Avalon Code Review

Of all the genres that you could imagine the DS would end up excelling in, would one have predicted that it would become such an RPG powerhouse? The split the genre now exists in between the graphical giants hitting the high-tech console scene and the resurgence of low-fi-but-lovable titles making their way to the handheld is quite interesting, and nowhere shown as perfectly as how the kings of the kingdom, Final Fantasy XIII and DragonQuest IX, now sit on completely opposite ends of the technology spectrum.

This all actually may or may not have any relevance here, because while Avalon Code is a DS RPG, it also kinda isn’t. Pieced together by Matrix Software–folks who have a knack for doing this kind of thing, having developed the DS ports of Final Fantasy III and IV–it has many of the familiar gears that typically make the RPG engine run. Yet there’s also a decent helping of adventure, however, as time not spent in town talking to NPCs or watching cutscenes is spent instead dispatching monsters in real-time fast-action combat, or trying to beat the clock in the many time-based dungeon rooms you’ll come across.

So Avalon Code is sort of action-adventure-RPG, I suppose. Whatever you call it, it’s a final product that plays pretty decently and looks, at its best moments, absolutely stunning. (There were times while playing where, all hyperbole aside, I stopped to take a moment to appreciate what I was seeing, because I was honestly surprised at what my little DS was cranking out.)

Then, however, there’s the catch to all of this.

A wonderful, devilishly clever little catch, something that seems so small at first but then propels Avalon Code from being that not-too-shabby little action-adventure-RPG into being something special.

When the storyline kicks off after picking your hero’s name and sex, you are almost instantly handed two things: a tome called the Book of Prophecy, and the understanding that the world is soon to come to an end. Ah, but in a very welcome twist, your job this time isn’t to save the world, but instead to use the Book to record the people, creatures, and items that you want to take with you when you, the Chosen One, pass on to the world’s rebirth.

Smacking things with the Book of Prophecy creates a new page for them, a page made up in part with the game’s big, before-mentioned catch: the Code table. Here, everything added to the book has a set selection of attributes; set, that is, until you see fit to change them. As you play Noah, collecting those that you wish to save from the coming judgement, you can also play God, modifying weapons to be stronger, villagers to be healthier, items to be more useful, or monsters to be easier to defeat.

The Book of Prophecy, and its potential for changing elements of the game through Code swapping, provides for an enthralling experience. It also, unfortunately, provides for Avalon Code’s one real frustration. You can only hold four Codes on-hand at a time for swapping around, and as the Book’s page count grows, there’s no real way to track which Codes you’ve placed where. When it comes time that you need to say add Illness to a particular monster or the Fire attribute to your sword, tracking down those Code pieces can mean tediously flipping from page to page until you find where you left them. It’s a relatively small blemish on what is otherwise a vastly enjoyable game, but it’s a small mistake that could easily have been prevented.

B Good	Avalon Code's few missteps are overshadowed by the many things it gets right. This is a game that feels unique and special in its own way, and a title that you hopefully won't lose track of in the ridiculous flood of quality DS titles we're currently drowning in.
Avalon Code was reviewed using review code, physical copies, or hardware provided by XSEED Games. Scores are graded on a scale of E (Bad) to S (Special) in homage to Japanese video game grading scales, with the understanding that an S still does not denote a "perfect" score. Scores may have been adjusted from the original source to better fit my personal scale.