Come with me on this exciting adventure in the magical land of Blade Prince Academy, developed by Angel Corp and Published by Firesquid. Now, please sit back and relax while I tell you a story.

This story begins with a group of students raised to be killers and attending the Blade Prince Academy to protect the city and uphold the balance. With the threat of evil attacking the school and taking hostages, you and your fellow students must fight off the evil that is slowly closing in.

Where to start with this very unique game, Blade Prince Academy features True Real-Time with Pause with a top-down view of the academy and missions, bringing in a lot of ideas and functions to the game, being able to pause in combat to make a strategy and plot your best course of action almost like a turn-based game. Still, the enemy doesn’t get to pause. You can combine attacks with the students from the academy that you have on the mission to generate a powerful combo.

Each student has their unique skills and perks to give an advantage in missions, but not without adverse effects that even out the students. Some have melee skills which require time to prepare, to ranged skills that have little to no downtime, not to mention mage students that can heal you for a percentage of your missing health while also using slow and haste spells to slow down the enemy, being careful not to use your abilities too soon as they have cooldowns and can put you in a corner real fast.

You can also build relationships with the students in your squad and build trust by going to the academy to study and influence the outcome of missions. However, lacking trust and study can affect your missions, making the enemies more substantial and challenging to beat.

Also, the energy of each character slowly drains with each battle, making it essential to go to the medical building in the academy to restore energy to do more missions and continue the story. You will also be able to have conversations, make potions, and upgrade skills and abilities through the talent tree with new skills, gradually gaining more advanced spells to help you in battle.

One neat thing is that when you are on a mission, some chests can contain coins to spend on items from the shop in missions, or they can include cards, which is almost like a ritual that can increase the skills and overall stats, making you more robust. Still, it also comes with negative attributes to even out the cards, so you must be careful and ensure you gain more than you lose; otherwise, it can affect you on your later missions when the enemies get more substantial.

One thing I did find quite frustrating was when in pause mode, accidentally clicking a location that the character would move to when the time was unfrozen. You are unable to reverse that click and can put you in a tight spot if you do multiple clicks making multiple moves and being attacked unavoidable.

Controls are simple, with a mouse for highlighting and moving your characters and a spacebar to pause the game to make your strategy. Depending on your number of skills, you can have one or two keys to activate your skills on your allies or enemies. It is straightforward to get your head around, not to mention a straightforward tutorial mission at the start of the game to get you started.

Blade Prince Academy has a unique top-down view with art that fills the screen with colour, with what looks to be hand-drawn art throughout the game. With very well-drawn characters, neat animations for attacks and spells, distant objects looking very clean, and animated fire being very well-designed giving life to the whole mission and creating an authentic thrilling atmosphere.

The sound is fascinating. Music blasts from every angle in missions, getting you amped up and ready to bring justice to the academy. The sound at the academy is very calming, letting you relax while your characters chat and heal up. Although there is no voice acting, the sound of your spells being fired makes large explosion sounds, making for a grand time.

In conclusion, I’m thrilled with Blade Prince Academy’s story and campaign. They have combined a very compelling and fun experience that I enjoyed immensely. Not to mention the fantastic artwork and sound quality, which boosted the experience that many people will also enjoy. Although the issue of miss-clicking did create quite an annoyance. I hope the problem can be fixed soon; otherwise, I’m pretty happy.

Written by: TypicalCambieAU