*Game was provided free for this review
Table of Contents
Overview
Those who grew up during the SNES era of gaming are probably familiar with Quartet and Squaresoft’s offerings during the time. Shrine’s Legacy, available on Steam, is a game that follows those footsteps; particularly borrowing heavily from Soul Blazer and Secret of Mana, It gets a lot of things right but a couple things VERY wrong. Do two wrongs still make a right good time? Read on to find out
Art
Graphics are on point and perfect for what Shrine’s Legacy is going for. Clean pixels, smooth animations, and great designs will greet you during your entire journey. The music is kind of middling BUT it works. You’ll find yourself so focused and admiring what you are looking at that it all meshes together nicely. Def the highlight of the game.
Story
This is an RPG and so the story is more important here than other aspects in a review, Sadly poor use of dramatic irony, spelling mistakes, forced references that are not hiding the source material, flat characters, and a plot that is too convenient and quick to move past itself all culminate to make for a very bad story. A perfect example of this is in the main character’s name: Rio Shrines. Those familiar with the indie game Quartet will recognize this as a name that was being made fun of. So out the gate you have a purposeful reference being made at the expense of the plot. I get this is a game that isn’t taking itself too seriously, and it has at times made me smile, but it is in dire need of an editor and a partial rewrite.
The good news though is there is just enough here to make the journey make sense and get yourself started. Basically You are from a hero’s lineage and because evil has showed up and forced you to act, by invading your town, you are now gathering magic stones to vanquish it. Don’t need much more than that tbh. Also good is that being an Action RPG means the combat is more important and makes the story not need to do any real heavy lifting. Serviceable but in need of a proof read and edit session.
Gameplay
The other glaring weak point in Shrine’s Legacy is the combat. This is a shame because everything built around the combat is amazing. With some refinement it would be the best part of the game and make it a must buy. The issues come from controlling the character. There is this magnetic pull towards cardinal directions so doing diagonals are almost non existent. You will start moving at an angle only to be forcibly pulled in another direction entirely. It’s jarring and makes positioning yourself to solve puzzles and attack enemies an exercise in frustration. The reaction between attacks is also more sluggish than the games it looks to emulate. This means you fiddle a bunch to be in the right spot to attack or move something only to get hit or walk into a damaging part of the environment,
Other than those issues Everything is great: You have equipable gems to help build a character for the situation you are in. There’s a magic system that is useful in and outside of combat. Fun little side quests and distractions as you look for the gems to defeat the evil Aklor… You even get Soulblazer like dungeons where defeating enemies will unlock new areas! The puzzles are satisfying as well. My favorite part though is it has 2 player co-op. At any point you can let someone play with you and this is this games saving grace. You will want to play this with someone to help make things easier and more fun.
Honestly it’s real cozy and has charm but the moment you want to move around the map or fight… Things get messy real fast.
Conclusion
Shrine’s legacy is a game that isn’t complete. It’s also hard to recommend to anyone as a solo experience outside of the die hard Mana and Quintet fans in it’s current form. All they need to do though is fix that movement tech and clean the script for spelling mistakes and it’d easily be worth the $18 price tag. I’m going to revisit this game in 6 months to see if anything changes cause I really want this game to be successful. As it stands however; there just isn’t enough here to balance the fun I had with the frustration I endured unless you have a buddy to play with.
