In this aspect you might consider this a strategy game…you would be wrong. The game is made up of a few elements from “old school” strategy games in that you move from square to square on a map and you “gather” resources to build on to your castle to hire bigger and better troops for your army, but that’s where the similarities end.

As I mentioned, you find your self gathering these resources that appear on squares of the map for a few turns but in addition to those mundane resources you must gather “Honor” points. The means to collect this honor lies in the second major part of the game, a simplified dungeon crawl.

In this part you find dungeons that are represented on the map as cave mouths and enter the dungeon. The control scheme is similar to the world map as you click on the adjacent squares to move from room to room but as you do the game introduces you to a new aspect…the enemies. Each layout of these dungeons, including their inhabitants, is randomly generated but keeps to the general level of the character.

The means for leveling up your character lies in the killing of the various creatures in the dungeons. Combat is interesting in that it is semi-turn based. You enter a new room and are attacked. The game shows you a static image (there are no animations in the game save the life gauge) of the creature you are facing and their respective level. As you fight you are given three choices, Thrust, Slash, and Smash. Essentially they are different tiers of attacks. The first does little damage but has a greater chance of hitting and the last is the opposite, low accuracy but high damage with Slash being the middle of the three. As you attack you will randomly get the Heroic options. Strike does a good deal more damage to the target, Heal does just that heals your character for a little of their missing health and Retreat allows you to escape a fight that you are losing.

Upon defeating these enemies you receive money or items. The items come into play in the dungeons and in the final fight against your main enemy, the other nation’s leader. These items range from various weapons and jewelry that increase damage done or hit accuracy to potions to regain health in long fights. Your character can only carry five items in his backpack at a time so it makes you decide what suits your play style best.

There are a few other places of note on the world map. You have a few cities that can be conquered for supply purposes as well as roving vendors that will sell different resources at varying prices. In addition you have a few places that are used to turn in items that are found to increase your gold supply. In the first scenario you also have a dragon that you must pass through a few different means, the primary being that you find five dragon eggs in the dungeons and she lets you pass.

All of these elements culminate in you building up your army and your level enough to attack the enemy castle and win that fight then for you and their ruler to have a one on one fight using the same methods as in the dungeons. This seems pretty straightforward but can be difficult in execution as the enemy tends to level up as fast if not faster than you.

In regards to appearances the game is surprisingly good-looking considering its simple game play. The images are nicely done and as they are static the details aren’t lost in animations. The interface is clean and understandable and the clickable help menus are a huge help. The game offers an interactive tutorial at the beginning that assists you in learning the game play and while appreciated the method for interfacing with that was odd. The window moved around quite a bit to show each new part and at times it was overwhelming.

The sounds are extremely well done for such a simple game. There are ambient sounds such as birds chirping and horses neighing as well as a subtle soundtrack on top of that. The quality is good but the lowest volume setting is still a bit too loud.

I wasn’t expecting much from this title upon first playing but as the game progressed I found myself drawn into the game. The feeling of one more move or fight is ever present and the simple yet detailed game play does this title justice. At times I need a semi-mindless game to just click through and this title does this well. If it wasn’t for the price I would probably highly recommend this to anyone that found my description at all interesting.