All your Swords are belong to Fairies
I have an affinity for mythology, just something about the spectacle of it all just has always been wonderous to me. And with the increase of Chinese games being released on console has just been wonderful as their mythology is simply beautiful to me. The latest game in the long running Sword and Fairy series has finally come to Xbox in Sword and Fairy: Together Forever.
Sword and Fairy: Together Forever is a straightforward action RPG based on the aforementioned Chinese mythology. Much like the other Chinese action RPG’s I’ve played like Xuan Yuan Sword 7, Sword and Fairy suffers from a lot of exposition meaning that players will find themselves watching quite a few cutscenes, and often. Now this is a blessing and a curse, the curse side is that it just seems like much of the effort was spent on these scenes and sadly combat took a back seat (more on that in a second).
MSRP: $39.99
Platforms: Xbox (reviewed), PlayStation
Price I’d Pay: $39.99
The blessing though is that most of them, especially the villain entrances, or battle scenes; are cool as fuck. Once of early ones sees the villainous trio teleporting into the realm, and the poses that each of them hits as they appear in the sky along with the camera cuts and music was just absolutely stunning. So much so I clipped it and sent it to my friends with the caption “us entering the club”, obviously this was in my youth as nowadays the only club I hit up is the Sam’s Club where I am a premiere member.
The story, while predictable, was interesting nonetheless due to the mythology involved. The heroine Yue must gather a band of heroes to stop demons from upsetting the balance between the realms. At least I’m pretty sure that’s what happened, you see one of the biggest issues with Sword and Fairy 7 is the translation. All the spoken words are in the native language so anyone else will have to depend on the subtitles and boy is it rough. Most things can be figured out via context, like when your hero earns new combat abilities, and the description reads something like “Hit your enemy with fires flame and winds fury”. Doesn’t tell me what type of attack, but it might hint at the type of damage but even that wasn’t a sure thing.But when the story, which is interesting, was going good and heavy and I missed a line of dialog only to have the next line be mistranslated it just made it rough trying to put together what just transpired at times.
The combat, oh man the combat, while flashy it just ends up being passable. The biggest issue with the combat is just how stiff it feels, everything from trying to hit enemies with combos to using special abilities just feels like the timing is completely off. While it is something that players can get used to and some of the late game more flashy attacks are fun to watch, overall, it just ends up being more flash than substance which for me is a true sin because if you listen at all to the N4G Podcast (and if you aren’t why not? ) you know I love some fast and fluid combat with all the flash of Dragonball Z. This from the videos looked to be just that, but alas it was not to be.
Now that’s not to say Sword and Fairy: Together Forever isn’t a fun game, because it very much is. The journey and world are overall linear, but the fun is in the experience, and the story is good enough to deal with the stiff combat if you enjoy your tales on the fantastical side. The graphics were great with the usual amount of graphical pop in that has become the staple of Unreal Engine 4 at this point but the way the fabrics and hair move when in combat is almost mesmerizing and makes up for the aging engine. If you are wanting to try something new, I’d recommend Sword and Fairy: Together Forever, even with it’s issues it was still a good time but hopefully we can do a better job with translating the next one.
Review copy of game provided by publisher.
