There’s a lost art to the bite-sized thrills of retro role-playing games. Frankly, I don’t always have the time or the inclination to dive into a multi-hour dungeon crawl, especially if I’m trying to get a good night’s sleep. (Looking at you, Persona 5.) But a 20- to 30-minute cave spelunk, with the promise of treasure at the end? Sign me up.
The Adventures of Elliot: The Millennium Tales is the latest game from Square Enix’s Team Asano, the studio behind the Octopath Traveler and Bravely Default series, as well as Triangle Strategy and the 2022 Live A Live remake. It’s Team Asano’s first action RPG, and it’s one that clearly understands the appeal of offering players a buffet of compact yet compelling tasks to undertake at any time. In an hour-long, hands-on demo of the game last month, I had dozens of options for how to spend my time — and it went by all too quickly.
As Elliot, you’re on a journey to save the land of Philabieldia, an idyllic medieval land that’s in fact not always sunny. (It has been overrun by ferocious demons.) You’ll be able to explore this world across four distinct eras. Along the way, your fairy companion Faie can help you cross sprawling gaps or light torches to navigate dark spaces. My demo began about three to five hours into the game and didn’t dwell heavily on story developments, so I didn’t get too deep into the game’s time-travel mechanics or the central conflict. Exploration and combat were the main focus, and thankfully there was plenty of fun to be had with both.
The combat consists of gratifying hack-and-slash action, similar to Square Enix’s Mana series. In addition to the obvious sword and axe, I had access to an arsenal of weapons — including a hammer, boomerang, spear, bombs, and a bow. You’ll engage enemies directly in the field — there are no separate battle screens or menus to navigate, and you can swap between your various weapons on the fly. Some weapons are slow to strike but deal heavy damage, others allow you to attack from a distance. I never felt forced to use one weapon over another, which I appreciated — there’s no single “right” way of doing things, which is a welcome design choice.
You are encouraged to block, parry, and string together combos to deal bonus damage. But don’t worry, The Adventures of Elliot isn’t yet another game to jump on the parryslop bandwagon. The more intricate defensive aspects of combat aren’t strictly required, and the difficulty can be adjusted from a save point at any time. I found the normal difficulty struck a satisfying balance between hasty button-mashing and meticulous timing. That said, enemies can hit pretty hard — sometimes 30 to 50% of your HP with a single shot — so as the game progresses, you’ll probably need to git gud or make your peace with lowering the difficulty.
If you played the demo of the game released back in July, you’ll know that The Adventures of Elliot gives you free rein to explore its world rather quickly, and the latest demo proves that generosity persists throughout the broader experience. You can fast-travel not just from anywhere in the overworld but even within dungeons, a welcome quality-of-life perk that eliminates the drudgery of backtracking. On the rare occasion you stumble into someplace you truly shouldn’t be yet, Faie will warn you not to enter, but you still can — you’ll just probably get your ass handed to you by a formidable foe you’re not equipped to handle yet.
Everywhere you look in The Adventures of Elliot, there are tons of enticing nooks and bomb-fodder cracked walls to distract you. The maps are compact and densely packed, a far cry from the open-world sprawl that has become so common elsewhere in the genre. For every run-of-the-mill cave, you’ll also find mini-dungeons with unique terrain features and puzzles, like squishy pumpkins that can be used as springboards and air vents to bomb and open new paths. There’s always some kind of reward for your curiosity, whether it’s a piece of magicite that you can use to customize your weapon stats, a new traversal skill for Faie, or a container to increase Elliot’s HP. (It’s not shaped like a heart, but it’s basically a Zelda heart container.)
Team Asano’s trademark HD-2D visuals go a long way toward making this a world you want to keep exploring, too. The top-down views of forests and medieval towns have the charm of an impossibly intricate pop-up book. And in typical Square Enix fashion, the music feels like it was paired to each moment by an expert sommelier, with jangling ditties to accompany a visit to a new village and rousing marches to fortify your nerves in a boss fight.
The relentlessly satisfying and succinct gameplay loop of The Adventures of Elliot made my hour with the game fly by. While I barely dipped a toe into the game’s timey-wimey hijinks, I’m excited to see all the possibilities it opens up for further exploration. Thankfully, there’s not too much longer to wait: The Adventures of Elliot comes to Nintendo Switch 2, PlayStation 5, Windows PC, and Xbox Series X on June 18.
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Author: 360 Technology Group
