(Credit: Square-Enix)
Square-Enix’s newest HD-2D title, The Adventure of Elliot: The Millennium Tales, drummed up some nostalgia in me when it was first revealed during a Nintendo Direct last year. I’m always down for a 2D pixel-art game, especially when the Octopath Traveler team is heading development. At a glance, I expected something in the same vein as the Mana series: methodical action, RPG-style character progression, and party-based combat. What I got instead from my recent hands-on time was a throwback to classic SNES-era action-adventure games. Hang the turn-based combat and stat systems, because The Adventures of Elliot is a faithful homage to the Legend of Zelda games of old, and I’m 100% on board.
(Credit: Square-Enix)What Is The Adventures of Elliot: The Millennium Tales?
In this action-adventure, you play as an adventurer named Elliot and his fairy companion, Faie. They travel across four distinct ages spanning 1,000 years to lift a curse on the princess. The title departs from Team Asano's typical turn-based formula, offering real-time action gameplay heavily inspired by classic top-down Zelda titles. I’ve thought this HD-2D art style lends itself perfectly to this type of gameplay, and I'm thrilled to see it realized in The Adventures of Elliot: it looks fantastic, even if it's almost identical to the studio’s previous releases.
Shifting Traditions: Simple Combat, Impressive Variety
As mentioned, The Adventures of Elliot ditches the experience points and leveling systems I expected from the Octopath team, instead leaning much more heavily into real-time action with a core moveset and ability-based progression. However, the game doesn’t modernize things too much, either. The base controls are simple. Elliot can run, jump, swing a weapon, or block attacks. I can equip two weapons at a time, but a radial menu lets me swap to any other weapon in my inventory at a moment’s notice. These weapons are also heavily Zelda-inspired: swords, hammers, spears, bombs, a bow and arrows, and a boomerang, for example.
I can shake things up by charging my attack, which varies the move. With a sword equipped, my charge attack unleashes a long-ranged beam, letting me hit out-of-reach foes or hit close-range enemies multiple times for good damage. These unique effects can actually be modified with Magicite, which is the foundation of the game’s RPG depth. It’s very similar to the Badge system in Paper Mario: I have a fixed number of points to spend on allocating magicite crystals to my weapons. These magicites have highly varied effects that radically affect how I use my arsenal. For example, I can add a lava effect to bombs, which leaves a pool of fire on the ground after detonation that damages enemies standing in it. I can add a triple-shot to my bow’s charged shot, which lets me shotgun foes in a cone in front of me.
(Credit: Square-Enix)The heart of melee combat has me maneuvering Elliot around enemies to unleash a few basic attacks to defeat them, or in the case of bosses, charging a heavy attack to dish out damage before backing away from any retaliatory attacks. Classic, 2D action, à la Zelda. I really appreciate the simplicity of the combat here. Controls are tight and fluid, and just demanding enough to require my attention without feeling frustrating or tedious. It’s brilliantly balanced.
Exploration: Shrines, Puzzles, and a Sprawling World
The Adventures of Elliot adroitly fuses sharp combat with intricate puzzle-solving, further cementing the Zelda feel. My game time was split between exploring an expansive, pixel-rich overworld map and tight puzzle-dense, monster-riddled caves and dungeons. Mini caves challenged me with dodging or evading obstacles, often tantalizing me with treasure that’s just beyond my reach until I can navigate the obstacles or use the right abilities to get to it. Larger dungeons have more enemies and more expansive puzzles. One such dungeon had several very elaborate mirror puzzles, requiring that I move and rotate reflective statues to aim light beams at switches to open new paths. The more elaborate of these involved multi-room statue-adjustment to solve. Much like the combat, these puzzles were tuned to demand a bit of thought from me, but not so much that I ever felt stuck.
Larger dungeons also have a boss fight waiting at the end, challenging me to use my arsenal to the best of my abilities to take them down. I encountered a giant knight dual-boss at the end of my session. One armored foe focused on melee attacks, while the other blasted me with cannon fire from a distance. I swapped between ranged melee attacks during the fight, occasionally dropping a bomb at the boss’s feet when they were stunned to make short work of them. The fight was not especially difficult: Once I learned their moves, the challenge came from finding the best openings to attack.
(Credit: Square-Enix)Defeating the boss earned me a “life drop,” which is the Adventures of Elliot equivalent of a heart container from Zelda. This life drop permanently added a point of health to my life gauge. These drops can also be found in shards hidden within dungeons across the map, making them well worth investigating.
Faie, the Chatty Puzzle-Solving Sidekick
You are accompanied by Faie, the floating fairy sidekick, at all times. She grants handy mechanical abilities that are integral for puzzle-solving, like a dash that lets me rush across the screen, or a flame ability that lets me burn enemies and light fires. In one puzzle-focused shrine, I learned the teleport ability for her. When activated, I can move Faie to a spot on the map with the right thumbstick, then tap the appropriate button to swap Elliot’s place with hers. These abilities are key to reaching some of the chests I encountered in caves and dungeons during my adventure.
However, Faie’s probably my only real complaint with the game. She comments and quips incessantly; perhaps Team Asano aped Zelda a bit too much here by giving us a nuisance sidekick on par with Ocarina of Time’s fairy, Navi. If she’s going to quip frequently, I think a good solution would be to play the line once, then only display the text box whenever she makes that same comment.
Will the Full Quest Deliver?
Square-Enix’s trademark HD-2D art style remains stunning, though it admittedly looks identical to Octopath Traveler and Triangle Strategy. While the aesthetic has not evolved much over the years, the nostalgic SNES vibe is captured perfectly. Time will tell if the real-time gameplay loop holds up across the game’s entire campaign, but The Adventures of Elliot: The Millennium Tales has earned itself a place on my wishlist.