PlayStation 3
Published by Sony Computer
Entertainment Europe
Developed by Zindagi Games
Medieval Moves puts you in the shoes of
Prince Edmund, a young boy who sees his father, the king, killed and
finds himself turned into a skeleton by the evil sorcerer Morgrimm.
Morgrimm has invaded Edmund's castle and is scheming to take full
control of the kingdom. As the skeletal Edmund it's up to you to get
back a weapon enhancing amulet and defeat Morgrimm and his hoards of
bony minions. Using either a single PlayStation Move controller (or two
if you prefer) you'll get to use a sword and shield, fire arrows and
throw hira-shuriken (throwing stars) and explosives as you fight you way
through a seemingly endless amount of enemies.
The game is an on-rails action game that sees
you making various gestures with the Move controller in order to wield
weapons against the overly large skeletal army of Morgrimm. You'll
simply swing the controller to imitate the swing of the sword. Pressing
the Move button activates the shield and you'll have full control over
its direction which is important because enemies will swipe at your
lower and upper body in addition to your head and it's up to you to put
the shield in the relevant position. Put the Move controller over your
shoulder and press the T button and you'll switch to a bow and arrow.
Whilst you are aiming with the bow and arrow you can press the Move
button to zoom in for greater accuracy. Point the Move controller at the
floor and press the T button and you'll have the grappling gun equipped.
This can only be used in specific locations however. To restore health
you can have a swig of milk by mimicking the drinking action with the
Move controller and pressing the Move button. For the most part I was
pleased with the responsiveness and intuitiveness of the controls in the
game. However, using the throwing stars felt fiddly and lacked
precision.
In addition to the main game, which is called
Story mode, you also have access to a Battle mode which caters for both
online and local multiplayer and can even be experienced as a solo
player. If you want to play a local multiplayer battle however you'll
need two PlayStation Move controllers otherwise you won't have access to
either the Team or Versus mode.
The biggest problem that Medieval Moves has
is a lack of variety. As good as the motion controls are, it doesn't
prevent the action from becoming tedious far too early into the game.
Combating swathes of enemies in predictable patterns gets old much too
quickly and there isn't even a strong enough storyline here to encourage
you to continue through the monotony of it all. In fact what you'll find
yourself doing is playing the game in small bursts to help prevent
boredom from setting in. This is a shame because had the game been
designed in a less predictable manner and had more variety in regards to
what you can do in the game, it would have remained interesting for
longer. It also doesn't help that the combat model is actually quite
basic. Yes the controls are satisfying but there's not a lot of
complexity here and, with the sword fights in particular, it can feel
like you're simply doing some virtual fly swatting rather than engaging
in a sword fight.
There can be no denying that visuals in
Medieval Moves have a certain charm even if they aren't pushing the
PlayStation 3 to its limits. The skeletal enemies look good and all
animate nicely. The various environments you find yourself in look quite
good too although you won't really get a chance to fully appreciate them
thanks to the on-rails nature of the game and not being able to explore
the surroundings at will. In place of true cut scenes the game uses
motion comics to deliver the storyline. The artwork here is a little
crude which is disappointing. There are no performance issues to speak
of with the frame rate and the load times all being absolutely fine.
Medieval Moves is quite a good experience for
deaf gamers although you wouldn't think it at first. This is primarily
because by default the subtitles are enabled for only the in-game
dialogue and not the game's motion comic cut scenes. Upon loading the
game for the first time you are taken right into the game's Story mode
meaning you don't have the ability to enable all of the subtitles
beforehand. Thankfully you can press the start button and visit the
options menu to enable all of the subtitles without missing much (and
you are given tutorial information to begin with which is delivered via
text). With the subtitles enabled you'll be able to follow all of the
game's storyline. There are some comments which are not subtitled such
as the taunts from your enemies and comments from Edmund such as "Where
are they all coming from?" when surrounded by enemies, but thankfully
neither of these omissions are of any importance. All tutorial
information is displayed visually via text and illustrations. You're
also notified in text of any challenges that come your way. There are
also visual notifications for checkpoints and any treasures, coins and
health restoring milk that you collect.
Whilst there have been some good games that utilise the PlayStation Move controller there hasn't really been one that's an essential purchase. Medieval Moves isn't going to change that but it shows a lot of promise with its motion controls. However, the on-rails nature of the game hampers the ability to explore the game world as you wish and the repetitive nature of the gameplay means you'll begin to feel tired of it long before the story reaches its conclusion. The gameplay desperately needs more variety because as it stands, and as impressive as the motion controls are, it becomes tedious when played in anything other than short bursts and that's a real shame.
