XBOX REVIEW | Necro Story

“An epic adventure through Heaven and Hell to save humanity.”

Necro Story is the second game from Belgian developer Rablo Games. Their first game, Healer’s Quest, was released back in 2018 on the Nintendo Switch and Steam. Healer’s Quest was solo-developed by Pablo Coma in his spare time. Necro Story was started by Pablo shortly after the release of Healer’s Quest, and after a few years of development, he welcomed Baptiste to the team. They decided to work together and restart the development of Necro Story. After four years of collaboration and six years of development, Necro Story is here. Rablo Games uses a distinctive 2D art style and tries to offer something unique in each of their games.

In Necro Story, you play the role of a very powerful, somewhat evil Necromancer named Jaimus, who has been in a deep sleep for the past five years. Suddenly, one day, Jaimus is woken by the ghost of a playful white mage named Vivi. She needs Jaimus’s help to sneak into the underworld and save humanity before it’s too late. Necro Story is a light-hearted creature collection RPG, and during my twenty-plus hours playing through the story, the jokes and banter between Jaimus and Vivi had me laughing out loud on many occasions.

Things I liked!

• Gameplay | Necro Story is a joy to play, with simple but effective controls, fun cartoon visuals and art style, along with some great music and sound effects. I really enjoyed the banter and comical jokes between Jaimus and Vivi, who went on like an old married couple at times, often making me laugh to myself while playing. You play as Jaimus, who is a kind of evil necromancer. You can choose how evil you want Jaimus to be, along with many other customization options such as playing as a male or female character, the colour of hair, robes, and the type of belt you wish to have, and more. You can also change your character’s name if you wish; for this review, I have kept the default name of Jaimus. As you start Necro Story, you are in a castle, and as you try to escape with Vivi, you will encounter many enemies. As you explore, enemies will appear as black smoke moving around. If you get too close, the smoke will chase you, and on impact, you are taken into battle. You and your team will always appear on the left side of the screen, with your opponent’s team on the right-hand side. From here, you can start casting your spells to defeat the enemy teams, catching and absorbing souls as you go. There is no turn-based combat; as long as you have some mana available, which you can see at the bottom of the screen above where your selected spells are located, you can keep casting spells. As you defeat your enemies, you and your team will gain XP. When Jaimus levels up, you will get the option to manually select which upgrades you wish to choose. When your team members gain XP during battle, they level up automatically, and you do not have to manually upgrade them as there are just too many after a few hours of playing. When you or your team members are low on health, you can use health crystals to heal your allies, which will consume fifty Animae. Animae, which is collected as you play, can also be used as currency to purchase items in shops. As you move around the various levels and locations, you only see Jaimus on screen; occasionally, Vivi will appear to talk with Jaimus. As you explore, you will come across poles with a purple ball floating above them; these are called rejuvenating spots. When you touch them, your party will be fully healed; however, it will make all monsters come back. It also works as a checkpoint to save your game progress, and these are very handy. You will also come across fast travel points, usually found at the start and end of a level. The game will tell you around the midway point that if you progress from here, there is no chance of returning. You will also see all your progress so far, and you can decide if you wish to backtrack to look for any missing items. During my first playthrough, which took me 21 hours, I was able to find 84 of the 92 items. I have already started my second playthrough to try upgrading different spell trees, and finding all items is my mission.

• Visual Art Style | While at first glance the 2D visual art style may look slightly different, after playing for many hours, I think the developers have nailed it. The characters and game worlds look like they have been painted on the screen using pastel paint. While simple, it works really well during gameplay and in how the story is delivered on screen.
  
  
• Controls | I found the controls in Necro Story really easy to learn and get to grips with. As you begin your adventure at the start of Necro Story, there is a short tutorial that explains the basics. Along the bottom of the screen, you have your selected spells, and you simply use the RB and LB buttons to select which one you wish to use. Pressing the A button will activate that spell. You use the left stick to aim, and by pressing the X button, you can switch between front and back line targets. You then use the left stick to aim and capture any souls that are flying around on the screen before they fly away. When you capture a soul through the soul vessel, you can then add that creature to your team after the current battle ends.
  
  
• Puzzles | There are lots of puzzles to find and figure out how to complete, spread across the many levels in Necro Story. While they are easy to spot near the start, as you progress, they quickly become more difficult to find. You will find map-like images appearing on notice boards, on the ground, and in other places. You need to copy the walking movement somewhere close to where you saw the clue. Do so correctly, and you will unlock a hidden pathway or a treasure chest. Many of these chests will contain items that you can use within your team to gain a strong advantage during battle. There is also an achievement for finding all hidden items.
  
  
• Replayability |  Necro Story has bags of replayability, with five different difficulties ranging from Story to Apocalypse. For this review, I played mostly on Normal difficulty, but I also experimented with easier and harder levels to see how much of a difference it made to the gameplay. Hard and Apocalypse both become very challenging, and you have to use your mana sparingly while working out each type of enemy creature’s weaknesses and vulnerabilities, making sure to only cast magic spells that will do damage or have any effect during battle, as some may be immune to certain types of magic. The complete opposite is true when playing on Story and Easy difficulty. Story difficulty gameplay became much like a hack-and-slash game where you just cast as many magic spells as possible and capture enemy souls with ease. There are over twenty different necromancy spells available, spread across five schools of magic. Each necromancy spell has its own unique skill tree to unlock, with a total of over 260 spell upgrades spread across each spell type, allowing you to carve your own playstyle.
  
  
• Sound/Music | I was really impressed with the variety of music throughout the levels of Necro Story. There were lots of keyboard and piano pieces, and even some saxophone on certain levels. Although the music can repeat itself during some levels, such as during battles, it never became annoying. The sound effects are also implemented really well, like the swishing sounds as you cast a spell and the big, thunder-like boom as you enter battle. Most of the dialogue is presented through speech bubbles, which works very well, especially with the humour, and Necro Story has plenty of laughs along the way. During battles, you can often hear Jaimus shouting when casting spells, accompanied by an evil chuckle.

Mixed & disliked!

• Battles | Sometimes I felt that it was too difficult to move around and explore without encountering battle after battle. I found this happened more during the earlier levels in Necro Story. I quickly got used to it, as it became a great way to farm XP and level up, but I do think some players may find it repetitive. I would urge anyone to carry on and, if needed, adjust the difficulty. The higher the difficulty level, the more engaging the battles become, as every move matters.

How long did I play the review before publishing? 23 Hours
How long to beat the story? 21 Hours
How many Achievements did I earn before publishing? 30/34 OR 705/1000G
How long to achieve 1000G | 30 Hours +
You’ll love this game if you like these | Sea of Stars, Cassette Beasts and Chained Echoes

CONCLUSION

Score: 86/100 – When I first began playing Necro Story, I really didn’t know what to expect. I have played a few turn-based fighting games, and while Necro Story isn’t exactly turn-based, it follows much of the same formula. The first thing that really grabbed my attention was the humour and jokes at the beginning; this made me want to know more about each character, and I was not disappointed. During my 21-hour playthrough, there were often times when I thought I was near the end of the story, and to my surprise, there was much more to come. Rablo Games have done wonders with this gem of a game, especially considering that only two people made it, with the help of Clémence, who is an illustrator. She took the art style established by Pablo and elevated it to the next level. Necro Story is an incredible achievement, and I am already looking forward to what they do next, which I’ve heard is already in the early stages of development.