I have so many amazing memories from gaming! Countless hours of my life were spent getting blissfully lost in labyrinthine dungeons looking for master keys. I remember feeling the wind while riding Epona through the fields of Hyrule. BUT, in all my years, I never thought I would want to revisit the Water Temple. You know which one I’m talking about. It makes me moist in the eyes just thinking about it. Lo and behold, A Knight’s Quest makes its debut and reminds me why, despite frustrating memories and recurring nightmares, it’s exactly what I needed to revisit.

Classic Style

A Knight’s Quest, simply put, is a new 3D adventure with classic style. Okay, listen up! I’m only going to say this once – CLASSIC STYLE ≠ PIXEL GRAPHICS. I’m talking about the feeling, the memories. Remember the days of exploration? Do you miss being taunted by tantalizing treasure, just out of reach? Clever navigation, flailing combat, and brain-busting puzzles – that’s the name of this game. I can’t tell you how much I missed this type of experience.

A Knight’s Quest puts you in the oblivious, unassuming shoes of a redhead named Rusty. Rusty is a simple man. He has a robotic arm due to a lost limb and, fittingly, enjoys living life to the fullest. He is also the son of a bullheaded (no, not literally) Mayor who carelessly runs the town they reside in. Standing next to each other, I really don’t see the resemblance.

Wild and Reckless

Not subscribing to the Mayor’s macho buffoonery, Rusty spends most of his time with a studious introvert named Valy. Although the purple-haired Valy is intelligent, her curiosity exceeds her caution, which only encourages Rusty to explore with reckless abandon. As you can imagine, this combination is a recipe for trouble. Okay, in that light, maybe I can see a bit of a resemblance . . .

Speaking of trouble – wouldn’t you know that Rusty and Valy would KICKSTART THE END OF THE WORLD (yes, literally). A Knight’s Quest begins with you, Rusty, exploring a mysterious cavern. It serves as both a tutorial, and a very clever intro. You explore a bit, jump over some endless pits, and fight evil skeletons. You are almost in the clear until you awaken a pink, magical crystal, and its evil-looking hooded prisoner. As the emanating power begins grow and crumble everything around you, you narrowly escape certain death, falling through the letters of the game title as you are blasted from the mouth of a cave, and leaving a pink blast shooting up into the sky.

Magic

In a nutshell, A Knight’s Quest is the story of Valy researching what evil has been released, how to stop it, and Rusty bumbling around wherever she tells you to go. Either by fate or sheer dumb luck, Rusty is given weapons with magical powers in his travels, and it is up to the player to use these weapons and powers to progress further into the game. The power of air, fire, and ice will play huge roles in combat, exploration, and puzzle-solving throughout the game.

For instance, in combat, you can use gusts of air to disorient enemies, or to activate spinning pinwheel-like switches. Fireballs can be shot at enemies to trigger recurring burn damage, or to melt things. Lastly, ice shards can be fired like projectiles or used to freeze small bits of flowing water. With a little creativity, I’ll bet you can think of lots of potential uses there. Without spoiling too much, you’ll eventually unlock additional powers later in the game, called spirit powers, for an even greater depth of gameplay and puzzle-solving ability.

Spoiler Alert

Okay fine, maybe I’ll spoil a little – SPIRIT REALM, FLAMERUNNING, and GIANT ICEBALL! Right around the time you figure out what those are, is right about the time the game really shines. Everything blends together very nicely for an exquisite showcase of 3D platforming. It’s all a bit metroidvania, a lot puzzle-platformer, and 100% classic adventuring. Think chunks of Zelda, mixed with filet of Ratchet and Clank, and add a dash of Banjo-Kazooie. What you have a sweet, steaming stew that smells of nostalgia of ridiculousness.

On the subject of ridiculousness, one of the most delightfully wacky elements of A Knight’s Quest is the dialogue; the writing is consistently hilarious. It’s sarcastic but can also be deep and emotional . . . but mainly sarcastic. Random NPC’s will occasionally break the fourth wall, so you know the game embraces its sense of humor. As a bonus, there is no voice acting – only small sound bites of . . . noises? All “dialogue” is voiced in short grunts, sighs, laughs, etc. As a whole, it really makes for great content.

That’s the most obvious trait of A Knight’s Quest; it’s apparent. But the real hidden gems of the gameplay truly are the puzzles and platforming. Now, the difficulty and genius of them are rolled out slowly and gradually. It’s like chipping away at a mountain, searching for valuable minerals. There are flakes of gold here and there, but once you mine in deep enough, there are raw diamonds, waiting to be exposed. Unfortunately, because of the time and effort it takes to get those precious stones, many won’t experience them in their full splendor.

Slow Your Roll

When I say these amazing pieces of gameplay are rolled out slowly, I mean it takes A WHILE. I played the game for probably 15 hours or so until I finally decided that A Knight’s Quest was amazing. And at that time, I was still only around 60% completed! I was so torn because the environments are big, bold, and beautiful! But when you are seeing this beauty between lots of backtracking at a sluggish run speed, it can really dampen the experience. But, while constantly spamming that roll button over miles of terrain, I saw light at the end of the tunnel.

