Reviews// Majin and the Forsaken Kingdom

'The Muppets vs Disney's Aladdin vs Venom (the Spider-Man villain) vs Lord of the Rings' is probably how I'd describe Majin and the Forsaken Kingdom. If I was feeling flippant and uninformative. I'm not wrong, though.

It's a fantasy adventure game, complete with the requisite combat and puzzle elements, in which you're a plucky thief accompanied by an ogre-type creature that looks like it was designed by Jim Henson when he was drunk. You fight a bunch of gooey black dudes against a fantasy backdrop and you have to do some kingdom saving. It stacks up.

It's the relationship between the plucky thief (Tepeu) and the Majin (the ogre fellow) around which Majin and the Forsaken Kingdom (henceforth MaFK) revolves, though.

None Have Come Out Alive
You see, it's been 100 years since the kingdom was mysteriously overcome by darkness and the people were either consumed or driven out. Since then, several intrepid souls have attempted to venture to the heart of the problem – the castle at the kingdom's centre – to find out what's wrong. None have come out alive.

None, that is, until the lone thief Tepeu, raised by animals, breaks in and discovers the golem (of Jewish legend rather than tedious Hobbit book)-like Majin, once the kingdom's protector, and sets him free. The pair then set out to uncover the source of the darkness and... etc etc. (I know, I should have been a story teller in the olden days or whatever).

Plot-wise, it's fairly standard fantasy fare, but developer Game Republic isn't trying to set your tits on fire with its story. As I said, it's that relationship with the Majin that provides the hook.

The Majin is a big, strong nature spirit sort who was once very powerful but, after a century of imprisonment, is severely weakened. Not so severely weakened that he can't lift heavy stone doors and beat up big monsters that Tepeu couldn't scratch, but weakened enough that he can't blow a gale from his lungs or control lightening like he used to.

So, while you directly control Tepeu, you can indirectly control the Majin with a series of commands brought up by pressing R2. These range from attack moves to interactions with the game world to use of special abilities. This starts with fairly basic actions such as 'thump that guy' or 'fling me over the wall in that catapult' and develops as the game progresses and the inevitable physics-based puzzles crop-up.

Enslaved
As a mechanic, having your Majin buddy around is fairly successful. A few games have had a pop at this – the Prince of Persia before last, Army of Two and Enslaved spring to mind.

In Prince of Persia, it felt like Elika was only there for the odd acrobatic assist. Army of Two was fairly successful. Enslaved did it very well, I thought, though Ninja Theory were smart not to hang the whole game off it.

MaFK is at least the equal of those games (and decidedly superior, in the case of PoP) in making interaction with the Majin a key gameplay mechanic. Use of him is crucial to progressing through many puzzle sections of the game. Without his strength, height or special abilities you simply wouldn't be able to progress, and using them in the right way often requires substantial tactical application of your grey matter.

Similarly, he becomes a key part of combat. Tepeu isn't overly powered-up, so approaching a skirmish with a good deal of stealth and making sure the Majin targets the right (big) bloke is pretty essential to winning out in a scrap.