Quest 64
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What happens when you try to take elements from Harry Potter, and then mix in The Legend of Zelda together? You get this of course.
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Quest 64 (Known as Holy Magic Century and Eltale Monsters in Europe and Japan respectively) is a 1998 role-playing game developed by Imagineer and published by THQ in North America, Konami in Europe, and Imagineer in Japan. It is the first role-playing game for the Nintendo 64, with Paper Mario being the 2nd role-playing game after that.
Bad Qualities
- Stupid premise: This game takes place in Count Land of all things that the hero is fighting for. Even Paper Mario had a much better premise than this game in general.
- Also, let's not forget that the main character Brian is just a poor man's version of Link from The Legend of Zelda series, making this game a complete reskin of that franchise alone.
- The elements just feel generic, and your powers just feels cheap. It doesn't help that this game was published by THQ of all people. Not to mention that this game just feels like it's inspired by Harry Potter, especially when you look at the elements at your disposal.
- The fact that this game is a role-playing game that brings nothing new to the table compared to the Final Fantasy franchise is just pathetic, especially for 1998 standards.
- And to add more stains to the already dirty clothing, this game will eventually get boring after playing about 30 minutes of the game.
- Uninspiring and generic enemies.
- There is no targeting system in combat, you have to be in a certain place when using spells in order for it to hit.
- The level up system is the same as Final Fantasy II, in which instead of having all of your stats increase at once you have to train them individually with your actions. If you aren't getting hit your defense won't increase, if you're not hitting things with your stick your HP won't increase and if you aren't casting spells your magic won't increase. Also, the levels of all 4 elements are separate, meaning you have to level them up individually as well. You also level up agility simply by walking around the world, but progression is very slow.
- There is no currency in the game, a basic feature in many RPGs. This is especially unusual, since even Final Fantasy XIII has this feature. Everything in the game is free. Things that would usually cost money in other games like staying at inns to replenish your HP and SP and obtaining items from shops cost nothing.
- The spell "Magic Barrier" eliminates any further challenge as it makes the player completely immune to magic, but since enemies only attack with magic then that means that with the downside of having to recast the spell every three turns, the player will be completely invincible for the rest of the game.
- This game suffers from framerate drops at random, thus making this game a chore.
- The main antagonist, Mammon is a generic "I'm gonna take over the world because I'm evil!" type of antagonist.
- It also doesn't help that his design is so ugly and gross, that it makes one of the Ren & Stimpy games look clean by comparison.
- Speaking of Mammon, he is just a poor man's version of Ganondorf, except with the wings on his body of course. (Which might make sense, considering that he stands out from the main antagonist of The Legend of Zelda games.)
Good Qualities
- When it comes to the capabilities of the Nintendo 64, the graphics are very good.
- Great use of draw distance.
- Nice cover art.
- Audio is decent, especially the music.
- Interesting combat system that was sadly executed poorly.
Reception
The game received mixed reviews. On GameRankings, it received 54% out of 100%.
Next Generation reviewed the Nintendo 64 version of the game, rating it three stars out of five, and stated that "In the end, Quest 64 proves the cartridge-based N64 can be a viable format for RPGs. However, while graphics and sound go a long way, the need for well-told stories and characters you care about has never been more apparent."
Trivia
- A sequel was planned by the developers. However, due to financial difficulties Imagineer faced, the sequel was scrapped.