Game Review: Fantasy Life

This game had something of an advantage with me before it even started simply for being an RPG. I'm not necessarily a competitive person but I dislike losing and lose interest quickly if I can't complete levels easily. This usually leads me to puzzle games with hundreds of levels that allow quick progress or RPG's where I can move at my own pace.

Fantasy Life was something of an impulse buy for me really. The game store was having a sale and I just happened to have some money set aside. The back of the box looked ok and I was pretty sure I had read about it somewhere on the net so I just went for it. Best snap decision ever!

The basic idea is to choose a career and complete quests to master your skills. There are 12 'Lifes' to choose from and you can chop and change at will. Learning skills in one Life can give advantages to another and I would definitely recommend dabbling in as many as possible. Another bonus to having more than one Life on the go is that you can complete quests while also moving along the main storyline. If I was to start the game again (which I probably will at some point) I would start all the lives as soon as possible and collect as many of all items that are lying around as almost everything will have a use later.

There is also a main storyline which will open up new areas on the map but to be brutally honest I found it rather dull and charged through it as fast as I could. It involved a fair bit of reading which I found to be rather tedious but if I had spent more time training up my levels instead of rushing through it all at once it would have perhaps been more bearable.

Another mistake that I made simply through ignorance was to start and settle in a career that didn't focus on fighting. I wasn't aware that the main quest would involve me having to defeat monsters and half way through I had to swap to paladin and train up simply to make any more progress. If I had spent more time trying out other Lifes I would perhaps have been more prepared.

One advantage to rushing through the main quests was that it opened up the full map to me pretty quickly and now I can level up in each new Life quicker as I have access to more ingredients/monsters/tools/materials etc. So I don't regret the way I chose to play but next time I will try something different. Of course the main joy of an RPG is that you get to choose the way you want to play and how fast you want to move. They are also plenty of side quests to keep you occupied and help you earn experience and new items too so it should be long time before you get bored.

My favourite game of all time is Harvest Moon and although this game is slightly different it has ranked a very close second for me. If it had the option of starting up a farm after the main quest I could play forever! There are animals available in game, pets to help you fight and a horse to ride, which is a nice touch. Another reminder of HM for me was collecting items from around the map which can be sold to make money or, even better in my opinion, used in recipes or quests later. It gave me more of a purpose to collecting everything I saw.

So in summary Fantasy Life is a great game. Recommended to anyone who likes the Harvest Moon series and although the main quest can be a little dull at times it is relatively short and opens up new map areas so can be forgiven.

8/10