Real Talk By: J.Valdez

Probably one of the most hyped games of 2010 for the iPhone, infinity blade exceeded expectations and wowed everyone with its impressive graphics and immersive gameplay.

When it first came out, I was a little disappointed with the fact that I couldn’t control the player and move about the castle as I willed it. Instead every time you finish a fight, you have the opportunity to look around for items or money that may be lying around. Other than that the game is mostly cut scenes getting your character from one fight to the next. The fights are really what this game is about (aside from it’s story, but we’ll get to that later).

While most people may be disappointed that they can’t free roam around the castle yet, they will definitely enjoy all the fights. Fights require quick thinking and skill if you are to survive the journey through the castle. After playing through the story line a couple of times, fighting became almost second nature to me, my dodges were quicker and my parry was more accurate, greatly helping me defeat the God King a couple of times.

If you saw the intro video, you’ll notice that the God King says something about your fathers bloodline possibly serving a purpose, then he goes on to say maybe your descendants will do better. That’s the beginning of the story, making it more than just a hack and slash game. As of right now there are 3 different endings, and from what’s been said by ChAIR, during the next updates they will be adding a deeper storyline.

With the current game being so short you can get through a bloodline in about 25-35 minutes depending on the routes you take and if you spend time treasure hunting. It took me 5 blood lines to finally kill the God King, so it only took about 2 and a half hours to “beat” the game in its current form. Even with how short it is you will get a lot of replay value out of the game, the God King just keeps getting stronger, and of course there’s collecting all of the weapons and armor.

The controls are easy to learn and not that hard to master, you might have trouble with the parry, but other than that everything is relatively easy. There are 3 on-screen buttons used for fighting, dodge left, dodge right, and block (which I barely used). You attack by swiping your finger in any direction once you get the chance, there are also quick prompts that show up in battles that give you an opportunity to stab the enemy and opens up a couple of seconds for an attack. There are also 2 other buttons that you can use in battle, one is for magic, and the other is an attack that stuns the opponent so you can attack at will. What magic is available to you depends on the rings you buy, to use it you tap the magic button (once charged) and draw the attack you want to unleash.

It supports gamecenter for achievements and leaderboards, and in an upcoming update it will use gamecenter for multiplayer.

Now that I’ve talked all I could think of about the game, let’s talk about what the big deal is about this game. It is hands down the best looking game available in the app store, and that’s thanks to EPIC’s Unreal Engine 3. There’s really no point in me explaining them to you, so look at the screenshots and watch the videos.
Is this what we iDevice gamers have been waiting for? Almost, a strong foundation has been laid with this game, and that means that the best is yet to come. multiplayer will be added very soon, and there are many more updates in store. It’s not just a hack and slash on wheels, and it’s only going to get better as more updates come along. At $5.99 it will wow you and your friends for a long time.

Infinity Blade Gets

5 out of 5

What’s Legit?

+The Best looking Mobile game. Period.

+Combat is incredibly satisfying

What’s Perpetrating?

– A little light on content for the time being.