Zenonia is an action RPG game created, developed, and published by the company "Gamevil". And while it is not very involving or complex, the game does provide enough entertainment and gameplay to be considered a success for this type of game on the iPhone. Also, it can be a hell of a lot of fun.
The game's protagonist is a young man named Regret (yes, a strange name, but you will notice there are a lot of those in this game). The main plot of this game revolves around Regret's quest to discover the reason his father was killed by a demon who appeared in his town. Along with this main quest, there are many fun side quests that will keep you busy for a long time. Close to 40 hours, in fact. Regret is controlled by an on screen d-pad on the left side, and an action button on the right. There are also magic attacks that you can acquire, and a separate bar on the touch screen will allow you to use this attacks. As expected, the touch screen controls aren't perfect, but once you adjust to them it runs pretty smoothly.
As per any regular RPG, there are different classes to choose from (a limited selection: Paladin, Assassin, and Warrior) and a leveling system controlled by experience points (which you gain from killing enemies or completeing quests). Every time you gain a level, you can learn new magic attacks and assign points to different stats of your character. Want regret to be tough as nails? Bolster up his strength and make him as strong as you want. Very simple customization, but it still adds another fun element to the game.
The graphics are what I would consider a strong point of this game. They are very early Zelda-esque, but the melee and magic attack animations add something new and make them all that more attractive. The towns and forests are well designed and remind me of other well designed RPGs for hand-held systems or earlier consoles. Classic RPG style. And, on another topic, the yelp that Regret makes whenever he uses his sword to attack is strikingly similar to the sound Link makes in, say, Ocarina of Time. That made me chuckle.
As for the quests, there are a lot to chose from. And as i mentioned before, they are pretty fun and will keep you busy for a good amount of time. The drawback is that after a while the side quests feel a bit tired and repetitive as most of them are structured the same way: kill enemies, then kill more enemies, etc. I feel like they could have included more varied side quests, but for what they have they made it fun enough to keep up my mild enjoyment. Another irk i had with the game was the dialogue. One speech in particular, Regret is speaking to a woman and when she starts to swear, the speech says "(bleepy bleep)", or something along those lines. If you're going to use swearing in a game, actually swear. If not, then don't bother with with the "bleeping". If it was supposed to be used in a humorous sense, I didn't buy it.
Overall this game is quite enjoyable. With pretty graphics, tons of hours of gameplay, and decent customizable elements, Zenonia should keep you interested for quite a while, despite the repetitiveness and other drawbacks.
-James C.
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