Isle of Reveries

Isle of Reveries is very much a love letter to the GameBoy Zeldas, both visually and mechanically and, by and large, is successful in its execution. If you wanted an Oracle-like with dedicated puzzle focused dungeons, with a gradual opening up of the overworld then this is easily right up your alley. IoR pretty much nails all the core behaviors that its predecessors established, while changing it up enough to make certain aspects more engaging. For example, in the Oracle games, you rarely ever unequip the sword or swap it out for something else for a long period of time; usually you'd pull the menu up, swap to one of your items, immediately use it, then swap back to an established general selection (usually the sword and Roc's Feather). In IoR, however, you're obviously no longer constained to the Oracles' two-button layout. Leif has the ability to jump from the get-go and it's bound separately from the item selections, so you have way more flexibility in a way that doesn't have you popping the menu up repeatedly only to swap things around again 5 seconds later. Also notably, more items you get have direct combat utility. The Oracle games were kind of lacking in this regard. You'd have items that do damage other than the sword, obviously, but many of them were designed such that the sword would still be your #1 go-to at the end of the day, leading to a supplementary item relationship, rather than a symbiotic one. A lot more items in IoR have the ability to stand on their own offensively while also having utility in some other form (e.g. the claw'ncher), which is nice to see; it's another design aspect that also cuts down on rapid item switching. The overworld in the game is very nice in terms of things to do and find. Every new item you pick up in a dungeon will open up an optional path somewhere on the overworld and give you the opportunity to run across even more new upgrades or trinkets, and even let you run across new people, let alone opening up new progressive paths. One nitpick I had with the overworld, however, is that I found navigating it a little overly opinionated in how you do so. For example, in the Oracle games, getting from point A to point B felt much more lax and open to (perceptibly) emergent means of traversal, whereas IoR more or less expects you to take the same path without shortcuts, even with progressive upgrades that you find. To explain a little more, imagine a paved pathway through a park, normally jutting off of them at certain points, you'll have these dirt paths worn in by people finding quicker ways to accomplish getting to a particular location quicker than what the paved path allows (aka desire lines). The Oracle games are very good at making it feel like you're carving out your own desire lines, even if that isn't really the case. I think it's because the Oracle games had ways to directly augment your traversal in supplementary ways. Ground traversal had Pegasus Seeds, and swimming had hitting the A button to get bursts of speed (Oracle of Ages also had the Mermaid Suit). This made movement and traversal feel more fluid depending on player preference at the time of use in conjunction with the level design and reduced the feeling of being railroaded along in particular ways. IoR doesn't really have something to oscillate speed in a player-actionable way like that other than a trinket that permanently increases movement speed when equipped (which results in the new speed becoming the new norm, causing that perceptual behavior to fall off). Coupled with IoR's more densely obstacle populated map, it eventually gets somewhat annoying to retread certain paths. You *do* end up getting a fast travel option eventually, but I don't think that should be the end-all-be-all to the problem. All that being said, I really enjoyed my time with the game and I'm glad I ended up backing it. Like I said at the beginning of this, I very much recommend the game to anyone that liked the GameBoy Zeldas; there's a lot of fun to be had with it.

The game is fun is has SO MANY BUGS! The demo is controller compatible but the main game isn't, the demo save doesn't transfer over, and the controls reverts whenever you set it up, and the music just randomly cuts out and just remains cut. I tried too contact support and still haven't heard back from them. :( I can't recommend it right now. I'll update it if the bugs get fixed.

[h1]Umfangreiches und anspruchsvolles Retro-Action-Adventure für Experten[/h1] Mit Isle of Reveries liefert Carl Baker einen sehr starken Debuttitel ab. Die audiovisuelle Präsentation vermittelt hervorragendes Game Boy-Feeling. Die Spielbarkeit steht dem im nichts nach und es macht sehr viel Spaß die umfangreiche Spielwelt zu erkunden. Leider ist der Schwierigkeitsgrad recht hoch angesetzt. Bereits der allererste Dungeon stellt das Können des Spielers auf eine ernste Probe. Die Rätsel erfordern oftmals einiges an Hirnschmalz und die Gegner leisten ernste Gegenwehr. Dementsprechend sollte man eine gewisse Frustresistenz mitbringen, um Isle of Reveries vollauf genießen zu können. Dieses Spiel wurde gewiss nicht für Einsteiger konzipiert, sondern für erfahrene Retro-Gamer, welche die alten Zelda-Spiele in und auswendig kennen und sich nach einer anspruchsvollen Herausforderung sehnen. [h1]Pro und Kontra:[/h1] Pro: - bietet einen hohen Anspruch an den Spieler. Wer Isle of Reveries knackt, wird ein Gefühl des Stolzes empfinden - gelungene Spielbarkeit nach bewährtem Zelda-Muster - schöne audiovisuelle Präsentation im Stil des Game Boy Color - großer Umfang - man bekommt Zugriff auf sein eigenes Dorf Kontra: - der Schwierigkeitsgrad ist hoch angesetzt und wird selbst erfahrene Spieler stellenweise frustrieren und erschöpfen. Ist jedenfalls nichts für Casuals. - der Lief-Sprite spawnt außerhalb des Screens nach einem Sturz in Abgründe und dergleichen - viele Screens sind arg eng aufgebaut, was es schwer macht die Gegner adäquat zu bekämpfen - der Controller funktionierte nur mit aktivierter Steam-Eingabe Wertung: 80 von 100 Punkte Der vollständige Test: https://gamecontrast.de/isle-of-reveries-review/