Tales of the Elements

How much of this game I've played: 12 Hours, 35 minutes How I've played so much: I had a pre-ordered non-steam copy. Completed Main story, not the super secret boss area. Here's why you'd be interested in this game: Good rhymes, good story, old school gameplay. Good rhymes: If you haven't heard of BeNeVoLeNcE, you might have heard of Mega Ran - he's known for clean nerdcore rhymes over chiptune beats and melodies. Hip Hop by both is featured in the game, and it's not an "afterthought" like it might be in some games - the music is interwoven in with the story - it's actually rewarding to gain access to the rhymes that go along with the instrumentals in different parts of the game. Good Story: There's a lot of heart in this story, and one can feel like it really draws on some current feelings in real life. The story told here is indeed good vs. evil, but it also touches on how evil can flourish because of indifference, and greed. And also how some things a person might want to do with good motives...have to be put off for one reason or another. A person can really be drawn into this story. Old School Gameplay: If you've played a Shining Star game, or Secret of Mana/Evermore, the game plays similar to that. Very reminiscent of old school SNES games. Some of the items/skills in the game are implemented in the same way as games in the past. --------------------------------------- Here's why a person may not like it: Old school graphics; mostly stupid AI party members, sometimes frustrating movement/attack aim Old school graphics isn't really something I have beef with at all, but if someone expects the latest Ys from this game, this is not it. Mostly stupid AI party members: This issue had me yelling at the screen a few times. AI party members are dumb, and will charge to their death often. Best advice here is to not worry about spending items reviving them, unless you need them as cannon fodder. This goes into the third issue. Sometimes frustrating movement/attack positioning: This is very much a game where you need to take a few seconds to learn boss patterns. Once you have an idea of where to stand and when, you will not take a scratch on boss fights. It's Dark Souls-y in that way. Get greedy, and you will get punished. Many times on certain characters your attack skill will put you in harm's way, so often learning how to be cheap about your own attacks will serve you well. Score: 9/10. This is a solid, enjoyable game, and I look forward to the next chapter. Obligatory: Would charge the buster and blast through walls again. EDIT: Certain areas are maddening if you get into the habit of clearing rooms before entering.

I like the tone and music, but the gameplay is a little slippery and inprecise. The other party members AI constantly run off and get themselves killed too which sucks.

Not really sure why people are freaking out about this. It's a very basic, dull game with outdated graphic/chip-sets used, general gameplay is boring and about as dense as it gets. Music isn't even good; and it's a godamn music-based game.

So far, I like the music and I like the gameplay. It's simple and pretty damn chill. However, I couldn't find an option for fullscreen. If anyone has a problem with windowed, you just have to edit the game.ini file located (by default) @: C: /Program Files/Steam/steamapps/common/tales of the elements FC/game.ini

[h1] Skip it or suffer horrors of RPG maker. [/h1]

[h1]Tales Of The Element Review[/h1] [b]Tales of the Elements First Chapter, a game adaption of the album of the same name, is a mixture of Hip Hop, JRPG, & party-style goodness! Featuring Mega Ran, K-Murdock, and Last BeNeVoLeNcE, experience a fast-paced 2D Japanese-style action RPG for up to 4 players![/b] What do you get when you mix Hip Hop, JRPGs, fast-paced action, and 4-player couch co-op? [i]Tales of the Elements First Chapter is an indie action role-playing game adaptation of the album of the same name. While similar to the classic style of Japanese RPGs of the 90s, TotEFC blends Hip Hop music and culture with the characteristics and setting of a traditional JRPG to create a world of fantasy and style! Starring music producer and recording artist Last BeNeVoLeNcE, the legendary “Chip Hop” pioneer Mega Ran, and Panacea producer K-Murdock![/i] [h1]Aspects Of The Game:[/h1] • Based on the Hip Hop album of the same name. • Japanese-style RPG storytelling like the classics of the 90’s. • True 4-player co-op action battle system with X-Box 360 gamepad support. • A great soundtrack that features a unique blend of Hip Hop and RPG music. • Hip Hop themed mechanics that are rewarding but optional. • Light puzzle-solving progression without the help of quest markers. • Secret bosses and a hidden unlockable that literally breaks the 4th wall [h1]Gameplay[/h1] In terms of gameplay it is a typical top-down RPG game, they claim to support X-Boy 360 controllers. However, if you are going to play the game there is no mouse support. The game is controlled through the keyboard with various input combinations. You walk through the levels avoiding obstacles, in order to reach your destination and progress on the story. The levels are confusing at times and it's like a puzzle. You have weapons, which you use to attack creatures that come in your way. [h1]Story[/h1] The story is basically features Mega Ran, K-Murdock, and Last BeNeVoLeNcE, adventure in a mysterious place. [h1]Visuals[/h1] Visually a retro styled game with pixelated artwork and a ton of retro-rpg elements. [h1]Music and Sounds[/h1] This is exactly what this game is based upon. The game comes with an amazing album, and it's the best thing about this game. I took my time listening to all the amazing soundtracks, and it's worth it. [h1]Pros:[/h1] • Fully featured gameplay • RPG Storytelling • Hip-Hop themed mechanics • Great Soundtrack Album [h1]Cons:[/h1] • No mouse support • Hard to control • Confusing at times The game is good, and seems to be moving in the right direction.Though it's a little over-priced, but considering the amazing album that comes with it, it's maybe worth it. Reminds you of playing old TV Video games. Some good old memories right there. [h1]My Rating: 6.0/10[/h1]

