Recently, game developer Gaijin Entertainment released their first self-published game Braveheart. It’s an action/role playing game where you tke on the role of Richard, a brave knight searching for the Holy Grail. The King has promised a hearty reward for Richard’s success, but this quest will not be easy. There are enemies and monsters that stand in Richard’s way, with the Grail itself guarded by a massive dragon. To succeed, players must progress through a series of touch-controlled missions with help from 10 different weapons, plus power-ups and perks uncovered during combat.
Multiple Locations and Battles
The game world’s locations are spread out across four zones, with increasing difficulty and unique enemies and bosses in each location. The fantasy storyline unfolds through comic book style cut scenes interspersed between action sequences. In addition to the main quest, players can also participate in “challenge” game play to build skills, earn gold, and compete against friends. Braveheart supports the OpenFeint social platform, with certain in-game perks improving as more friends play the game.
Squeals and Splats
I played the iPhone version of Braveheart (it’s also available for the iPad) and the first thing I liked about the game was how easy it was to start playing. The touch controls are intuitive and well explained, in just a few moments, my knight Richard was equipped and out on the battlefield slaying a variety of enemies, including soldiers, magicians and wild boars. The graphics are impressively detailed, but the objects and enemies are still easy to interact with. The soundtrack has appropriate music and great sounds, especially the squeals from the boars and the satisfying “splat” that occurs as you take down an enemy, which I did mostly using the flail.
When you kill and enemy, in addition to the splat, you also get a great big puddle of blood, and since the enemies come in droves, pretty soon there is blood all over the place. In addition, fallen foes also yield gold, health, power of various kinds. You move Richard over the items to collect them. The action is rapid, and at one point I did get kind of confused when fireballs started falling form the sky and I wasn’t sure if I should run or let them kill the surrounding opponents as they landed. An explanatory bit like I got in the initial part of the game would have been welcome.
Variety, and Also Shopping!
Between battles, you get to take the treasure and experience points that Richard has gotten on the field and use them to upgrade his weapons, skills and characteristics. This helps him progress in his quest to find the Grail. There’s an interesting variety of upgrades to choose from and you accumulate resources quickly enough that you can begin upgrading almost immediately after your first battle.
Price and Availability
Braveheart sells for $1.99 for iPhone/iPod Touch and $2.99 for iPad, with a free lite version also available for iPhone / iPod Touch.
Verdict
Braveheart is an excellent game because of its ease of entry for new players, making a super pick if you are a casual gamer looking to branch past point/click farming to something with more action. If you are a more experienced player, the game should provide you with enough variety to be entertaining, but you may get through it pretty rapidly.
Pros
- Great for players of all skill levels
- Nicely detailed graphics
- Smooth intuitive control of character
- Good variety of upgrades for character
Cons
- Might be too violent for younger players
- Game play is occasionally confusing
Rating 4.5 
