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> Results: Tao's Adventure: Curse of the Demon Seal
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Tao's Adventure: Curse of the Demon Seal is a curious mix that contains exploration of a massive dungeon as seen in last year's excellent Fate, a collection of monsters to battle alongside you similar to the Pokémon games, and a rune-drawing magic system reminiscent of PC role-playing game Arx Fatalis. Those are all good games, but unfortunately Tao's Adventure doesn't add up.
Controls this clunky and frustrating should be long gone as the DS matures, but prepare for your greatest challenge to simply be getting around. You must use the stylus for most things, although mercifully you can use the cursor to move around and a couple of buttons to run and advance dialogue. Core gameplay is turn-based dungeon crawling with level after level of you gaining strength, items and spells while you make your way towards the final battle. It's the journey that mattersﾗdeveloping a battle strategy using your familiar and the monsters you collect as allies, equipping yourself with the best items and making best use of the spells, and exploring every corner of each area. That's the best part of the game, battling your way through the dungeon while uncovering new weapons and monsters and increasing your powers. Whether you find any pleasure in this depends on your tolerance of the controls and the slow-paced dungeon crawling. You don't get tremendous ﾑloot drops' as in other dungeon crawls, just a few decent weapons and the ability to enhance them as you continue. I enjoyed it quite a bit more than I should have. This is a deeply flawed game that I wouldn't recommend to anyone unless I knew they would see the charm hidden in the adventure. For those it will become a nice simple pleasure, but for most it will be boring and frustrating from the start until you ultimately just stop playing.  
Kid Power! As in so many of these types of games, a young boy finds himself tasked by circumstance to defeat terrible monsters to help save his village. Unlike many of these games, he isn't the only one left. In fact, the town elders were spared the fate of being turned to stone that happened to the rest of the village. But they are helpless and useless, and you are left to make the journey to the monster tower to collect the egg needed to save your family and neighbors. This brings up typical feelings of rising to the challenge and overcoming all obstacles.
There are some interesting moral overtones based on tolerance of different people based on past prejudices. Tao is a Bente, marked with a symbol that identifies him quickly as part of a hated group that used a terrible form of magic in a long ago war. To others, though, the Bente are heroes and celebrated for saving a village and entire people. Working on building up the trust among the community is a slow process for Tao and the others, but serves pretty well to illustrate the limiting forces of prejudice. The rest of the game is pretty tame. Simple graphics depict the battles without bloody graphic violence. There is no objectionable content or language and the "use of alcohol" refers to patrons at the tavern and café in town. This review edited by Dave Long Comments? Chat about it in our forums! Format For Printing | Tell A Friend | Digg | Slashdot | del.icio.us | Buy This Game Browse Amazon.com's selection of "tao's adventure" themed games Home > Review Archive > Video Games > Results: Tao's Adventure: Curse of the Demon Seal |
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