Forever Kingdom - Retroview

Review Breakdown
Battle System	4
Interaction	5
Originality	5
Story	4
Music & Sound	2
Visuals	4
Challenge	Moderate
Completion Time	12 Hours
Overall
TO THE BATCAVE!

Released in 2002 by Agetec, the sequel to Evergrace, Forever Kingdom, lets us find out more about the man with the cursed mark, and with a storyline longer, and alot better than the first.

Darius, Ruyan, and Feana, run into a wizard and warrior attacking a young girl along a road in the countryside, and because of this, there lives were entangled by a spell known as the Soulbind. There lives now became intertwined so if one of them felt pain the rest of them would feel it as well, and if one died, the same went for the others. The only way to get rid of the curse was to find the secrets of the continent that would lead them to and, ultimately, allow them to destroy the wizard who cast it on them.

The battle system was unique, in that the characters being controlled by AI, were also needed to be controlled by the player simulatiously, allowing for combo attacks which result in more damage, and enemies dropping Palmira pieces once they are defeated. Using the accessories found throughout the game, the characters can use different abilities, mixing them up and finding which ones cause the most damage, or even allow the easiest combo attacks. Other than that, the rest of the battle system plays like one would expect from an adventure game, with the ability to change weapons and armor, and each character excelling at using certain types of weapons.

Throughout the game, however, you will find many hidden treasures, as well as almost every enemy in the game will drop a rare weapon, armor, or accessory in which to collect and become more powerful. In the shops, characters are able to use the Palmira pieces that they collect and upgrade their weapons/armors attack, elemental attack/resistance, and defense against attack, while also purchasing equipment and fighting in an arena to gain other rare equipment.

Music throughout the game isn't memorable, but atleast it fits with the game, and is good enough not bore the player. The storyline has voice acting done on each part, but it also had the words subtitled at the bottom, which fit perfectly with the words used, and an excellent or near excellent translation, seeing as I saw no errors throughout the playthrough.

He knows Omnislash too? Watch out Cloud.

Also, the graphics are great, being very detailed, in which the weapons and armor change depending on which ones your characters are equipped with, just like in Evergrace or Legend of Legaia. The graphics of the characters and their designs are excellent as well, and all of the areas during the game are nicely done.

But although this game does have many rare items to acquire, there aren't any mini-games and nothing to do really after you've gotten all the items besides going through the game again with all the items from the previous game(s.)

Overall, Forever Kingdom is possibly the best 3d adventure game I've ever played, and if you're a fan of the Zelda series, this offers closely the same kind of gameplay with a pretty good and original storyline.