The Adventures of Elliot: The Millennium Tales Review – Puzzles and Portals

The Adventures of Elliot: The Millennium Tales Review

I should have enjoyed this game more than I actually did. All the pieces are in place. You’ve got those excellent HD-2D graphics, an interconnected world to explore, and snappy combat. There’s a whole weapons wheel with a host of upgrades to discover. The plot is centered around time travel and an unflappable need to see it all. So what’s missing? The Adventures of Elliot: The Millennium Tales is an objectively excellent game that could not hook me, despite a valiant effort and a solid foundation. Is the game somehow flawed, or has the ADHD melted my brain into slag, sparks, and embers?

The progression system in Adventures of Elliot feels slightly overwrought. You defeat monsters, which gets you Tuul and Magicite. The Magicite gets poured into a gacha machine that spits out random upgrades to whatever weapons you have unlocked. The more you use the system, the better your odds get. But it’s still essentially random. Elliot’s levels and raw stats never directly improve, it’s all tied to this gachapon system. You also find health upgrades and better weapons as you explore this world. So instead of your progression being a mountain you climb, it’s more of a maze of paths through a dense forest. This puts too much distance between your efforts and your growth, at least for me.

An Element Of Chance

But combat itself is still a great time. I’m so used to new games in this genre handcuffing you with clunky controls and massive tradeoffs, you see. So a game that just gives you weapons that work as you expect them to is almost shocking. There aren’t any big delays to navigate, and ammunition is easy enough to come by that you don’t mind burning it on regular encounters. Not that there isn’t strategy involved in what weapon you wield, to be fair. The hammer and the chain whip have their place, along with the sword and the bow. It’s just refreshing to have them all feel useful.

The narrative is aggressively okay. You’re travelling through time to stop some jerk from undoing all of history and plunging human civilization into utter ruin. Elliot forms strong bonds with everyone he meets, including a princess with an arc so telegraphed it depressed me. Sometimes when I can see the plot coming from a mile away I immediately lose interest. Other times these cliches feel necessary for the medium, like killing god or scheming viziers. In this case I backburnered the story to focus on the more mechanical aspects of the game. Solving puzzles, getting stronger, and exploring the entire map.

He’s So Obviously Evil

You’re rewarded for diving into every cave and crevice in Adventures of Elliot. New spells, health upgrades, and better weapons await you. Everything you find is potentially quite useful, even if it doesn’t directly lead to Elliot’s growth. Plus, all these mini dungeons are crammed full of puzzles to solve. This game is festooned with puzzles of varying cleverness. Some of them feel almost insulting, while others required a short break and a good meal before they made any sense. Unless the puzzle in question can’t be solved at all. Sometimes you just have to come back later, after some time travel has been done or a new skill has been acquired. This isn’t always obvious, which led to me wasting a lot of time in a couple of seemingly impossible caves.

On top of your weapon wheel, you’ve got a fairy companion with a bunch of awesome spells. She can light fires, boost your speed, and even teleport you short distances. Rad, right? She can also revive you when you die. I didn’t think this would come up all that often, until I ran into an especially nasty boss. I’m sure there was a strategy I was missing. What happened instead was she drained my bank account and the boss was obliterated through stubborn brute force. It was neither elegant nor clever, but I did technically succeed. So if you’re too bullheaded to give up or turn down the difficulty, you can always spend your way to victory.

Spend Your Way To Success

All the ingredients for an excellent game are here. The combat feels snappy and slick, the graphics are delightful, and there’s a big, beautiful world to explore. You’ve got tons of upgrades you can apply to all your weapons, your fairy friend is full of amazing powers, and there’s time travel to mess around with. And yet, I was never properly hooked. The experience and progression system feels clunky, the story falls flat, and the puzzles can be annoyingly obtuse. Though maybe there’s hope yet. This game wasn’t quite perfect for me, true. But if you’re looking for an action RPG full of clever ideas, The Adventures of Elliot: The Millennium Tales might be perfect for you.

***A PS5 code was provided by the publisher***