Developer: Chad
Sexington
Here’s a
review of another RPG maker game that I’ve played through recently. Undeniably
Sexy: A Thief’s Tale is based off of the setting of Ultima Online and hence can
be considered as a fan game. However, despite that, it follows its own
storyline and has its own set of colourful characters. I personally have never
played Ultima Online and could still get into the story of a Thief’s Tale very
easily.
The central
protagonist is Chad Sexington who appears to have a very light-hearted attitude
to everything in life and simply seeks a prize behind anything he comes across.
His greatest goal is to simply find the greatest treasure, and somehow as if
brought together by fate, he bands with 6 other quirky characters, all of which
embark on the same quest. This is perhaps one of the best parts of the
storytelling in this game – there is a very well-developed and funny chemistry
between the team members. Just when it seems the group grows closer to each
other, they end up drifting apart, and just when you think they’ve grown apart,
they come back together.
Another
thing I enjoyed about the storytelling in this game is how unpredictable it can
be at times, managing to maintain a great element of surprise and to keep you
hooked to know what happens next. All this is spiced up with tonnes of silly
jokes and other humourous moments.
Most
locations look very beautiful and manage to convey a good sense of atmosphere,
and the soundtrack is very fitting too. Although many of the tunes are from the
RPG maker XP RTP, there are some new ones present as well, and I personally
thought even the RTP tracks were well suited in the places they were put.
The entire
game is split into 3 acts, and overall takes a linear approach until the late
stages of 3rd act, when the player gets a chance to revisit previous
locations as well as travel to some new optional ones for side adventures. The
amount of optional content is very impressive and should satisfy the
completionist type players. The game’s overall length is easily over 30 hours,
not to mention that there is also a chance to go into a New Game +, where the
player starts from the beginning but with all of the experience, skills, gold,
and items transferred over. According to the developer, this feature was
planned from the very beginning and is meant to drastically change the core
gameplay, giving a more open-ended approach.
During the
game we get to visit a lot of stunning-looking cities and a variety of dungeons
of different themes. Many dungeons contain very interesting puzzles that
require the player to think carefully in order to solve them. In fact even to
progress through the story in many of the cities the player is required to do
something, like to acquire a certain item or to play with the disguises in order
to fool the guards. Oftentimes the hints are given in the in-game books or from
the NPCs even. The overall level design of each location is great and every
level is quite memorable in its own way.
The only major
criticism really that I can give is that at times it is easy to get stuck
because a solution to a puzzle at hand might not always be so obvious. However,
the developer, Chad Sexington, has been making very frequent updates to the
game and adding new hints at various points in order to guide the player along.
So to
summarize, I’ve had a great time playing through a Thief’s Tale. With the huge amount
of different skills and a variety of enemies and bosses, the gameplay is rich,
puzzles are aplenty, and the overall feel of the story is light-hearted and
fun.
You can find
more info and download the game HERE.
Or you can
simply visit its site right HERE, which also includes a video walkthrough.
