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An old-school style first person RPG for Mobile! | Margonem Adventures - First Impressions

2K View2023-02-04

At first glance, youngsters might think of this game as Minecraft inspired with its blocky looking graphics. For the more aged gamer, It looks like The Elder Scrolls I or II. And they’re both right, as Margonem Adventures looks as if The Elder Scrolls II got upgraded to Minecraft graphics.

After the tutorial section though, the game immediately shows its true colors as a mobile game, complete with a three star system to rate the “run”, an energy system to limit play, gacha elements, and daily, weekly, challenges as part of a live service setup. This allows you to get better items and loot in order to progress faster. The UI of the gameplay is passable at best, but the hub town is a major offender with its craggy UI and visuals.

What’s most important though is the gameplay, as Margonem Adventures is a first-person RPG dungeon crawler that puts you in the shoes of a traveler, who's the only one that can purge the world of evil; one dungeon after another. Like the King-style Saga games (Candy Crush, Papa Pear Saga, etc), you also spend energy to get a try at these levels. Finishing dungeons grants you gold and random loot at the end, to equip on your character.

The controls are pretty non-complex; left side of the screen to move, and right side to look. Oftentimes, you will encounter monsters in the dungeon to fight, usually in big open spaces. The combat mostly consists of strafing left to right to avoid projectiles, moving backwards to avoid melee attacks, while throwing a plethora of spells — heal, freeze, poison, haste, defense, burn, etc. — chosen from a deck-like randomization element, two at a time. Some enemies will have special telegraph attacks but they’re still too easy for the first few levels that I’ve played.

Although there is an option to disable it, I prefer using the auto-targeting feature in combat, as I feel it goes perfectly with the auto-attack nature of the game (there is no attack button). A nice quality life element especially when playing this game on the go and in short bursts where you don’t want to micromanage everything.

There’s also a small mini-exploration and puzzle angle wherein you have to collect all the crystals hidden in the levels, and interact with basic interactables like levers to open gates and or journals from dead adventurers. How many crystals you find will constitute your 1-3 star rating at the end of the dungeon run.

Margonem Adventures is an interesting amalgamation of old-school first person RPGs, minecraft visuals, and candy crush-like progression system. It's a decent time-killer to play in short bursts, and it's just fitting since you can’t play long sessions anyway unless you pay.

Full Review will be posted soon here on Taptap! Stay tuned!

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