Covenant of Solitude is a JRPG developed by Magitec and revealed by KEMCO that was initially launched in 2013 as a cell recreation. I by no means performed the sport earlier than, so this was a brand new expertise for me, and I used to be keen to check out the sport’s distinctive monster mechanics.
You play as Fort, a younger man from the village of Listy. Monsters are feared by everybody, although there are some folks, often known as genies, who can summon these monsters and command them. Fort is a genie, and he does his greatest to cover this secret. Nevertheless, when battle and damage arrive, and genies are a goal for use or be killed, Fort has no alternative however to make use of his energy and work alongside monsters to not solely survive, however assist save the world.
The start is heavy with dialogue and backstory with two transient observe battles in between. It took about fifty minutes to get by means of all of it earlier than I may begin taking part in. I believe that’s too lengthy for an intro, particularly since I didn’t take care of the writing or Fort’s character.
First, Fort’s character was unlikeable. He’s a little bit of a wimp and whiny. As well as, the general dialogue didn’t do it for me. It didn’t circulation nicely or learn authentically. Among the banter between characters fell flat, and I discovered myself skipping by means of the textual content simply to get by means of it. I had to decide on rigorously when to concentrate as a result of Covenant of Solitude doesn’t have a quest checklist on the pause display. There aren’t any map markers or reminders of what to do or the place to go subsequent. As soon as a personality tells you to go to a sure place, that’s it. You higher bear in mind what they mentioned or else you’ll wander. Fortunately, the map isn’t too huge so the subsequent space was easy sufficient to seek out.
Enemy encounters are frequent in dungeons and on the map, so leveling up your social gathering is straightforward. I solely had one recreation over, although that’s to not say the battles are easy. General, the enemies versus my social gathering had been fairly balanced. Nobody was ever too overpowered, leaving room for technique in battle or utilizing the auto battle perform after I did really feel the necessity to grind just a bit bit.
However who’s your social gathering in Covenant of Solitude? That’s as much as you. Since Fort can summon and command monsters, the participant will get to decide on between 4 kinds of monsters: dragons, fairies, vampires, or beasts. Every kind has its personal specialties. For instance, the beast has elevated assault and velocity stats. Then you definitely assign them every a job: fighter, healer, wizard, or thief. The fighter is a powerful attacker whereas the thief makes use of fast motion. I may have made my beast both/or if I needed to make the most of its specialties, so I made my beast a thief. I additionally had a dragon fighter and a vampire wizard.
I loved utilizing this mechanic to create my social gathering to combine and match stats. The sport permits for a number of events. It’s inspired to create many monsters so you may change out your social gathering members relying on the world and enemies you’re dealing with. Nevertheless, the monsters not in your social gathering don’t improve in degree. This is sensible, however when my social gathering was degree thirty-eight, I created a healer to see what that’d be like they usually had been degree one. Until I backtracked to an earlier a part of the sport and grinded lots, it wasn’t value it to me.
This brings up some nice replayability for Covenant of Solitude, though the story will at all times be the identical and, being an RPG, its gameplay is linear. I’m not into the story or the characters, so I’m unsure I might wish to undergo all of this once more to check out different abilities and stats.
The monster mechanic is tremendous cool, and I like creating and customizing my social gathering as such, however…I take pleasure in RPGs a lot for the comradery of the social gathering, and the monsters don’t speak. There’s no banter, dialog, or character improvement of the monsters or the social gathering as a complete. That was a bummer for me. I needed to really feel a connection to the characters, however the one one with character was Fort and I didn’t take care of him.
Covenant of Solitude has enjoyable battle mechanics, although it’s nothing groundbreaking except for creating the social gathering members. Every battle is turn-based, the place you need to use primary melee assaults, magic, objects, defend, or run away. As talked about earlier than, the auto battle was useful for grinding. The characters will at all times default to their primary melee assault in an auto battle, although. They don’t suppose to make use of magic or objects, however it labored regardless.
Talking of things, I want these had been extra balanced. The one strategy to totally heal was to both sleep at an inn or use the therapeutic spot proper earlier than a boss battle. The sport is beneficiant with HP therapeutic objects, however the MP therapeutic objects had been a uncommon discover. The “heal MP barely” merchandise was out there on the store in varied cities, however that solely healed thirty MP. My magic person had 200+ MP and her stronger assaults used at the very least twenty MP. So, you may think about how a lot I’d undergo in a single dungeon. Leveling up didn’t assist, both. It solely totally healed their HP, not their MP, and it didn’t do away with standing situations.
General, Covenant of Solitude is an honest RPG. The battles are the guts of it, they usually had been nice. Between my social gathering, the enemies, and managers, it wasn’t too straightforward or too troublesome. I used to be in a position to make progress with out getting annoyed. Nevertheless, I want the merchandise pool had been extra balanced, the writing had been higher, and the characters had extra of a say. Nonetheless, when you’re a fan of RPGs, this recreation is value a go, particularly when you’re extra within the battling.
