Lizsoft, 2008
Windows
Lizsoft, 2008
Windows
命运召唤:尔茄的精灵石(Fortune Summoners: Secret of the Elemental Stone)是一款类“银河城“(Metroidvania)[1] 的硬核横板卷轴 ARPG,游戏有着三个职业(战斗人员)并且重点突出了角色的属性和技能。
主角尔茄(Arche)是个操作起来像是格斗游戏的物理型战士,而她的朋友们则都是魔法使——萨娜(Sana)的水系魔法虽然攻击缓慢但变化多端,而丝黛拉(Stella)是个进攻型的火焰术士并且能够在画面中自由移动。
Fortune Summoners is a hardcore side-scroller ARPG in the vein of “Metroidvania” games, featuring three classes (combat roles) and a strong emphasis on character stats and skills.
The main character, Arche, is a physical fighter who is controlled in a manner similar to fighting games, while her friends are magic-users – Sana's water magic is slow but diverse, while Stella is an aggressive fire spellcaster, capable of freely moving around.
总的来说这游戏最优秀的是它的战斗部分。敌人会对你的行动做出相应反应,如果你的动作过于单一,它们会预判行动,躲避你的攻击并且利用你移动时的停顿间隙给予你沉痛一击。它们不仅会进行格挡、绕击侧翼、击晕并定住你、飞行、起跳和飞扑,并且还会远程攻击、释放强大法术、给自己疗伤、漂浮在你攻击或是施法范围外,而且速度比你快。
游戏的主要难点在于对于时机和动能的把控(这可能会劝退一部分人)。同伴的 AI 非常强并且可以高度定制化,玩家可能会发现自己操作女孩们(尤其是尔茄)的表现要远逊于 AI。
《命运召唤:尔茄的精灵石》对新人来说可不算友好,迷宫错综复杂并且流程极长,谜题涉及到了跳跃、拉开关、推箱子以及发现隐藏通道等操作。遗憾的是探索是线性的并且只能收获道具,同时游戏设计千篇一律,总是要求你在数百人中找到关键 NPC 来推动剧情。
从尔茄作为转校生踏上前往新学校的道路开始,游戏的故事和对话满满的都是套路,幸运的是游戏没有对其进行严肃处理,而做到了轻松愉快。Carpe Fulgur 的翻译精确抓住了游戏中无处不在的轻松氛围以及伙伴间的友情,这也让玩家更好地理解通篇的无厘头情节。
《命运召唤:尔茄的精灵石》有着充足的理由和资本为其老派的游戏设计而自豪,战斗部分极具吸引力与挑战性,游戏文本相当诙谐并且极富感染力,玩家在探索迷宫时,虽然有时会因为折返原路探索而被人为地拖延时间,但玩家仍可以从中发掘到许多秘密。因此,它仍然是我最爱的游戏之一。
Generally, combat is what the game does best. Enemies react to your moves, acting ahead if your actions get too simplistic, dodging your attacks, taking advantage of the pauses in your movement, and inflicting status ailments. They also block, flank, stun-lock you, fly, jump, do leap and ranged attacks, cast powerful spells, heal themselves, float out of your attack or spell range, and move faster than you do.
Much of the game's difficulty comes from managing your timing and momentum (which may prove frustrating to some). The companion AI is competent enough that the player might find themselves worse at controlling the girls (in particular Arche) than the AI, but also highly customisable.
Fortune Summoners never holds your hand. Dungeons get labyrinthine and span many screens, featuring puzzles that involve jumping, switch-pulling, crate-pushing, and discovering hidden passages. Unfortunately, exploration can get fetch quest-y and linear, with a back-and-forth design that often expects you to find the one NPC amidst a hundred of others to advance the plot.
Starting off with Arche, the transfer student on the way to her new school, the game's story and dialogue are nothing if not cliché-laden – luckily treated playfully, not seriously. The pervading spirit of light-heartedness and camaraderie, perfectly captured by Carpe Fulgur's translation, eases you into the whole nonsense pretty well, too.
Fortune Summoners takes pride in its old-school design, with good reason and to good effect. The combat is engaging and challenging, the writing is upbeat and charming, and the dungeon-crawling, while at times artificially prolonged by backtracking, is enjoyable with many secrets to find. As a result, it remains one of my favourite.
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1 译者注:本身是《密特罗德》(Metroid,又译作《银河战士》)和《恶魔城》(Castlevania)合成词,由于上述两款游戏本身共通的设计元素经常被后世的游戏借鉴模仿,久而久之成为了一种特有的游戏类型。其中《密特罗德》所代表的是强关卡地图探索设计,《恶魔城:月下夜想曲》(Castlevania: Symphony of the Night)代表的是装备道具或是属性升级驱动的角色成长。