Once you FINALLY unlock all the weapons and powers and pass a certain point (which I will keep spoiler free), the game becomes a work of glorious 60 FPS art. New, powerful abilities become unlocked and instead of lethargic trudging it becomes fluid exploration. Areas you didn’t even know existed, that were right there under your nose THE WHOLE TIME, become deathtraps of tricky maneuvers and skilled button presses. The dialogue continues to amuse and engage and the whole package together is an experience that now I wished wouldn’t end. Why it took so long for this to happen is beyond me, but I promise you it’s worth the journey.

There’s Levels to this Stuff

A Knight’s Quest low-key has some of the best level design I’ve seen recently. Have you ever played The Messenger? The genius there is there are two worlds on top of each other, one past, one present. You can experience both interchangeably by traveling through portals. A Knight’s Quest takes this idea of simultaneous existence and expands upon it! I swear I’ve visited the same three large areas three to four times each and every time it was a different experience. It literally LOOKS different. On top of this, each visit becomes more and more challenging as well. It’s weird to try and explain, but it makes for an incredible use of space. And remember, the areas are already large so there is plenty of adventuring to be done.

What’s funny is you see all these things around – portals, auras, gates, etc. You can’t access any of these places for a huge chunk of the game. The player sees so many, and so often, one kind of just learns to ignore them. It’s a very linear experience since you’re basically stuck into a singular path with a few branching options. You play this way for a long time. But, once everything is unlocked, the game becomes a maze of insanity with hours of additional content. Do I wish it happened sooner? Yes. Do I think it takes away from the experience? Slightly. Is it worth the sacrifice? Absolutely.

Word Count

I spent a lot of time talking about navigation, exploration, and level design. There’s a lot of words up there. It’s deserving of the praise, so don’t tell me how to write my reviews. By now, you’re probably wondering how the combat is because, oh yeah, there’s actually quite a bit of it in this game. It’s meh. The enemies are challenging at times (I FU#$ING hate the skeleton spin attacks), and sure, there are some visual factors that make it enjoyable, like slow-motion finishes and the occasional ragdoll physics, but overall it lacks polish.

Don’t get me wrong – I love the weapons and powers. They are a blast to experience and look amazing. However, I have to nitpick a bit. Aiming your powers are a hassle. They are projectile-based, and you have to be facing precisely at what you are looking to attack accurately. There’s a small amount of forgiveness but more than a few degrees off and you’ll overshoot. It doesn’t make it easier that enemies run around quite a bit. You almost must lead your shots to hit them consistently.

Inflation

Also, there seems to be a lack of weight to the attacks as well. I will say A Knight’s Quest does a pretty decent job of accounting for movement physics, but when it comes to an enemy getting slammed by a massive hammer, they stand there and eat it like it was an inflatable toy. The only time you get a sense of real damage is when you kill an enemy. That is when ragdoll physics kicks in and it actually looks like you did some damage. Out of everything, I think the punches tend to feel the best. And, because of this, the flame knuckles are my preferred weapon of choice.

And in speaking of the flame knuckles I must mention something else. As much as I hate to say it, there are lots of bugs in A Knight’s Quest. Like, a noticeable amount. Unfortunately, the worst offenders break immersion and can sometimes lead you to have to reset the game and start back at your last save. This might be tolerable were there the option to manually save but, alas, no such luck. Autosaves are both a blessing and a curse. Luckily, if you do get stuck punching a fence or a pot, or trapped inside an invisible box like I did, typically the last autosave isn’t too far off. Just don’t say I didn’t warn you!

Music to My Ears

Let’s end on a more positive note though (pun intended), like my overall experience with A Knight’s Quest. The last element I want to bring up is the soundtrack. For a good chunk of the game, it’s a subtle detail unique to each area. Some areas even seem to be devoid of a soundtrack altogether other than environmental ambience and Rusty’s guttural roll sounds. But I have to say, when the game wants to get dramatic, it pulls out all the stops! Full, raw, orchestral emotion comes through and really puts you in the zone.

There a handful of times where I noticed it, and just stopped. I stood there where I was in the game to really appreciate the quality. It’s not often that I find it relevant in mentioning, but here I do. I won’t go as far as to say I would add it to a Spotify playlist, but it’s a worthy addition to the game. It needed – it deserves a small shoutout near the end of some fool’s review of A Knight’s Quest. Might as well be mine.

Final Words

Overall, A Knight’s Quest is a surprising, lasting experience. I mean it really is a game that KEEPS ON GIVING. Throughout the game, its lighting complements the smooth 60 FPS gameplay. The puzzles are very clever and plentiful. The platforming has some of the most unique and difficult challenges I’ve seen since classic Zelda games (hence the water temple reference in the intro). I was so torn on my feelings until later game, but the charm and the experience won me over. I highly definitely recommend this game to any lover of adventure who gets consumed by digital wanderlust. If that’s you, and you’re wondering whether to get this game, the answer is yes.

Thank you for reading this review. It really means the world to us here at Nindie Nexus, and fuels us to continue this crazy journey! Join us on our Discord, or see us on YouTube. Jump in a Twitch stream sometime! If your pockets are weighing you down, we have a Patreon for monetary support as well. Until next time!