LOSTMAGIC

Having survived an onslaught of monsters when he was very young, our hero Isaac escaped only by running away from his village and getting himself lost in the forest. Fortunately Isaac was found by a kind and grandmotherly magic user who took him in taught him the ways of magic. Years have past and Isaac has become a headstrong young man who has always wondered if his parents survived that fateful attack. Now through the magic of happenstance AND plot development, Isaac's father miraculously runs into him and hands him one of the seven magic wands that were scattered across the lands many years ago. Isaac must now come to grips that he will need to do battle with a powerful Diva witch who is collecting all of the wands in an attempt to turn the world into her own twisted version.

 "Quick! Draw a reverse question mark so's to fool all monsters learning basic English!"

Now this is the second DS title that I have played where you only use the stylus. Not that this is a bad thing, as you adventure (again, this is an RPG), Isaac will begin learning how to defend himself by using magic. Magic is done by pulling the left trigger (OK, so maybe it isn't totally stylus controlled) and then drawing the symbol of the magic that you want to cast. The better job you do of drawing the symbol, the more powerful the magic will be. For example, one of the first magic attacks you will learn is the fire attack. This is done by pulling the trigger and then drawing an upside down "V". The straighter you draw the lines in the symbol, can mean the difference in taking two shots to destroy a monster, or one. And you should also know that you must touch the stylus to the real time combat map that is occurring in order to aim your attack at the correct monster. It's all rather clever and I really enjoyed the heck out of this thing.

 The further you get along, the more magic will be at your disposal, but you should know that your magic abilities are temporary. Firing off several attacks will deplete your mana and you must wait briefly for it to recharge. This makes battling several monsters at once a bit more strategic. Approaching a group at an angle's so's to anger only one of the group is one way that I discovered in how to deal with them, pick them off one at a time if you will. But, if you get really good, and you will need to, you can fire off several shots at multiple monsters and when your mana has run out but before the monsters reach you, you can touch young Isaac and have him start running away while your mana returns. Trust me, this take a bit of practice.

 
"I tried for ten minutes to come up with a funny caption, sorry."

LostMagic is a decent-looking title, I recall that Castlevania also involved the drawing of runes in order to unleash magic on the problems that come crawling after you, and I also recall saying that the game reminded me of how the character's in Full Metal Alchemist (the cartoon) do the same kind of thing in order to perform their magic. Well, LostMagic is definitely more of the same, emphasis on more. The arcane symbols are decidedly effective looking and do a good job of making the gamer feel like a spellcaster plus, according to the booklet, there are 400 total spells in which to use. The game looks like an early Zelda game only with a bit more cleaner lines and a bit more detail in the lay of the land. Don't get me wrong, the look of the game isn't bad; in fact it kind of felt right too considering that the game is rated E for everyone. I liked how the character anime faces pop up at the bottom of the screen when they are talking, but if you have played any RPG lately, you will note that this is quite a common theme. The monsters on the other hand are pretty simplistic and un-scary. But I guess that too kind of rolls with how the game is presented.

If anything, the sound too is kind of cutesy in a saccharine-sweet way. I know that voice acting is rare in these types of games, especially on a platform like the DS, but something more audio wise is needed for this title. The light music that plays as you go from point A to point B is pretty much standard fare and the dramatic sound that pops up when something surprising happens is pretty much fluff. It's not horrible mind you, but you can tell that the developers were just using some tried and true music for this one. Hey what can I say, it's what it is.

Now back to the in-game action. As time rolls on and you are traveling from one place to another (fairly linear game here and getting lost is not on the menu) you will run into others who will offer advice or need help or need help offering advice, whatever, you get it. The point is that you will be sometimes given a choice on how to respond to a question or a choice involving some sort of decision. These choices are somewhat odd, since they inevitably seem to bring you to the same conclusion. Sure there is some variance and the right choice can certainly help reap rewards but still, the whole thing seemed a bit out of place to me.

 
 "Mmmmm, M and M's."

Probably the thing that surprised me most about LostMagic is that there are some heavy strategic elements present in the game. Early on, you discover the ability to trap monsters and have them fight on your side, which leads to some quick stylus whipping as you discover that the only way to continue on is to have monsters go into battle with/for you in order to take on the action scenario, which is usually precluded by a bit of plot "Oh no, the village is being attacked!"  The point being, in order to capture the monsters, you must first beat the snot out of them and then use the capture spell, once that is done, you will need to figure out what monsters are most effective against other monsters. The game is based on that whole yin-yang thing, water-based monsters do well against fire-based, earth against wind, you get it. Eventually you will have quite the menagerie of critters rolling with you and through trial and error should have a good enough experience battling your way through the game's surprisingly sly plot.

Gameplay: 8.6
The game is darn near controlled entirely by the stylus. How well you can draw the rune has an effect on how well the spell is cast. The whole RPG with strategy involved battles is a great way to bring out a new title.

Graphics: 7.9
There is a lot of information contained in this game, the graphics aren't bad, they look somewhat retro and I mean that in a positive way. Some simplistic-looking monsters but you never forget who or what you are looking at. The niftiest visuals is the magic symbols that are drawn on a cool looking arcane symbol.

Sound: 7.0
Nothing new or riveting. It sounds good, clear and crisp, but there wasn't anything I could get really excited about.

Difficulty: Medium
The game has some challenging battles, and you will realize quickly that you need to be fast on the draw with your stylus. But some elbow grease and figuring out which monsters you need to bring into battle will help out considerably.

Concept: 8.8
This is great; easily one of the games that has embraced the stylus-based gameplay and done it right.

Multiplayer: 8.0
With a second copy of the game, you can do duel battles against one another with full-scale monster wars and magic-symbol drawing. It's cool.

Overall: 8.2
A really strong contender for dark horse game of the year. If good word of mouth can get out there then the game will see a deserved sequel.