The Blind Prince and the Liar Princess Review
Pants on fire
Several days ago, a question came beyond my Twitter feed asking me to name an average game I absolutely adore. It was difficult for me to answer because I don't very much consider whatever game I adore to be average. Breath of the Wild's not average, Overwatch is not boilerplate, hell, I even consider Delicate Dreams: Farewell Ruins of the Moon to be an above-average feel, Metacritic score be damned.
I concluded up not answering the question because there just wasn't a game that came to listen. Zippo fit that criterion for me. Nothing…until now.
The Liar Princess and the Blind Prince (PlayStation 4 [reviewed], Nintendo Switch)
Developer: Nippon Ichi Software
Publisher NIS America
Released: February 12, 2019
MSRP: $39.99
The Liar Princess and the Blind Prince leans hard in the fairytale aesthetics right from its opening moments. It starts with a tedious, though whimsical, text-driven cutscene that sets up the world, the characters, and the building blocks of a story about growth and the lengths we go to protect the people we intendance virtually. The story takes place in a shrouded forest overrun with monsters and ruled over by a witch. Most people don't dare venture into the thicket, fearful of what lurks in the shadows, simply the titular prince of this story doesn't fear the unknown. In fact, it's i unknown that lures him deep into the woods. A vocalisation, singing its soul out straight to the moon, serenades him nightly. That voice belongs to a massive wolf, who comes to appreciate the prince as her audience. Every bit monsters and humans are eternal enemies, she doesn't reveal her true course to him, keeping her figure obscured by the cliff she perches on.
I dark, after hearing her sing so lovely, the prince decides its fourth dimension to come across this songstress and climbs up the cliff. The wolf, afraid of what he'll retrieve, tries to block his eyes merely ends upward inadvertently blinding him instead. Seeking to make right all she has washed wrong, the wolf goes to the witch of the woods and asks to be given the class of a human princess. The witch agrees, taking the wolf'south vocalism every bit collateral, beginning a journey that will run into the princess guide the blind prince through the treacherous dangers of the forest.
Everything you but read is covered in the opening to Liar Princess. Before you lot even take command of a grapheme, you're given well over 10 minutes of exposition and story, setting upward the roughly five-hour hazard at mitt. Information technology can experience overly long, as do many of the picturebook cutscenes that litter the campaign, simply its verbosity is necessary as the story is the main depict here. This is fantastic news if you're in the mood for a fanciful fairytale, but not so much if yous're looking for a challenging game.
Liar Princess is tin can best be described as a puzzle-platformer escort mission. The princess, who can alter from her human being form to her wolf form with the press of a push, must take the hand of the prince and guide him through each stage, protecting him from other monsters and using his abilities to solve the puzzles that stand up in their way. As a wolf, she can attack and fall from cracking heights without worrying most damage. As a homo, she takes i hitting or falls from too high and it'due south back to the last checkpoint. The same goes for the prince. Permit him get hit and you lot have to restart back a bit in the level.
Initially, the prince is helpless and useless across standing on switches, simply he eventually adds the power to carry objects to his repertoire too as walk brusk distances on his ain. Most meaning is his power to carry a torch, which allows the duo to light upward darkened paths and clearly see the danger in front of them. In that location is a lot of potential for experimentation with this set-up, his talents and her shapeshifting power, but Liar Princess fails to adequately mix the ii until the absolute final level.
Outside of ane bizarre — and quite frankly, out of place — brainteaser, none of the puzzles found in the levels present whatsoever sort of claiming. Almost are just different variations of the same printing-the-switch puzzle. Combat is similarly elementary, as the wolf is invincible and can kill most any monster in three hits. Liar Princess never quite makes for a compelling puzzle-platformer nor does it plant itself equally a proper action-platformer. It exists in a foreign eye ground, ane that could exist immediately forgettable if not for everything else that makes this game what information technology is.
Two years agone, I reviewed A Rose in the Twilight, another NIS articulation, and called it visually spectacular. Liar Princess is another stunner. Its world is impeccably designed, the master characters are a delight, and some of the creatures that pitter-patter through the copses are drawn in means I've never seen before. Levels make extensive use of the foreground and groundwork every bit well as lighting for dramatic upshot. Even if I didn't always relish playing this game, and there were times I was merely going through the motions, I never once took my eyes off the screen every bit I was completely captivated past the earth Nihon Ichi Software created. That level of enthrallment extends to the soundtrack, which elegantly portrays the right mood and emotions for every level and cutscene.
As wonderful as the art and soundtrack are, and for as much as I enjoy the story, they can't quite save what is otherwise a pretty standard puzzle-platformer. The Liar Princess and the Bullheaded Prince only ever comes close to meeting its potential in the final stage of the game, and that's non an exaggeration. Every time it flirts with some creative concepts, it quickly retreats to its quotidian comfort zone. I personally love this game considering I savor a proficient fairytale, but unlike the titular prince, I'm non so blind I can't come across everything that'south wrong with it.
[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]
Source: https://www.destructoid.com/reviews/review-the-liar-princess-and-the-blind-prince/
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