On paper, Sacred Earth – Reverie is the kind of recreation I’d count on to get pleasure from. In any case, it’s a VN/RPG hybrid with point-and-click exploration mechanics, quick turn-based fight, excessive replayability that builds on previous actions, wonderful battle music, and a wealthy story with colourful characters: all indicators of a grand gaming journey. Sadly, Sacred Earth – Reverie‘s well-polished armor has a number of chinks, preserving it from being a stellar expertise, with one important, irritating weak level that nearly made me drop it solely for a time.
Sacred Earth – Reverie revolves round protagonists Cain and Abelle. You decide which one to play primarily based on a persona dialogue alternative within the recreation’s starting portion. Our heroes have been as soon as profitable knights till a fateful battle between the realm’s human forces and their sworn enemy, a strong entity recognized solely because the Demon Queen. The decimation from the battle disillusioned Cain and Abelle, main them to desert their knightly careers. So, they retire to the outskirts of human society till phrase reaches them that the Demon Queen is on the transfer. Burning with questions in regards to the combating’s goal, they set off with a colourful solid of characters to do the seemingly inconceivable: ask the Demon Queen herself for the reality.
That’s the primary gist, although I’ll say the plot goes in some surprising instructions. The sport’s worldbuilding can also be spectacular. It’s no marvel that, from a story stance, two of the inspirations for Sacred Earth – Reverie are Utawarerumono and Falcom’s The Legend of Heroes: Trails sequence. Whereas the sport does reference lore and occasions from earlier Sacred Earth titles, I used to be pleasantly stunned by how simple it’s to get immersed within the narrative with out in depth prior information. It supplies a self-contained story that consistently evolves primarily based on decisions and actions made all through the playthrough. There are a number of endings to uncover on the best way to the true ending, and new scenes to peruse in the event you occur to play the New Recreation Plus model after reaching the tip credit. The primary time I performed, I engaged in an non-obligatory boss battle that not solely gave me an influential new celebration member for the endgame but in addition netted me a surprisingly completely different ending than the one I initially anticipated. I give Sacred Earth – Reverie credit score for its consistently evolving narrative, which isn’t predictable and affords excessive replayability.
Sacred Earth – Reverie‘s exploration phases are point-and-click affairs. On the town, you enter into conversations and occasion eventualities by selecting them from the map, with some new occasions solely opening up in the event you select to see a previous one. The NPC narratives additionally consistently evolve alongside the primary plot, serving to the world really feel lived in. You can too often purchase sidequests that require you to enter into battles or discover spots of curiosity in dungeons and collect supplies to earn rewards. You equip weapons, armor, and non-obligatory stat-boosting equipment to your celebration alongside highly effective elemental Ether Gems that present capability and stat boosts to your characters.
Within the dungeons themselves, you traverse by point-and-clicking over factors of curiosity on a given part of the map. Every time you journey to a brand new space of the dungeon, you purchase extra factors on a hazard/encounter gauge. As soon as the indicator is full, a random battle happens, and also you’re given choices on take care of it primarily based in your Journey Factors. These Journey Factors let you do issues like re-roll for a unique encounter, increase your stats earlier than the struggle happens, and even retreat from fight earlier than it begins. This method helps preserve random encounters manageable, although sadly, it isn’t obtainable for the myriad demanding boss battles over the course of the journey. I performed the sport on my Steam Deck, and Sacred Earth – Reverie is completely playable on the platform. Nonetheless, I’d prefer to level out that it isn’t as controller-friendly as a mouse-and-keyboard schematic.
The sheer problem of many boss battles is the irritating level of competition I discussed in my first paragraph. Even on decrease problem settings, there’s a really noticeable spike in problem on the subject of boss fights. Often, bosses get a number of quick turns to shell out huge quantities of harm. Relying on random luck, these turns can spell doom even earlier than the struggle correctly begins. I misplaced rely of what number of instances I restarted a boss struggle as a result of I bought a recreation over earlier than my celebration had an opportunity to counter. After they do get a flip, your celebration members aren’t awarded almost as many strikes as bosses obtain, so fights really feel largely one-sided. Boss battles ought to supply extra problem than common fights and require extra technique to beat, however this recreation’s hellish spike in problem is extremely irritating. Be ready to retry boss battles usually and scream profanities the second you make a miscalculation that turns the encounter right into a wash. On condition that retries appear anticipated, ideally, I’d have liked a retry possibility for boss fights proper from the Recreation Over display. Sadly, it’s a must to backpedal and cargo a save from the primary menu.
Visually, there’s lots to reward in regards to the recreation. The UI is clearly seen and crowd pleasing with massive, easy-to-read textual content, and there are two completely different artwork kinds to select from at any level within the narrative. I went with Model A, however there’s nothing visually unfavourable about Model B both. It boils right down to your private desire. The CG illustrations for key scenes and the pixel sprite artwork for dungeon exploration are properly detailed and aesthetically pleasing. The artwork itself is vibrant and colourful, and all of the characters are expressive all through the story. I admit I don’t love a number of of the feminine character designs, specifically, and I might see them as doubtlessly offputting to others who is perhaps within the recreation, which is a disgrace provided that different facets of the visible path are strong. That stated, I do know the character designs gained’t be a dealbreaker for everybody, given the subjectivity of artwork and visuals usually.
The sport’s soundtrack is sort of outstanding, particularly this observe and the various stellar battle tracks all through. Listening to them over and over was most likely the very best factor in regards to the fixed boss battle repeats! Sacred Earth – Reverie additionally has partial voice performing, and the solid delivers top-notch performances. The story script does have occasional typos, however given the title’s sheer quantity of textual content, it’s primarily negligible and straightforward sufficient to appropriate in your head when an error happens. Nonetheless, I did discover that, whereas enjoying as Abelle, the sport would generally handle the protagonist as “Cain,” which makes me suppose Abelle was maybe a later addition. This misnaming is uncommon, and the 2 protagonists’ personalities are fairly completely different.
Sacred Earth – Reverie is a recreation with stunning depth, held again specifically by a crushing problem spike concerning most boss battles. I loved my time inside its multilayered story, appreciating the assorted methods the narrative might evolve, however I additionally discovered some facets of the sport offputting. Players who can get previous these hurdles and overcome the demanding boss fights that await might encounter a doubtlessly partaking expertise in Sacred Earth – Reverie.
