Several manga-anime game adaptations are set to be released this year and one of the first is The Seven Deadly Sins: The Knights of Britannia or Nanatsu no Taizai as titled in its anime series. I am a huge fan of this series, have followed it through and through. The anime is now in its second season, every episode is intriguing and this game marks this animes first console video game adaptation.
Platform Reviewed: PS4
Platforms Available: PS4
Publisher: Bandai Namco Entertainment
Developer: Bandai Namco Entertainment
Release Date: February 13, 2018
Price: USD $59.99
This review is based on a pre-release review code provided by Bandai Namco Entertainment.
The game takes us to the Kingdom of Liones in which several towns and villagers are threatened by the Holy Knights. Holy Knights are soldiers that have special unique powers and has now spread terror all over the region. They have successfully carried out a coup-d’etat, overthrowing the King and has ruled the place ever since. An old legend states that there was once a group of powerful warriors named Seven Deadly Sins that fought these corrupt Holy Knights and emerged victorious at the end. A lot of townsfolk have doubted their existence as they are only rumors. But Princess Elizabeth, after escaping the mutiny, has set her out to find these elusive warriors
As Elizabeth wanders about, she collapsed in a tavern and was assisted by a boy named Meliodas. As you assume his role, not only he is the owner of that tavern called Boar Hut but he revealed that he is also the Leader of the Seven Deadly Sins. He is the sin of wrath and he agreed that, together with Elizabeth, they will find the remaining members. Let me also mention another entertaining character, a swine named Hawk. He assists Meliodas in running the tavern and he also fights! In locating the rest of the members, you will have to traverse the map, gather magical items and defeat different adversaries. Battles vary from eliminating a certain number of enemies and at times, adding a time limit to it. Often times you also find yourself in a war with your own playable character especially when you get to unlock it. Gathering missions are only reserved to Elizabeth as she can’t fight but will be assisted by Hawk to defeat enemies.
This game features cartoonish style graphics and plays as a third person shooter. The game follows the anime up to the letter but the story-telling is much to be desired for. Some conversations, important scenes are somehow skipped and narrating it in a one-liner doesn’t really do justice and whenever conversations come up – they are represented with expressionless display. Avatars appearing on conversations only has one face – smiling faces. So if the conversation went south, you wouldn’t really know until you read through it. This is absolutely a bummer when a player isn’t familiar with the anime yet.
The story is what kept the anime very interesting and if the player hasn’t seen the anime yet. How this video game tells the story, won’t be much towards the player since you can just easily skip these parts. It also offers two modes: Adventure and Duel. Adventure mode lets you experience the story. As I have mentioned, you need to battle your way through the area. Fighting credits you with two necessary advantages on this game: magical crystals, magical items, and gossip ratings. Magical crystals is like games’ currency; you will need this to upgrade skill level together with magical items that specifically unlocks a certain skill.
Gossip rating is a must since rumors will open up quests and side missions for the group to get more magical items, crystals, and gossip rating. At this point, everything is now repetitive and this goes the same with battle mode. Battle mode at first was spectacular, very fast paced with a lot of variations to choose from. Square button gives you a weak melee attack, Triangle button is for heavy attacks, Circle is for ranged attacks and if you combine those buttons with R2, then you got yourself special magic skills. More damage to your enemy means more points on your special power bar and once this gets full, you can show off your ultimate skill and bring extra damage.
Now all of this is again unique to the character’s capability. Diane, the sin of envy, for example, does not have special R2 key combos but deals major damage on ranged attacks. King’s, sin of sloth, strong suit is his magical capabilities. I think this would have a lot to do with their character background. But then it won’t be properly pointed out in this game so I suggest you watch this on Netflix first before you play the game.
So I have mentioned that this gets repetitive in time, you see even though there are a lot of skills to choose from. I managed to defeat countless enemies with just triangle and range attacks. If special power is available, then I get to use that. Then repeat the same cycle no the next battle. So I don’t really look forward to battle modes but I need to complete them because they give the necessary items to progress my skill tree. In every battle that you do, you are also ranked just like how it is Final Fantasy Series battle modes. Ranks are from S to C in which S is the highest, the ranking is important because the total score you get the more magical crystals you farm. But what I find missing is that each of these battle modes should’ve indicated how much we need to gain the S level ranking because, after fights, the game just tallies the score and assigns you a ranking.
Although they are replayable, you will have to wonder what score should you meet in order for you to get that kind of ranking. During gathering missions, it is quite challenging that Elizabeth can only jump and run. She can only evade so much the arrows that these soldiers shoot at her. Even with the help of Hawk, he really cannot eliminate multiple soldiers especially if they are fanned out. So it takes time for them to die and little that you know other soldiers are closing in on the Princess. If this happens, pressing Triangle button will summon Hawk besides you and attacks the nearest soldier. This is at times the most crucial part where Elizabeth needs to run but whenever you do this move, you get kinda stuck in that position and it’ll take 2-3 seconds for you to move. I am not sure if this is a bug or its one of the consequences in summoning Hawk but 2-3 seconds might be my saving grace.
In Duel Mode, you will have multiple approaches to choose: Single Player, CoOp, Local Multiplayer and online multiplayer. Each unlocked characters are playable in this mode and each location that you unlock will also be a part of the map option available when you duel. Costumes, as you play along, will be unlocked and can be changed before you go to a certain mode. This is helpful if you just want to fight off or test out characters, play with a friend on another console using Local Multiplayer or play with another AI and defeat two more AIs in CoOp, or connect with other players using the Online Multiplayer. It’s not really the best out there since there aren’t any split screens and the screen is only planted at the back side of Player One, so player 2 will have to really work hard since it will be difficult to see those combos.
Overall cutscenes are stunning and using vivid colors makes it beautiful in a way. Locations for battle mode or just the map of Britannia is breathtaking. Simple combat systems although stiff and laggy but humorous conversation exchange between characters may want you to give in a little.
