Child of Light

Release: 2014
Developer: Ubisoft Montreal
Genre: 2d, JRPG
Gameplay Stats: 9 hours, Story completed, 80% quest completion

This is an entirely unique game made by Ubisoft with their Ubi-art framework. The only other game I know of that uses this framework is Rayman, so I suspect this is for using hand drawn elements in a 2d game. Was that a spoiler?

Visuals: This game is very pretty! Everything is hand drawn and it looks it. You can see that there was love put into every element of this game's visual design. This is definitely a strong point of the game. Unlike a lot of games with hand drawn elements, the lack of consistent hitboxes doesn't matter as much here. I'm not sure if this was something that they purposefully made irrelevant or if it was happenstance, but this is the first hand drawn game that I can think of where inconsistent hitboxes didn't matter. My only gripe here is that there was a definite lack of enemy variation. All of the bosses are unique but there are probably half a dozen enemy types with most having several re-skins.

Audio: The music in this game is great! It's all beautifully orchestrated and fits extremely well with each level's visual theme. The sound effects are extremely bland in comparison, it makes for a weird juxtaposition. All of the combat sounds are like stock ones that you might find in Gamemaker, nothing too original. There is also a lack of sounds in the game. Like, there aren't a lot of reactionary noises that you would expect in a game that is so combat focused. There is next to no voice over present in the game and it's a shame. The dialog is very nicely written to be rhyming and poetic, but without a voice reading it, it came across as a bit stilted. I think that having voices read with good inflection would have greatly improved the experience.

Plot: The plot in this game is a bit convoluted. Like, it's easy enough to understand but it's difficult to express succinctly. It's fairly short, so I think it fits. The whole thing feels a bit like a children's fairy tale and I think that's by design. I didn't particularly enjoy the story, but I think they nailed what they were going for.

Gameplay: I actually really enjoyed the gameplay. I think this is what led me to finish the game in all honesty. The majority of the game, you are flying around a 2d world, exploring nooks and crannies and solving some very rudimentary puzzles. This part is okay. The rest of the game places you into a JRPG style combat, with every participant on the bottom along a ribbon-like active time battle gauge. The last 20% or so is labelled 'Casting' and if a character gets hit while in this area, their turn is reset and their action cancelled. I haven't ever played a game like this and I found it very interesting. Most JRPGs are formulaic in their combat, in that it makes perfect sense to focus down a singular enemy most of the time. I found myself spreading out the damage frequently to interrupt enemies and avoid damage. Juggling abilities with different cast times was also relevant. This paired with controlling a magical firefly with the ability to slow enemies in real time (not beholden to the gauge) made the combat pretty strategic and I liked it. I'd like to see this combat style used more frequently!

Overall, I kind of enjoyed the game. It was a bit awkward and a little uneven in terms of polish, but it was enjoyable and definitely unique. I wouldn't say this game was a masterpiece by any means, but I'd recommend it because it's so different than most other games out these days. [7/10]