 |
|
| Creator | KrashBoomBang |
| Engine | FE8 |
| Download | Here |
| Score | 69/80 |
| Rank | 2nd |
| FEU Link | Here |
Reviews
Judge 1: Darrman
Gameplay: 9/10
The goal here is to kill the boss, but it’s invincible until every phantom on the map is killed. In turn, each phantom is invincible unless a bone pile is destroyed, with each phantom being linked to one pile. The army starts split up to facilitate this, with a group of three flyers at the south and the rest of the army at the north. Attack stats are very high at both ends: trying to enemy phase a phantom will lead to certain death. So long as you’re paying attention, the chapter isn’t overly difficult. All units cause game over on death, however, leaving no room for error in that regard. The boss AI does change when the last phantom dies, but this is obviously telegraphed.
Overall, the chapter isn’t the most mechanically complicated, but it is well-executed. Enemy phase can be easily handled with Munio, but a fast pace must be kept in order to destroy bone piles to kill the phantoms.
Presentation: 5/5
By all accounts, presentation is a focus here. Graphics such as the main menu background are adjusted, to begin with. The character portraits are good, but there’s points here for having cutscene props appear as portraits when required. The cutscenes are well-evented and the map itself looks great. The music choices are also nice. Nothing is out of place and I do appreciate going the extra mile to have a character holding a skull when paying homage to Hamlet.
Story: 3/5
The story is set after Four Kings, and serves as an extra bit of story for some of its characters. The war has ended and everyone is helping rebuild, but there are rumours of strange goings-on in the desert. The king decides to hire some mages, veterans of the war, to investigate ghost sightings. Most of the dialogue consists of bantering between the various characters over a wide variety of topics, such as how a couple of newlyweds are doing in their new house or how a mage has been learning how to use a sword recently. This is by and large fine and helps introduce the characters for those who haven’t played Four Kings. Soon ancient ruins reveal themselves, as do the ghosts. The head ghost has few words to say, talking about queens and crowns.
After everyone catches up via talk, heal, and dance conversations, the boss is defeated. It is suggested it once launched a rebellion, but apparently so many rebellions were launched nobody knew who to look for. The party realise they know a contemporary of the ghost, but the entry ends before meeting him, leaving it ultimately unresolved, which annoyed me a little.
Total Score: 17/20
Judge 2: Rivian
Gameplay: 8/10
The map is intimidatingly large but the party split and high movement of fliers makes it a lot quicker than it seems. The units all have a boatload of powerful tools like siege tomes, effectives and defensive prfs and there are a few options for busting through the enemies, though enemies are strong enough to really punish a bad matchup. The central gimmick, the phantoms being invincible unless their bones are desecrated, helps give the player an objective to plan around and also enforces the interconnectivity of the two parties as the phantom and its bones are often across the map from each other.
Presentation: 5/5
There’s a lot to appreciate here. The use of portraits to show Chase stabbing a sandwich or Yufin breaking a skull was very cool, even if the shading might be a little odd compared to FE8 mugs. The picnic having a picnic box map sprite and showing the crew off their mounts, who are also present, is quite neat. The scene of the desert breaking apart was impactful. The actual map, palettes and mugs all look pretty good, but the eventing especially comes a long way.
Story: 4/5
I have played a significant part of Four Kings so I am somewhat familiar with every playable present. The writing is mostly exploration of character interactions for existing characters rather than telling a contained tale so it serves as a nice epilogue for if you have already played Four Kings. The hack does a good job of showcasing the relationships between these characters even if you’re an absolute newcomer. It is rather curious you don’t really learn much about who or what you’re fighting.
Total Score: 17/20
Judge 3: Legend of Loog
Gameplay: 8/10
The chapter’s gameplay asks you to break all the “Bones” enemies on the map to make their corresponding Phantoms vulnerable, and once you defeat all of those, then you can defeat the boss. You have a lot of tools at your disposal to speed through the map, and although enemy offenses can be very high, you have supports and Munio/Nosferatu to deal with them. Generally, the map felt fairly easy to chew through, but I can see there being a lot more to the gameplay if you’re trying to speed through it, as the end event encourages, and it was an enjoyable chapter that didn’t overstay its welcome.
