The Play has Ended
Sands of destruction is a Nintendo DS RPG developed by ImageEpoch and published by Sega in 2008 in japan and 2010 for the US
Sands of Destruction is quite a different title wherein you
play the harbinger of destruction from a being to end in fact all main
objectives move towards this goal. You play the young man Kyrie, who in typical RPG fashion is an orphan raised by his uncle, While this is
not ground breaking twist that soon changes with you joining the bad guys "The world annihilation front!" Who’s sole desire it is to end everything, of course
this depends on perspective if you inhabit the world why would you want it to
end? But then again in a world presided over by the ferals and their lords
where humans call even the lowest peg of the ladder master, and are used as pets, food or even fertiliser wouldn't death be
welcome?
The story is quite easy to follow even with the many plot
twists. An innocent young man with incredible power is found by the world
annihilation front, one of the more extreme groups dissatisfied with
their masters so much so they want everything gone and because of you they might just get their way. Morte a member of the WAF soon snaps the young man up after receiving word that the destruct (harbinger of the worlds end) via handbills falling from the sky has been located.
She tracks him down and whisks him off his feet and on an adventure to
destroy the primal lords in order to bring chaos and death with quakes, tsunami
and storms. Along the way you will make alliances with various characters from a women bent on ending the
world to a dragonkin and my personal RPG favourite a living stuffed bear that happens to also be a bounty hunter, While the story has its quirks
and some moments that are seemingly random they all end up tying back to the
main story and is mostly well done. It has decided to cut from the RPG
stereotype cloth a fair bit but it is by no means bad, if anything it adds a
sense of nostalgia of an era of RPGs past. I personally enjoyed the story and
dreaded the phrase "Acta Est Fabula" the destruct code … such power.
Visually the game yet again reeks of an era since passed, offering more nostalgic visuals retro or old school gamers are used to, it is blocky but it works think anime art style in a SNES RPG fashion. It’s your typical old school RPG where characters and NPC models are more
Lego men than people yet backgrounds are quite well done it even boasts a rare
beautiful CG scene. The same can be said about the music scores in the game
they to seem to have hopped through a time warp and made it into a more modern
title but again it works well with how the story’s progressing and situation
you are in. This alone keeps me coming back and I am sure any old school RPG
fans would appreciate reliving a game similar to that of their youths.
You can customise your attacks and skills by spending points it’s a basic system that is easy to understand, just a case of adding points to become stronger these are earned like EXP. As well as
this it boasts a function I don’t recall coming across before called the quip function
simply a small quote or catchphrase or even a snide comment with a variety of
effects from HP restoration to Stat boosts mid battle, This function is so
easy to use all you have to do is set it and your good to go I personally love
it, it has so many uses and can be used in any combination it’s more of a
functional extra than most titles provide as it can make a small difference to battle outcomes. On to
battles now being on DS I was expecting use of the top screen and rightly so. Battles consist of two areas top and bottom ground based foes on lower screen
and airborne on the top, for this reason you have both ground and
airborne attacks all of which change depending on your target and you simply
press the button with the attack you wish to use even new gamers should easily grasp this
system, I personally enjoyed this turn based combat and it kept me interested
in trying combos and skills I had customised myself. This is not as far as my love of this titles vintage style stretches, the most welcome addition to the game was the seemingly endless maze like dungeon’s, and puzzles which could occasionally verge on the frustrating really add to the game.
To sum up this game in a word it would be classic, as it truly reminded me of the old school
RPGs I had played in my youth, simple in nature with flashy
images and funky soundtracks, a story worth it's salt and a fun yet
easy to learn battle system. It’s something I’d recommend to friends as almost all
like RPGs and many are yearning for that retro feel. It’s not a long game (this run took me around 20 hours) but it
should keep RPG fans entertained and interested how the plot twists plan out. I
would have actually liked it to be a little longer as throughout the game the
development of bonds between the party seemed almost instantaneous, in order to
progress the story without drifting much if at all into how or why it happened, it would have been nice to delve a little more. My final note on this is anyone looking for a old school RPG with modern elements should enjoy this game.
7/10
Who should buy.
- Fans of RPGs from yesteryear
- Someone looking for a moral grey area story
- Someone after a bit more of a game requiring thinking
Who should avoid.
- If you want up to date graphics
- Someone who is not a fan of puzzles
- Looking for a very long game
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