It feels like The brave squire It's been popping up at gaming events forever. It first came onto my radar during one of and I was drawn to it from the get-go. Yesterday, Devolver announced that it will be releasing in just over a month, on September 17th. After playing a few hours of the game over two sessions, I'm happy to say that it's a title to keep an eye on.
The brave squire is the first game from All Possible Futures, a studio founded by Jonathan Biddle and James Turner. Turner is an artist best known for his work on Pokémon at GameFreak. If you know what a Vanillite is, you have Turner to thank for that. Biddle previously created the 2017 ARPG Swords of Dittoand the couple has brought in other developers who worked on Idem in the team.
All Possible Future's debut combines classic 2D and 3D gameplay styles into a unique whole. You play as Jot, the character from a children's book series who defeats evil and saves the day. When the series' antagonist discovers he can change history, it's your job to stop him. A large portion of the game takes place on the book's 2D plane, from the same classic overhead view as in Idem. The “cutscenes” are pages of books, too, and there are a few interstitial, Mario-esque side-platforming segments thrown in for good measure. There's a real sense of whimsy woven into it all, aided by the game's narrator, who tells your story with every turn of the page.
Jot can slash, jump, roll, and everything else you'd expect, and you'll unlock more combat abilities as you progress, such as a sword throw or a Zelda-Spinny-Sword-Attack-style sword attack. The formula has its twists, though, as a variety of puzzle mechanics are included. The first thing you'll encounter are word puzzles: with a swipe of his sword, Jot can dislodge certain words that you can then move around the page. At its most rudimentary, you can swap the words “closed” and “open” from a couple of sentences to make your way through a door. There are some playful elements to this that reminded me of Scribblers —Doing something “huge” will never stop being fun.
He real The unique thing about Jot is the ability to jump from the storybook plane into a fully three-dimensional world. When you come across a green spiral-shaped icon, you can jump from the book to its owner's desk. Often, it's a quick move of jumping in and out to solve a puzzle, but you'll also be able to go on longer adventures on the desk.
While they are not as charming as the book segments, I… beloved Explore the desktop and see the game's wider world. The 3D gameplay feels like a throwback, somewhere between classic PlayStation-era mascot games and the LittleBigPlanet series. On a high-end gaming PC, the desktop environment was gorgeous, with hyper-detailed textures and realistic lighting that contrasted with Jot's cartoonish figure. There are also 2D elements within the 3D sections, where you can jump on a surface to move forward, similar to the mechanics in The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds.
The reason for this jump to 3D also influences the game's broader story: by breaking the boundaries of his 2D world, Jot discovers the influence his tales have and will have on the boy who possesses the storybook. If the game's antagonist succeeds in changing the story, Jot will no longer inspire the boy.
“You're fighting for your own land, and also for the owner of the book and their future,” Turner explained to me earlier this year at Summer Game Fest.
I’ve played through the first few chapters of the game, as well as a portion of chapter six, and I’m starting to get a sense of how its disparate worlds fit together. At one segment, my progress through the book ground to a halt, and I had to jump to the desk and navigate the clutter to find a single (unbranded) Magic: The Gathering card. This gave me the item I needed to defeat the enemy I was stuck on. Turner said that items later in the game will let you modify the book in more ways, suggesting that more mechanics and degrees of complexity will be introduced as you progress.
To further break up the proceedings, there are mini-games. They are fairly frequent and usually based on well-known titles. My favorites so far were a Punch-Out! style boxing game and a shooter inspired by one of my all-time favorites, ResogunIn a nice measure of accessibility, these minigames can be skipped if you're not up for the challenge. I'm sure there will be more enjoyable things to come from both 2D and 3D exploration, but for now these minigames are the highlight of my experience.
None of the individual elements of my playthrough were anything unique or crazy, but the way they all connected and the level of refinement of everything made me very excited to play the full game. It seemed like behind every turn of the page there was a new surprise waiting to make me smile. The brave squire Originally scheduled for release in 2023, it will now be released on September 17. It will be coming to Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series x/S, and will be free on the Extra and Premium tiers of PlayStation Plus.