Presentation: 5/5
This entry sets the standard for aesthetic effort, beginning with the start event and its cutscene eventing. One example is that when Dorian bumps into a pillar, the whole map starts to change to transition into the actual combat map. Beyond this, there are a number of unique portraits for specific moments, like Chase showing off his sword and Yufin holding/crushing a skull. Other aspects of presentation like music and the map are solid across the board, so this is a consistent strong point that deserves top placement.
Story: 4/5
This chapter takes place after the events of Four Kings, and it centers around several of the player characters (and some new additions). Playing Four Kings did help me to some extent here,since it meant that I needed little explanation about the characters, but the introduction of the hack explains it well enough to follow along even if you haven’t played the original hack. The main story functions as a nice side story that helps show what some of these characters have been up to. The dialogue is consistently well-written and succeeds at showing each character’s personality, and overall, the narrative was an enjoyable read throughout.
Total Score: 17/20
Judge 4: Levin64
Gameplay: 9/10
I can say that this hack uses the principle of “simple is better” due to its straightforward defeat boss objective. The extra gimmick; which is phantoms, also functions as “checkpoints” for progression. Although, the gimmick itself can be a double-edged sword; because with the phantoms, the outline of how to tackle the chapter is static. Players HAVE to follow the flow intended by the hack maker; which is not a bad idea per se, but for people who love to experiment, I don’t think they would enjoy the hack.
I ended up clearing the chapter on first playthrough, and I didn’t notice the pattern you told me; but I had a feeling that the bone placement wouldn’t be as simple as what I thought, and I was right! It’s fun predicting which phantom is connected with which pile of bones. Combat feels balanced, I assume the “big numbers go boom” is very Four Kings (haven’t finished it yet, but I did play a bit; kinda stopped and haven’t continued the playthrough) on the midgame until endgame? Take this paragraph with a grain of salt, though. Hey, at least there’s consistency!
Love the party split, with the ones dealing on ground, and the other midair. The synergy between the two parties are great; especially on how you place the bones for the “puzzley gimmick”. Although, I can see if mistakes are made, I’d get punished; and I did. But this is only a chapter, so it’s not really a big deal. The mistakes I made can be easily reverted by resuming the chapter itself; the game-over condition can be quite rough, but I guess it’s necessary. Units capped with level 20 does remove the “dopamine effect” when a unit gets a level up, but for me it helps streamline the chapter itself by making the player not worry about “grinding” per se.
Presentation: 5/5
Very Four Kings, I love the aesthetics! Everything is super polished, it helps that you already have the foundation at hand; which is Four Kings itself, and it’s a big boon, definitely. Boss theme is quiet at the beginning, but imo it’s not really a big deal.
Story: 3/5
Since I haven’t finished Four Kings, I missed a lot of references mentioned by the characters— especially this is basically a side story AFTER the main plot. But, the story in this hack can stand for itself. The intro dragged on a little bit; especially the picnic scene (I feel if you remove that scene, it will not change anything doesn’t actually advance the plot, but character interactions are still cool), but it picked itself up until I started complaining, so I guess the timing was good. The outro is brief, yet sums up the chapter nicely. I did play some chapters of Four Kings, and I noticed several familiar characters; mainly the Mage Quartet, and their interactions are great. I don’t know about the wyverns, but they seem fine.
Total Score: 17/20
Results
| Category | Darr | Rivian | Loog | Levin | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gameplay | 9 | 8 | 9 | 9 | 35 |
| Presentation | 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 20 |
| Story | 3 | 4 | 4 | 3 | 14 |
| Total | 17 | 17 | 18 | 17 | 69 |