- Joined
- Sep 20, 2004
- Posts
- 3,073
I got a bug up my ass to play through Magician Lord (AES) this week and figured I'd post my thoughts not that anyone gives a shit.
The game still holds up, and while it's not exactly the best gameplay for a platformer, when you consider the year it came out it has a ton going for it.
Theme and Graphics are fantastic and have aged very well.
Sound Samples and Music are phenomenal even though it was reused for some later stages (Stage 2/4/5 are epic) I honestly think MagLord has the best music on the system.
While the Elta isn't the most nimble to control, he is at least able to shoot upwards and downwards even in mid-air - this helps out a ton especially in stage 3
Multiple forms - while I personally don't use them unless i need health (or you have made it to the final boss) I feel most of them are pretty much worthless - it's cool they had the option, just seemed under-utilized.
The POW system - I personally feel this game shouldn't have had any POW meter at all - it feels perfect once you meter up to level 3 and I believe they did this instead of making the game a double loop like GnG. If you don't have full POW you pretty much will be unable to beat the stage 6 boss, and you will hit the same wall on the boss gauntlet.
I ended up having to unibios (adjusting pow to 3) in order to finish the game. and afterwards was able to 1cc the game no problem like this. I've seen some really skilled people 1cc this without enabling anything and really boils down to not taking one hit, or having one mis-step as Elta loses life and POW meter for every hit.
Anyways, if you ever swore the game off due to it's difficulty try setting the POW to 3 and memorize everything you can, a 1CC should be within reach.
It's a shame they never made a sequel, game holds up.