Review for Spooks and Summons

Write and read reviews of games that have been uploaded to Slime Salad.

Moderators: Bob the Hamster, marionline, SDHawk

Post Reply
User avatar
marionline
Metal Slime
Posts: 673
Joined: Sat Feb 26, 2011 9:23 pm

Review for Spooks and Summons

Post by marionline »

Infos
"Spooks and Summons" by Fenrir-Lunaris was released in in the 2016 Halloween Game Contest.

Plot
Hati has to take her brother Kotaru trick or treating because it's holiday, but she'd prefare staying inside playing computer games.
Hati takes her brother outside, they explore the scenery, meet Hati's boytriend and then go to the place where Hati's aunts live.
A dressed up men scares Kotaru and Fenris to run inside the house, where he gets trapped in a magic circle. Hait has to learn magic to summon him back.

**Bravo! Great Design!**
I really liked ...
- the title screen in FF style
- the walking animations!
- the character portraits
- the summoning circles getting new additions each level - cool feature!
- Cthulhu's shopping scene

**Things that could be improved:**
- The "subtitle" for Spooks and Summons is too small, hardly readable
- The enemies at the beginning are to strong to beat them. Even with items equipped. They sometimes kill with one or two hits.
- when changing the line up, the chars sink into the ground. Is this a walktall bug?

Overall Impression:
The game is very difficult, especially in the beginning. The enemies of the first chapter are way to strong. This really should be improved, since it can turn people away from the game effectively. Maybe my mistake was to not use the strong magic attacks but normal attacks instead, anyhow it should not be punished that harshly since in the first few battles one does want to test out all the attacks.
The battle system design was interesting: Summoning monsters to help you battle monsters. The monsters are stored in so called "gatcha" that the player has to buy and one never knows what monster one get. By using the book you can summon monsters from the "gatcha". Monster collecting is already cool on it's own, but it is never known what monster one will summon, this an element of surprise is what makes the whole system so much fun.
The magic book also has a chapter that summons monsters to fight. If you win, you get money and sweets to buy more gatcha and items to equip Hait and the monsters.
There is a inn and shop near by, and basically the player does not have to leave the room, that is quite cool. :)
After fighting a few enemies the chapter of the book can be finished by choosing "finish chapter" from the book's menu. That will summon a strong boss and force a boss battle, plus there will be more cutscenes and character interaction. Also, one can always go back an battle weaker monsters. There seems to be a level-cap at level 20.
The character design is strong. They have their own personality and speech patterns. Also, most dialogue comes with character portraits, so at times the game feels more like a visual novel than a rpg game. The character are well drawn and they even have several gestures/emotions.
The graphics of the game have their own style. The outside map looks bit monochrome with dark and brown tones, but the interior maps of houses are neatly drawn and decorated.
I really like the random monster collection thing. That was fun! :D
Attachments
Nope, no mimigames
Nope, no mimigames
halowoof0131.bmp (63.55 KiB) Viewed 1983 times
boss battle against characters from other games
boss battle against characters from other games
halowoof0135.bmp (63.55 KiB) Viewed 1983 times
boss enemies are showing up if a chaper is finished
boss enemies are showing up if a chaper is finished
halowoof0096.bmp (63.55 KiB) Viewed 1983 times
stats screen for a spook
stats screen for a spook
halowoof0079.bmp (63.55 KiB) Viewed 1983 times
figth some spooks with summons
figth some spooks with summons
halowoof0067.bmp (63.55 KiB) Viewed 1983 times
Hati has to learn magic to summon her baby brother back
Hati has to learn magic to summon her baby brother back
halowoof0047.bmp (63.55 KiB) Viewed 1983 times
Last edited by marionline on Mon May 15, 2017 9:09 am, edited 2 times in total.
Post Reply