Puzzle Quest 2
Dec. 11th, 2010 12:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chuckroDo you like Bejeweled, but feel that it's a waste of time because you're not accomplishing anything? Never fear! Puzzle Quest is here! It's the RPG that replaces all random battles with games of Bejeweled!
I wouldn't necessarily say it's better than the first game, but besides the core mechanic, you could scarcely believe the two were made by the same company. PQ1 took place entirely on a world map, was text-heavy (and fairly plot-heavy), was a (visually) darker game and had a completely different set of minigames.
PQ2 is much more of a dungeon-crawler, as your character goes through a town and five levels of a dungeon (connected by teleporters, so you can easily backtrack), fighting monsters, kicking down doors, picking locks and looting treasure. There's a new (Bejeweled-based) minigame for each of these activities: Search, Pick lock, Bash down door, Unlock with a spell, Disarm trap, and Loot treasure. They also keep the spell-learning minigame from PQ1, though there are only a few of them. (You're given the option with most locks to pick, bash or use spells on them. My character was a Barbarian, but that gives you no bonuses to bashing down doors, and I was much better at the lock-picking minigame. So I'd inevitably fail at bashing down a door and resort to picking the lock. Worst Barbarian Ever.)
The plot is fluffier and less noteworthy than the first game. They didn't make that much effort to weave the events together; it's more of the standard dungeon crawler "plot happens when you arrive at the room it's in" sort of thing. Also, like the first game, there's no game over. If you fail at something, you just try again. Even the final boss will wait patiently as you flee a battle you've lost and come back to challenge her again. The exceptions are looting treasure (if you don't get anything good, well, too bad) and disarming traps (you lose a few HP off your max until you got back to town and pay to have it healed).
PQ2 removes the gold and experience gems from the standard board, instead adding a fifth mana color and "action gems". In addition to your spells, you can equip two items (and there are some challenges where you're given a free additional item) such as swords or shields, which you use action points to activate. Some spells let you increase your action points, and a Mana Drain (when no matches are available) doesn't reduce them. Action items also include healing potions, poisons, or mana potions (which essentially let you trade action points into mana of a chosen color).
You and enemies now have an armor value, determined by your agility score and equipment, which is basically a percentage chance that damage will be halved when you take it. Using a shield increases your armor value for a number of turns; there are also buff spells.
My favorite game breaker from the first game, the Troll Ring (gave you regeneration) is gone, but every piece of equipment has an adjective, and "draconic" items, when reforged to the "legendary" and "epic" levels, give you bonuses to damage for matching skulls. I was getting +10 bonus for matching skulls from my equipment alone by the end of the game. (Other items give you bonuses to critical hit chance, spell resistence or shield critical chance.)
If you want some purpose in your zillion games of Bejeweled (or just a fun way to play Bejeweled on a DS), then by all means, pick this up.
I wouldn't necessarily say it's better than the first game, but besides the core mechanic, you could scarcely believe the two were made by the same company. PQ1 took place entirely on a world map, was text-heavy (and fairly plot-heavy), was a (visually) darker game and had a completely different set of minigames.
PQ2 is much more of a dungeon-crawler, as your character goes through a town and five levels of a dungeon (connected by teleporters, so you can easily backtrack), fighting monsters, kicking down doors, picking locks and looting treasure. There's a new (Bejeweled-based) minigame for each of these activities: Search, Pick lock, Bash down door, Unlock with a spell, Disarm trap, and Loot treasure. They also keep the spell-learning minigame from PQ1, though there are only a few of them. (You're given the option with most locks to pick, bash or use spells on them. My character was a Barbarian, but that gives you no bonuses to bashing down doors, and I was much better at the lock-picking minigame. So I'd inevitably fail at bashing down a door and resort to picking the lock. Worst Barbarian Ever.)
The plot is fluffier and less noteworthy than the first game. They didn't make that much effort to weave the events together; it's more of the standard dungeon crawler "plot happens when you arrive at the room it's in" sort of thing. Also, like the first game, there's no game over. If you fail at something, you just try again. Even the final boss will wait patiently as you flee a battle you've lost and come back to challenge her again. The exceptions are looting treasure (if you don't get anything good, well, too bad) and disarming traps (you lose a few HP off your max until you got back to town and pay to have it healed).
PQ2 removes the gold and experience gems from the standard board, instead adding a fifth mana color and "action gems". In addition to your spells, you can equip two items (and there are some challenges where you're given a free additional item) such as swords or shields, which you use action points to activate. Some spells let you increase your action points, and a Mana Drain (when no matches are available) doesn't reduce them. Action items also include healing potions, poisons, or mana potions (which essentially let you trade action points into mana of a chosen color).
You and enemies now have an armor value, determined by your agility score and equipment, which is basically a percentage chance that damage will be halved when you take it. Using a shield increases your armor value for a number of turns; there are also buff spells.
My favorite game breaker from the first game, the Troll Ring (gave you regeneration) is gone, but every piece of equipment has an adjective, and "draconic" items, when reforged to the "legendary" and "epic" levels, give you bonuses to damage for matching skulls. I was getting +10 bonus for matching skulls from my equipment alone by the end of the game. (Other items give you bonuses to critical hit chance, spell resistence or shield critical chance.)
If you want some purpose in your zillion games of Bejeweled (or just a fun way to play Bejeweled on a DS), then by all means, pick this up.
