Fantasy RPG Queen’s Domain is frequently likened by certain other websites to From Software’s King’s Field games and The Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind, so I’m going to put my nose in the air and forcibly compare it to something else. Looks like, errrrrr, a first-person Ico with Mayan architectural influences, maybe a touch of Final Fantasy’s Ivalice period here and there. It’s set on an island with shorelines you could compare to Halo’s Silent Cartographer level, if you rubbed your eyes with breakfast cereal. Have I thoroughly confused you? Don’t worry, here is a trailer.
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Developers Freshly Baked Games and publishers Future Friends Games have just announced a release date – 30th October. There’s still a demo on Steam. Here is a very elegant plot summary: you are somebody’s son. The guy whose son you are has gone missing on an island full of tetchy skeletal abominations, laser trees and highly punchable fishpeople, plus one sleeping evil Queen. The island is the very same island you have just shipwrecked on.
As regards the combat, you’ve got a holy sword that lets you blink-jump, a choice of inexhaustible throwable weapons with a cooldown, a stamina bar, and the ability to level up. The battling looks to be broadly an exercise in lurching forward to clobber something and then lurching away to avoid being clobbered. Stately retro skull-pummelling: I can dig it. But I’m more interested in the setting, which they have dared to describe as “labyrinthine”, and which really does make me think of Vagrant Story and Final Fantasy 12 in places. The devs have done a great job using pixelation to sell the illusion of rusty filigree and dessicated stone.
Here is some piping hot numberwang, to whet your whistle: “50+ melee weapons to discover, equip, and upgrade; “20+ types of secondary throwing weapons allow for varied strategies in combat”; “Over 100 enemies, mini bosses, and bosses to defeat”; “Dozens of hours of adventuring and exploration”. If you like the looks of it, you’ll probably also like Lunacid.