Hands-on: Majin and the Forsaken Kingdom (Xbox 360)

This unique title is looking interesting…

The story follows a thief who rescues a creature known as Majin. Majin is an ogre who was once incredibly powerful but is now captured by the dark forces. Despite being strong, he is a bit of a simpleton.

You give Majin orders to engage targets, activate switches and so on. You can fight also but you are incredibly weak in comparison to Majin and can die very easily, you need to rely on him for almost everything. You can make him stronger by gathering special fruit that is scattered through the game; this gives him more abilities and more ways to progress through the game. Majin and the Forsaken Kingdom are more puzzle-orientated than your usual action adventure game and stands out because of it.

Now I only got a short time playing the game, but came away impressed. You have to think how to reach certain areas, unlock doors and how to defeat the enemies around you using Majin. When you first start playing, the game holds your hand a bit to let you get used to how it works and then it lets you get on with it alone. The puzzles that I came across were tough and some took a lot of work just trying to figure out what to do.

Combat is fairly simple, but you need Majin to do most of it as you aren’t nearly strong enough to take on some of the bigger enemies. Having said that, you can pull off powerful combos together at certain points for maximum damage. You can also get different outfits and upgrades for you and Majin as you go through the game.

Visually, the game is looking fairly strong. It’s bright and vibrant in colour, the character models are nicely detailed and Majin is ugly but adorable at the same time. He speaks very simply but does make me laugh sometimes. You’ll come to either love or hate him when the game launches next month.

Overall, I came away very impressed with Majin. It’s a different take on the action adventure genre with a bigger emphasis on puzzle solving and strategy in combat. I have high hopes for it and look forward to getting my hands on it in the near future.