and spells.  Last but not least is the Berserker, who incorporates savage melee attacks and long-range weaponry.  The core combat is not all that different for each character since it really boils down to melee attacks, ranged attacks, and unique spells. 

The thing that does keep it different is that fact that each character has access to unique weapons and spells, which makes it worthwhile to go through the game with each class of character.      

There are too many weapons and spells to list here but you should be able to find more than a few favorites among the melee weapons, bows, and spells.  I logged the most time playing as a Knight so I migrated toward melee weapons and the variety found in this game is quite impressive indeed.  With the availability of so many melee weapons, it came as utter joy when I leveled up to open up the dual-wielding ability.  Slapping two swords in the hands of your Knight and executing special moves is what dungeon slashing is all about!

The enemy AI is not bad even though there tends to be an abundance of enemy rushing and swarming attacks. The good thing is that enemies will counter your attacks by retreating – either to get a better position for counter-attacks or strictly a defensive move.  The controls’ blocking move helps to fend off enemy attacks but it’s execution is a bit disjointed since you have to first hold down the right trigger and then hit the ‘O’ button.  You do get used to it but a one-button block would have made a lot more sense since blocking is so important in the hand-to-hand combat.

On the other side of the weapons table, the range weapons suffer from the usual; “I can’t see what I’m shooting at!” syndrome.  There is no “line of sight” guide to assist you so you have to rely on audible cues such as the sound of the projectile striking an enemy or enemy grunts to being hit.  This shouldn’t bother most fans of third-person RPGs and if it does, you can always revert back to your trusty sword and shield.

With all of the available items in the game, you’ll find yourself constantly trying to increase the weight carrying rating of your character.  There is a ton of stuff to pick up so you’ll need to choose wisely when grabbing stuff from chests or defeated foes.  I wish the developers would have featured a way to look at the attributes of an object before picking it up since having a full load forces the player to drop an object and then pick up the new one to analyze it.  Fortunately, the selling and buying of items is easy since you can teleport to the main town (Arwen) and back through the game’s main menu.

The skill tree is pretty straightforward with branching for range weapon and melee weapon enhancements.  The special moves for melee weapons attacks are essential to your success since the standard slash goes only so far, especially when facing a pack of enemies or a boss.  Special moves are assigned to either the triangle or O button via the D-pad, which is a bit c*bersome since you have to scroll in a circular mode.  The real downer is that you can only assign two buttons for special moves, yet you earn roughly a dozen special moves as you level up. It’s not that bad since the combo moves are fun and effective to pull off but why not have the ability to string more moves together.  Maybe I’m asking for too much here but what a great way to move the game past the standard hack and slash fare with a highly varied fighting component.

In terms of graphics, the sword and spell attacks are what really show off the graphical power of Untold Legends.  Pulling off any of the special fighting moves or kicking a spell into gear should make any of your PSP-less buddies a tad envious.  The environments are a nice mixture of indoor and outdoor levels that have just enough visual detail to keep your travels interesting.  Not all is perfect though since texture seams are highly visible in a lot of the levels, especially at the start of the game.  It doesn’t pull down the game that much but it is an obvious detraction from what is otherwise, a very slick looking game.  While I’m on this topic, I do wish the bottomless caverns in the game had been functional instead of just being invisible barriers.  The possibility of either you falling through them while moving through the levels or pushing your enemies into them during battles would have added greatly to the overall gameplay experience. 

Speaking of enemies, the creatures are also a graphical plus with a wide variety - ranging from Ent-looking tree creatures to ninja-fighting women.  The great thing is that you can zoom in from your top-down view to get a closer view of these fiends.  It is at this level where you can actually marvel at the detail of your own character as well as the enemy creatures.  You also get a better view of the crumbling effect when they die, which is fun to watch (especially the sword-wielding skeletons). 

Untold Legends features multiplayer in ad-hoc mode only (local PSP to PSP), but no infrastructure mode (Internet).  This is strange coming from the developer of the most successful online multiplayer game, EverQuest.  Hopefully, we will see a future version of the game that will enable gamers to play over the Internet.  The only other items that I could find fault with was the lack of a quicksave feature and slightly long load times.  With saves, you have to go through the main menu, which is a bit of a pain that an autosave feature would have addressed.  The load times could have definitely been shorter but this one is difficult to pass judgement on since I haven’t had a chance to compare the load times with other PSP games.  

It’s difficult to find any serious faults with Untold Legends as SOE has down a stellar job of bringing an RPG to the PSP launch.  It is not the most innovative of games but it hits all the fundamentals in providing a fun and addictive RPG experience.  If you’re an RPG fan and have a PSP, then owning Untold Legends is the right cure for your portable RPG fix.

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