Untold Legends: Warrior’s Code

Untold Legends: Warrior’s Code Overview

Untold Legends: Warrior’s Code is a hack and slash role playing game that was released in early 2006. This game is the sequel to the handheld game Untold Legends; Brotherhood of the Blade. The iteration of the game includes five more playable classes, improved controls, more multiplayer modes, and shorter load times. If you are a fan of the traditional hack and slash gameplay that this game supports then this is a great buy for the PSP.

Untold Legends: Warrior’s Code Screenshots

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Untold Legends: Warrior’s Code Featured Video

Full Review

Untold Legends: Warrior’s Code Review

One of the newest action-RPGs to be released for the Sony PSP is Untold Legends: The Warrior’s Code. The game is the second installment in Sony Online Entertainment’s Untold Legends series, and features significant amounts of action that should please hack-and-slash fans. However, if you’re not a fan of hack-and-slash dungeon crawlers, then it’s a completely different story.

The game’s story takes place in a land where a powerful warlord is using his hordes of soldiers in order to become ruler. As a member of a secret shape-shifting race, you, along with many of the other changelings, have refused to join forces with the warlord. After barely escaping the clutches of his minions, you decide to fight back, which starts you on your journey!

When the game begins, you will be given the option of choosing one of the game’s five playable characters. Of the five characters, each of them has two different attribute strengths and two different weaknesses. Each of the characters is also fairly different from one another in abilities, weaponry, and in appearance. In fact, the game even allows for a little bit of customization with your character’s appearance, including hair color, hairstyle, and skin tone. While it’s not a significant amount of customization, and it easily would have been better to have full character customization, at least there is some way to differentiate your characters.

The missions throughout the game range from item-fetching to taking an individual from one location to another. Some missions even include an additional fighter battling at your character’s side. On the downside, there really isn’t a lot of mission variety here, but you can be assured that each mission will involve a large amount of hacking and slashing your way through your opponents.

As for the combat, The Warrior’s Code is very similar to most hack-and-slash dungeon crawlers. There are two main types of character attacks, including melee and range attacks. For the most part, melee attacks are performed by constantly mashing the X button. However, in order to try to mix up the hack-and-slash formula, your characters can also pull off a more powerful melee attack by holding down the X button and performing a charge attack. The game features another type of melee attack known as attacks of opportunity, which are basically a counter-attack when an enemy is vulnerable. Attacks of opportunity can be performed by holding down the square button and are normally used before or after the enemy has used a special attack. One of the biggest flaws with the charge attacks and attacks of opportunity are the fact that they really aren’t even necessary to use, and merely mashing the X button can be just as effective.

Similar to most RPGs, your characters will gain experience from defeating the enemies. Once that character acquires enough experience, they will gain a level. When a character levels up they will be given three points to add to their attributes, and one that will be used to acquire or upgrade their current abilities. These abilities are one of the more interesting aspects of the combat, with each character having very unique abilities and being able to equip up to six of those abilities.

As I said earlier, the playable characters of the game are part of a shape-shifting race and each of them will be able to transform into some sort of creature during the game. The transformation only lasts a few seconds, but once the character transforms they are supposed to gain even more strength and speed. Early on in the game the shape-shifting might be somewhat useful, but as time goes on and your character acquires new weapons and more levels, the usefulness of the transforming will drastically decrease.

One of the things that is a blessing in The Warrior’s Code is the addition of online multiplayer modes. Gamers are able to compete in several different player vs. player scenarios, or can basically play through the game’s storyline together. Of course, this adds a little bit of replay value, being able to play through the game with some friends, and any fan of dungeon crawlers will absolutely love the idea.

The visuals in the game aren’t exactly some of the most impressive on the PSP, but they aren’t too bad. Even though the graphics are a step over its predecessor, the game still has some problems. The look of the environments may vary from stage to stage, but most of the stages suffer from a consistent level design. In fact, sometimes you will walk half way across the map and still be viewing the same look that you saw minutes ago. Even though the game’s playable characters don’t look too bad, most of the enemies lack some of the detail that has gone into the playable characters. Still, most of the game’s spells and abilities look pretty nice and I liked the fact that equipping different armor and weapons actually made a difference with the appearance of your character.

The game’s sound isn’t necessarily bad, but most of the music in the background is somewhat forgettable and doesn’t make much of an impression. The characters’ voice acting, which doesn’t appear often, is done fairly well, except for the character you play as, because he plays the role of the silent hero.

Overall, Untold Legends: The Warrior’s Code feels very similar to all of the other hack-and-slash games on the market. If you can get past some of the game’s flaws then you can easily find a decent experience. If you enjoy constant hours of hacking and slashing your way through enemies, then Untold Legends: The Warrior’s Code is a game that is highly recommended. Otherwise, be careful.