ALALOTH: CHAMPIONS OF THE FOUR KINGDOMS

There are some games that are just special. Not so much because they're flawless, but because you can see the vision of their creators embossed into every digital edge. Having followed the production adventure of Alaloth: Champions of the Four Kingdoms for a while, it's a minor miracle that it managed to get released and largely fulfill its original goals. So let's take a look at what Alaloth is!

In the world of Alaloth there are 4 kingdoms living in harmony, until the eponymous demon rises to the surface and brings discord by establishing his own kingdom at the geographical center of the world. Thus, humans, elves, dwarves, and half-orcs find themselves in a more or less tense situation. Only a chosen one (or four) will manage to gather the precious parts of an artifact that will give Alaloth access to banish him back to where he came from and restore peace! That's the basic plot summary, before we dive deep into character creation and exploration of this world. You see we say "deep" because we have an abundance of choices, not similar to the Owlcat games, but because the game gives us carte blanche on how we want to play and then throws us into a huge world without much explanation beyond the basics. In other words, we're not tied up from the start about how to develop our character while we have a huge, yet forgiving, exploration journey ahead of us.

The philosophy of Alaloth is a marriage of many different genres. To give a point of reference I could describe it as a Battle Brothers/Dark Souls blend in an isometric perspective with an emphasis on combat. As already mentioned, to defeat Alaloth we must first find the artefact pieces that will give us access to his realm. When creating the character, we can choose to play alone or with three competing AIs. In the first case, there is no time limit, although the game gives the illusion that time passes without any negative consequences, while in the second, the AI may manage to collect the pieces first and so... game over. So, if we also choose the "competitive" mode, then we can add some Heroes of Might & Magic to the mix, since we have to fight three other champions without being guaranteed victory.

But where are these pieces located? Despite the plethora of locations we can explore, most of our character progression mechanics are tied to fighting arenas. These are areas where we can visit and clear out local threats, with a specific loadout that we choose just before entering. Of escalating difficulty, at the end of them we have access to a plethora of items with a bonus for whoever successfully cleared the area for the first time (important in competitive mode). Only from clearing the arenas do we gain the necessary XP that will give us the coveted levels and access to either passive or active skills. And that's where a huge chapter of customization of our character begins, as we can turn him into anything we want, from a pure melee fighter to a hybrid spellcaster, choosing from a wide range of fighting skills, healing/damaging spells and so on.

All these skills are essential for our success, given the difficulty of the battle. I must admit that I struggled too much at first with Alaloth, preferring to use a keyboard and mouse. The slow, tactical nature of the combat and the keyboard didn't help me to completely adjust. Contributing to this was the fact that technically the feel of the controls is janky. It seems to lack that extra element that would make the handling a little smoother and thus more responsive. However, for undefined reasons, the overall effect works very well once you get used to it! So equipped with the controller and several pounds of patience, I promised not to bend, despite repeated wipes in the arenas. Following simple patterns (block, attack, kick, and of course the spells) Alaloth pushes you to settle into its slow, methodical way of fighting, otherwise it's back to the resurrection shrine. It's been a while since the design decision was made, but it seems like the whole game was designed around the controller. Even if you overload the character with a combination of abilities the handling with the controller is organic.

With a little more exploration, I managed to unlock two companions (out of the four available per alignment: good, neutral, evil), helping dramatically in the first few arenas as they act both as sponges while contributing their own unique abilities. This exploration is done on the gargantuan map by visiting different locations outside of the fighting arenas. These range from beautiful natural landscapes to variable-sized city-hubs. The system here is pretty simple: we can move around the map (with fast travel options unlocked later via quests). When we visit a city depending on whether it's morning or evening the shops and various NPCs are available or locked.

This is where Alaloth for me shines and brings back some of the old time charm. During my involvement I often felt constrained by my habits that have gradually established due to the Quality of Life changes that have become the standard in the industry. Thus, there were more than a few times when I felt discomfort at not being held by the hand and sent with a compass to the final destination. This discomfort gradually morphed into stubbornness and then into smiles when a) I achieved my goal, b) memories from similar games where vague instructions sent you "somewhere over there" to find your goal came to mind. There are of course quests that will take you from one city to another with the straight out indicator, unlocking another 3-4 quests along the way. Still, it's refreshing to just have hints of where you can find the next item to unlock, say, a special suit of armor.

Moving beyond the strict technical boundaries of the game, it seems that the small team of 6 (!) people at Gamera Interactive have paid a lot of attention to side systems by popular demand during the extended Early Access period. The game supports everything from local co-op to online via Steam Remote Play (with only one copy of the game being necessary). Item crafting is simple, requiring a simple list of items to be acquired as you progress through the game, without too much grind. At the same time the world is quite responsive depending on alignment, deity and of course which of the four races you choose.

Is everything ideal? Of course not. Alaloth in a sense may have fallen victim to Gamera's own ambition: huge goals for a first studio attempt. In trying to fit all their memories and experiences into one game, I think they got too far out of line on elements that could have been more contained. Did the result reassure them? I think so, but it's still much more spread out than it needed to be. Despite any weaknesses and scope changes during development (more or less expected), the game is bursting with life, secrets to explore, length (at around 100 hours to see everything in the first playthrough) and above all love and care. Bypassing technical limitations especially in the feel of the handling, Alaloth brings back a sweet nostalgia. It's not necessarily the game that will revive people's interest in a particular genre (as it happened momentarily for blobbers with Legend of Grimrock, Bards Tale IV, M&M X: Legacy). It does, however, look at the gaming past with fresh eyes and nostalgia lenses. It's not for everyone, but those who feel like getting lost in a world and pushing themselves a little harder on the battlefield will find several hours of fun in Alaloth!

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