RPG Maker strikes again! "Tales of the Elements" is one of hundreds of low effort retro-pixel RPG Maker asset/construction kit flips spamming the Steam catalog, made with the RPG Maker video game construction kit... in their own words, "Our easy to use tools are simple enough for a child." Like all RPG Maker "games", this is essentially a bunch of low quality/canned assets from RPG Maker coupled with a cringeworthy high school anime club fan fiction. As with all RPG Maker games, the poor quality engine displays badly in fullscreen and doesn't have full HD support or any graphics tweaking options, making this unacceptable for any dedicated modern PC gamer. The point can be made that the intention of RPG Maker is to make demos and small games to pass around friends, and shouldn't be used for "professional" game development. Like most RPG Maker shovelware and asset flips, the game features extremely low quality copy + pasted 2D retro pixel art, looks awful, and has even worse gameplay. RPG Maker is an absolutely terrible construction kit, and never results in games of any reasonable quality or value to gamers. Notably the developer here couldn't work out how to use RPG Maker to make an RPG... and that's the only thing RPG Maker can do properly... except it's not even very good for making RPGs. Instead, we have two different RPG Maker engines in use, the top down "ARPG" brawler and the very rarely used third person low poly/pixel 3D engine... both of which are even worse than the traditional JRPG bit that most RPG Maker asset flippers abuse when making shovelware asset flips to dump on Steam Direct and pollute the place. And it's bad, really bad. The crux of this game has nothing to do with gaming, it's actually some dismally failed music producers attempt to go viral by dumping really, really, really bad music onto Steam through Steam Direct for $100. It's ear damagingly bad music, some of the worst ever made. This isn't making music better, it's making video games much, much worse. PC gamers will be insulted by the demand from the developer that a console peasant children's toy controller should be used, despite this being on PC. Developers should try to be aware which platform they're developing for, and must never, under any circumstances dictate to gamers how their games are to be experienced. In an attempt to excuse the low quality of delivery here, the game makes a big point of having a nice soundtrack, but the soundtrack is utter garbage. The quality of the music here is much worse than GenAI music you can listen to on Udio. If the business plan for a game is to compete with Spotify, which is free and has effectively unlimited music, all of which is better than the music here, it's failed before it even started. Gamers can listen to the Spotify for free. A game cannot be seen as recommendable just because it competes badly with listening to the radio or to MP3s. You don't have to take my word about how bad the game is, we can measure the interest in a game by how much people bothered to play it. "Tales of the Elements" has achievements, and they show us a very clear picture that the game absolutely failed to capture any interest from gamers. The most commonly and easily attained achievement is for making it through the tutorial without throwing up from just how bad the soundtrack is, trivial to achieve, but less than 3 percent of players bothered to get that far before uninstalling the game. That's a tiny, tiny proportion of gamers who even bothered with this. Ouch. Reviewing SteamDB to check how popular this game was with players reveals a surprise... there's a very healthy spike in player counts for the game. But this only happened once, and isn't consistent with the achievement stats, that show less than 3 percent of players bothered playing the game for any reasonable amount of time. How is it possible for this game to have so many concurrent players who didn't bother engaging with this game? Trading cards. People will use card idling software to collect the cards and sell them, but this won't trigger any achievements in-game. That tells us people only really bought this game for trading cards, and that's a damning indictment of the woeful quality. A closer look at the numbers shows the game just has a couple of players every week running up the game and idling it for cards, then deleting it. We must ask how it benefits gamers for there to be so many games like this, with little merit as a serious game, that only generate sales from people idling and selling the trading cards. So, should you buy this game? Is this one of the best of the 100,000+ games on Steam? "Tales of the Elements" has the almost comically optimistic (if it wasn't so sad) price of around $7 USD, it's not worth it given the defects and shortcomings with the product, especially considering the sheer number of completely free, much higher quality games on Steam. For comparison, the $7 asking price for this game could get you games like "Euro Truck Simulator 2", "Batman: Arkham City" or "Batman: Arkham Asylumn". Quality, professionally made games like those are frequently on sale cheaper than this. Gamers who instead want a good retro JRPG experience would be better off playing the originals, like Final Fantasy, Star Ocean or Chrono Trigger.

An 80's babies dream come true! Old school RPG with a fantastic soundtrack. Absolutely a must have.

I am digging it so far. The sound track makes me tingle. The sounds in general tick a nostalgia that I haven't felt since the SNES, and early playstation era. Pros: ~ The characters are cool, and feel unique. ~ The art is great ~ Sound Track IS SO SO GOOD. ~ Controls are tight. ~ Characters are creative ~ The writing is neat. If you go into it with the mind set that this is written by hip hop artist the disconnect is greatly appreciated. ~ I love that almost every line in this game so far can be sung. Cons: ~ That being said this game NEEDS a lot of polish. ~ I've killed monsters, and they'll die in areas that I cannot access so I cannot pick up whatever they drop. ~ I was sad that I couldn't use my SNES USB game pad, and had to use a XBOX controller. I would like to see the control scheme get changed to something that I can select. ~ The hit detection is really off some times. ~ The shadows in some areas are just black so I was having trouble seeing where my character is walking. Over all I am liking what I am seeing, but It would be nice to see this game polished. I'd recommend it honestly. It's cute, and I appreciate all the hard work put into it. I am also biased. I love the genre, and anything that MegaRAN touches I treat as gold. I always support his projects.

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