Legends of Pandora is a new RPG game by matakukos, popularly known for the Notebook War series. The game starts out simply, a quest of a missing news paper, but quickly you find yourself engulfed in a quest to find out why so many monsters are appearing throughout the world. Legends of Pandora is comparative to the early Legend of Zelda games, but has some differences that separate it as well. With simple game mechanics this game interprets some of the earlier games well, while introducing some of its own aspects. The pixel-art graphics also invoke nostalgia. If you liked the earlier Legend of Zelda games, then you’ll find many enjoyable hours with this game as it takes you across 26 questions, thousands of baddies and a lot of land to explore and master new abilities in. Along the way, your hero will level up and can be customized to your gameplay style.

Legends of Pandora

I wouldn’t say that the game is too difficulty – it’s not difficult in my opinion, because most of the enemies will never hit you, as your swings are decently paced and the stronger weapons will kill most of the enemies in a couple of hits. If you’re carrying one of the best weapons at whatever point in the game you’re at you shouldn’t have too many problems. The enemies are plentiful, but can easily be outrun, or gathered up to deal damage most efficiently. There were a few instances where cover was useful, but for the most part, if you do have a good weapon, you can take out the enemies before they hit you. One of the big pluses on the combat side for me was the different types of enemies, melee and ranged. Most RPG games do have this and it is always nice to see as it has the ability to spice up the battles a bit. Included also in the game, are poisonous enemies.

Overall, the gameplay was pretty good. It played out like many other RPGs where you find yourself suddenly on an epic quest. Many of the mechanics are similar to the early Legends of Zelda games, you face in the direction you want to attack and you fire, or swing, straight forward. I really liked the idea of having different “classes” where you can specialize in different weapons – maces, swords, daggers, and bows – with your stat points. This allowed you to play the game to your style, but i felt that the classes weren’t exactly equal to one another. Most of the daggers did only a fraction to what a good sword could do and the archers really didn’t have a chance in this game with the high price of even the weakest arrows considering how many you’ll need to make a profit. One suggestion would be that depending upon which type of bow you buy, you should have an unlimited amount of arrows of one kind (basic bows would of course be wooden arrows and more advanced and expensive bows you have heavier-hitting arrows. Most of time, the game was really fun to play, but I still felt like there are some things that the game could have done better. The good news is, that this is only chapter one of the series and I’m sure there will be many great improvements in the future chapters.

Here are a few things that I felt could have been better about the game.

What I didn’t like about the game is the tedious factor that plays such a large role. If you want some of the best weapons you have to farm gold for a long time and even then that is only enough gold for one item. When I imagine a game like this, I expect there to be some work involved – some grinding to collect enough gold to buy the things you want – but it feels like it takes too long even in a game where some grinding is expected. Another aspect of the game that I didn’t like too much was the leveling system. Up to level  20, I poured all of my skill points into Money Collection, thinking that I would be able to afford more arrows and thus have to grind less. Not only did I still not have enough money to sustain big battles with arrows, but I still received, seemingly, the same amount of gold, except for the occasional “large” pile of gold that didn’t have too much of an effect. Another downside to the game is the extremely unbalanced classes. At the beginning of the game I decided I would be an archer. In too many games before I had been a warrior, as it always seemed to be a balanced class, but I decided i would changed it up and try out archery. Not only do archers do less damage, but they must have a constant supply of arrows. Already the problem emerges, that if it takes multiple arrows to kill an enemy, and not enough gold is rewarded, then you will not gain enough money to sustain a good arrow supply. Around level 20 I switched over to maces and invested my skill points in experience. Another issue I have with the game is the save system. Sure it may be more nostalgia inducing, but I would much-prefer an auto-save feature. My last complaint is the slow move speed of your characters. To get from place to place, it usually takes a while and makes the game more tedious than need be. While I do have a few issues with the game, it isn’t too bad of a game! There are just some really tedious and unbalanced aspects of it that have made this easily four-star game drop a bit in the standings. If these problems would be fixed I don’t see why this wouldn’t be an even more successful game.

Legends of Pandora

There is one thing I can’t complain about though, and that is the excellent pixel-art. This truly does achieved the nostalgia effect. It is an excellent tribute to the older games. All of the sprites look really great and have just a little bit of animation to not only fit the era, but to give a little life to them. I like how the developer also snuck in some more modern art when you talked to the NPC around the world. This looked really great and didn’t look too out of place. Overall, while the art was very simple, it worked well with the game and it tribute to some of the older games.

All in all, Legends of Pandora is a fantastic RPG game that will keep you hooked. If you’re a big fan of the older LoZ games then you’ll love LoP as it combines many of the aspects of LoZ with its own ideas to form a unique and exciting RPG game. There were a few issues, mostly ones that envoked tediousness, but for the most part the game was very good, and if these issues could be fixed this could be an even more amazing game. In review, the game wasn’t too difficult. Most of the enemies could be killed with ease and only until you get a further into the game does your reliance on stat points, leveling up and strong weapons increase. The gameplay itself was very good. It worked like the early LoZ games – in a top-down manner, shops spotted across the land and enemies ever-rampant. I really liked the ability to specialized in so many different weapons and skills. The artwork was really fantastic and worked well with the gameplay. Some aspects seemed a little too patterned to me, such as the grass blades, but could easily be fixed with more variations. Overall, Legends of Pandora is a series that you’ll want to keep your eyes on. If you’re a big fan of the RPG genre, then you’ll find yourself right at home here is this epic game. Be sure to play it today on Kongregate!

Play Legends of Pandora on Kongregate!