Combat

Not a clickfest

One of the developers' main complaints about many RPGs is the tedium of menu based attacking. There's strategy involved there, but really not a lot of skill. Games like Final Fantasy 7 added a new wrinkle by adding a timer to make it a blend of turn based and real time but after a few dozen battles, it starts to get dull. The point and click style of combat (Diablo, Baldur's Gate) adds a bit more urgency but you lose a lot of complexity there and end up just wearing out your mouse button (I change to a 2 dollar mouse when playing Diablo for this reason). Cinematix looked for a way to improve the situation and decided to develop a combat system inspired by 3D fighting games.

That ain't Puff, the magic dragon

All aboard!

Free-Form

There are 4 primary modes of attack - with melee weapons, martial arts style, bow combat, and stealth mode. With melee weapons you can thrust, swing, or chop. In the right situation, you can perform a combo maneuver that links together for a more powerful attack. Look for fatalities, throws, and power moves. Hand to hand is similar to weapon mode with punch, kick, and jump kick. And yes, you will be able to do combos and such in hand to hand mode, just like Street Fighter or Tekken! Bow combat is included for cowards (like me) who don't like mixing it up close, and stealth mode is there for campers who want to sneak up on monsters from behind and kill them with assassination maneuvers (backstabs, neck snaps maybe?).

Meet the cast

The natives look restless