Blossom Tales: The Sleeping King
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Critic Reviews for Blossom Tales: The Sleeping King
Whether you're scouring the overworld for secrets or delving into the dungeons, Blossom Tales is a delightful take on a beloved genre
The decision as to whether or not Blossom Tales: The Sleeping King should be checked out boils down to the answer of a single question: does the potential buyer desire a new Zelda of the old school style? If the answer is yes, then this game is a must buy.
Judging a game on its own merits is very important. However, when a title happens to borrow just about every aspect of its design from an iconic game series, it's hard not to acknowledge. Claims could be made that a game like this is nothing more than a shameless clone, but thankfully in the case of Blossom Tales: The Sleeping King, the developer has intentionally crafted it with a sense of love and admiration of classic Zelda games. While it's not as flawlessly executed as the series it draws inspiration from and it doesn't add anything particularly groundbreaking, it's still a heartfelt tribute to the earlier entries in Nintendo's long-running series.
If I'm being honest, Blossom Tales might be a bit heavy-handed in its homage to the Zelda games of the past, but it brings a certain charm and fun to the Switch library. It also makes for a pretty good substitute as long as I still can't play A Link to the Past on my Switch.
Blossom Tales: The Sleeping King is another indie game which feels right at home on Nintendo's platform, despite also being available on Steam. The game will appeal to those looking for a bit of classic dungeon crawling, and it will be sure to please those that have missed top-down Zelda adventures. With a lovely kingdom to explore and a varied range of objectives, Blossom Tales shows us that this genre is still very much alive.
Blossom Tales scratches an itch I have of wanting to venture through Link to the Past once a year. It is well-designed if not a bit cliché in its approach. Still for those with the same nostalgia for Link's SNES adventure, there are few games that capture it as well as this one.
If you are looking for an Adventure game that follows the top-down Zelda formula closely, there might not be a better game for you on the Nintendo Switch eShop than this one.
Blossom Tales achieves with flying colors a synthesis of what used to make a 2D Zelda a great game, while adding enough ideas to satisfy the old-school fanatics. Thanks to a charming art direction, Castle Pixel's second game will please most of nostalgic gamers. But such reverence to the original Zelda series will not come along with many surprises, even with such a short length.
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