Awaken to the Challenge | Aaru’s Awakening Review

<p>Welcome to the world of Lumenox where Dawn&comma; Day&comma; Dusk&comma; Night rule in perfect balance&period; Well&comma; it was a balanced land until Night decided it wanted complete control over all the living&period; Dawn foresaw the tragedy that would befall the land and hid a special champion away from suspecting eyes&period; Aaru&comma; the half bear and half bird warrior&comma; is the champion you will control to travel to the Night realm and defeat the oppressor at Dawn’s great command&period; If the concept of a half bear and half bird warrior hasn’t incited you to wanting to play <em>Aaru’s Awakening&comma;<&sol;em> there is more incentive coming your way&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;aarus-awakening-review-awaken-challenge&sol;aarus-awakening&lowbar;screenshot&sol;" rel&equals;"attachment wp-att-79517"><img class&equals;"aligncenter wp-image-79517" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;03&sol;aarus-awakening&lowbar;screenshot&period;jpg" alt&equals;"aaru's awakening&lowbar;screenshot" width&equals;"476" height&equals;"268" &sol;><&sol;a><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Hand-drawn games are slowly being found within indie titles and the developers at Lumenox Games have great artistic talent&period; The scenery looks as if it comes from a book of fairy tales&period; With the sharp jagged edges of the bramble and cliffs&comma; to the sharp curves and unforgiving landscape&comma;<em> Aaru’s Awakening<&sol;em> brings the darkness of a fairy story to gamers&period; You are able to partake in an age old tale of a hero fighting against an evil entity that threatens the existence of all that is good&period; But Aaru posses something a little different than your usual video game&sol; story book hero&comma; Aaru can teleport&excl;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;aarus-awakening-review-awaken-challenge&sol;aarus&lowbar;awakening&lowbar;enemy&sol;" rel&equals;"attachment wp-att-79516"><img class&equals;"aligncenter wp-image-79516" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;03&sol;aarus&lowbar;awakening&lowbar;enemy&period;png" alt&equals;"aarus&lowbar;awakening&lowbar;enemy" width&equals;"403" height&equals;"227" &sol;><&sol;a><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Aaru has only two abilities aside from walking&colon; the ability to charge and to teleport&period; Charging head-on into a loose wall or enemy will do considerable damage&period; However the teleporting is a large problem&period; Shooting an orb of light to the area you want Aaru to be in and then clicking on the orb will teleport Dawn’s champion to that spot&period; It seems like a neat feature for a platforming game&comma; and something to make this game stand out on Steam&period; The idea of teleportation is definitely there&comma; and it’s something to tempt players into purchase the game&period; The problem with this mechanic is that it takes quite a bit of mastery&period; Even after playing for the first couple of hours&comma; I still had a difficult time teleporting Aaru to the platform I wanted&period; Much of the time Aaru would go to every spot BUT<i> <&sol;i>the one place he needed to be in order to progress&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The visual beauty of <em>Aaru’s Awakening<&sol;em> has the potential to make this game memorable&period; I cannot recall seeing such beautiful hand-drawn graphics in a platformer before&comma; and it’s enough to keep me wanting to continue&period; The muted colors set the solemn mood for the player&comma; and visually lets them recognize the dire need of a hero for Lumenox&period; Even though the story is rather simple&comma; it seems to be spoken through the art&period; All of the feeling and emotion comes from the paintings themselves&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;aarus-awakening-review-awaken-challenge&sol;aarus&lowbar;awakening&lowbar;04&lowbar;thumb&sol;" rel&equals;"attachment wp-att-79515"><img class&equals;"aligncenter size-full wp-image-79515" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;03&sol;aarus&lowbar;awakening&lowbar;04&lowbar;thumb&period;jpg" alt&equals;"aarus&lowbar;awakening&lowbar;04&lowbar;thumb" width&equals;"650" height&equals;"365" &sol;><&sol;a><br &sol;>&NewLine;Unfortunately though the graphics are wonderful&comma; they cannot overshadow the fact that controlling Aaru’s teleporting is practically too challenging&period; After a good few hours of gameplay time goes by and you still cannot seem to master Aaru’s teleporting power&comma; it’s clear that the game’s controls are in need of improvement&period; <em>Aaru&&num;8217&semi;s Awakening<&sol;em> offers a treat for the eyes&comma; at least for those brave enough to master the controls&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;