The adventure starts off with the main protagonist on a boat heading for the village Inoa, he's been having nightmarish dreams about the place for quite some time and feels he has to travel there to figure out what's going on. The boat shipwrecks due to an unusually strong storm and he wakes up on the shores close to the very village he was heading for. One of the inhabitants, named Jess, finds you and expresses how lucky you are to be alive, claiming that none of the remains of the ship were larger than his own fist. Later on it turns out that Alundra has the ability to enter people dreams and that everyone in the village has a terrible curse related to, take a guess, dreams. The story itself is actually really dark and in strong contrast to similar puzzle isometric rpgs such as for example The Legend of Zelda: A link to the past.
The village of Inoa, quite similar to A link to the past, is it not?
The graphics is somewhat simple compared to technically advanced games like Final Fantasy 7 that set a high standard in 1997 with its 3D computer graphics with polygons. The 32bit graphic style appealed more to nostalgic gamers from the famous SNES era and it looks gorgeous even to this date. That being said, I think the trend of the indie games being pixelated has made me more open to this graphic style instead of the e.g. polygon style.
One of the more difficult puzzles in Alundra
One of the best traits of Alundra is the sometimes frustrating puzzles. Note that by frustrating I don't mean that the puzzles in the game is illogical or insanely hard, but just hard enough to challenge your brain through word problems, switch orders, etc.
One of the bosses
The gameplay is all about where to position yourself according to the enemies and bosses, avoiding their rapid movement or projectiles heading your way. In terms of boss fights the gameplay is somewhat similar to the shoot'em up genre, since you have to move around a pattern of moving objects they keep sending in your direction, avoiding their direct attacks and manage to put in some hits with your dagger, sword or some of the ranged equipments you get throughout the game.
Personally I bought this game around the millennia change and it was as highly addictive then as when me and my brother picked it up again just a few days ago. I you like the isometric puzzle rpg genre and wants a darker Zelda game, then Alundra is the game for you. The game is currently available at Playstation Store. Enjoy your gaming!
The European Alundra cover
