Celestian Tales: Old North

When I watched the trailer for this game I got hooked immediately, because it showed that you can choose from different characters that have their own backstory and make meaningful decisions throughout the game. Unfortunately the character you choose makes those decisions for you automatically, so the difference in experiencing the story lies only within what character you decide to pick. This was a giant disappointment for me... Let's talk about the other sections of the game. The combat is pretty solid and has a nice variety of playstyles due to the different characters. The music is nice and the whole art style for the game is pretty well done. If you want a pretty solid RPG that changes some of its story sections a little bit based on what character you play as go for it. Otherwise I unfortunately can't recommend this title, since there is way more RPGs out there that are way above average.

This game, on paper, should work. It should have been an incredibly and worthwhile adventure. Unfortunately, the game starts and ends on a low point. There, unfortunately, just isn't any real highs. The combat is fun, but the level caps at 30 and it takes moments to ascend that high. The sprites are well done, but many second rate RPG's from the SNES/GENS era had better and more complete sprites. The handpainted backgrounds are done well, but are entirely abstract. The world map is full of adventure than you just aren't allowed to explore. There is little ambiguity in this adventure. It is, from start to finish, sub par. The music is praised for being great where it is juvenile and green. It is praised because there is little else to praise in this game. You can skip this one entirely and not miss anything. 2/5, will not complete again. I don't think I have it in me to finish the DLC at this point.

So right now if you look on the main store page for this game it advertises that "where your decisions in its dark and gritty storyline shape the world of tomorrow", yeah that's a lie. My entire first playthrough I had exactly one choice to make. One. I have one more issue with it in that the final boss came out of left field. There seemed to be no logical reason for them to suddenly become homicidal and need to be fought. Had the game revealed that they had taken a bad hit of acid and had gone insane I would have accepted that because it would have made more sense than the explanation I had been given. Now that aside the game was great. The combat is classic JRPG goodness. The game never crashed on me. The story overall is good and worth it. It's not too long or too short. I beat my first playthrough on normal in about 6 hours. Overall I would recommend it to fans of the genre. Just don't expect it to have huge branching storylines ala Mass Effect or Tyranny, it is very linear. That's not a slight against the game, linear is fine by me, I just wished they had advertised it that way.

I was really enjoying this game, and ready for a great ending, and all of a sudden, the world basically explodes, and the credits roll. WHAT!? Let's start over. Celestian Tales: Old North reminds me of what would happen if group of talented individuals made a Suikoden fangame in Flash. The battle system is very similar, at least the way the enemies are placed and how targeting works, but it also has a stamina system a la Skies of Arcadia. Your characters learn new skills, both passive and active, and though it is very easy (most post-NES JRPGs are), it's all balanced very well. Your party levels as a unit, so if you decide one character sucks, you can easily swap him/her out. The artwork is high quality, and the backgrounds are all hand-drawn, which is neat, but it makes the sprites look a little out of place. The music is decent, but in the final area, it's framed extremely well to make a fittingly epic conclusion. There are a few characters that I really liked, but there are also a few irritating characters with a single personality trait. Where this game shines most is in its conversations and in its world building. Yes, it's a somewhat generic Iron Age world, under a feudalistic theocracy, but it works well enough, and what's interesting is that men and women are treated as equals; the issue of gender is never brought up, because it's just normal to them. The conversations are very rich with philosophy, and I'm impress how even the poorly-written characters are used extremely effectively to stage arguments and set up some pretty deep counterpoints. There are a ton of grammar mistakes, but it's a little more forgivable, since watching the ending credits, I don't think English was the developers' first language. Still, the actual content of the writing was superb. Oh, if only the game didn't shred its conclusion to tiny pieces, incinerate them, and blow them out of the engine of a 747 over the Bermuda Triangle in the last 10 minutes...

Like others have said the story ends right as it starts to go somewhere. First a few gripes then I'll get into some good things for me. I wish this one kicked off with more immediate and bigger problems for the protagonist to deal with which is what draws me in quickly. Instead, you're kind of running errands for much of the game. A few jrpgs suffer this problem. Sometimes it can work out. Usually not. This game is not long. My game time showed 18 hours but I noticed my saves would jump ahead 2 hours when I only played 30 minutes. The reality is the game was maybe 13 hours. There are options with abilities but only three weapons for each character (that you can upgrade). The dialogue isn't amazing but serviceable. NOW TO THE GOOD PARTS. Visually the game is good. The character designs/portraits/sprites are nice. I thought it was weird that everyone squinted the same way when showing happiness (^_^). For a streamlined combat system there is some strategy involved although the game isn't difficult. It does get a bit difficult at the end though. This game's aesthetic felt kind of leisurely and comfy. I really liked how several aspects of this game came together. The music is excellent. There is some percussive stuff that reminds me very much of suikoden 1 and 2. This is a game that is an opportunity for the devs. If parts 2 and 3 can carry the sense of urgency in the gameworld getting shaken up at the end of part 1...this could be a memorable experience. I'm going to keep my eyes on this series. There are better options in this genre especially the classics that obviously inspired this game...but if you're someone who has played most of them and are looking for something newer to scratch that itch...this one kind of does it. I don't regret my purchase. Not an amazing value but the price is fair. 3.75/5 stars or 7.5/10 Gameplay C Graphics B Music B+ Story C/C- (with potential in future installments) Kudos to a small dev team for a solid effort.