To be honest, I am generally very cautious about the works of small companies these days. The mobile game market is too impetuous these days, and there are skin swaps and krypton gold traps everywhere. But a friend forced me to play "Apprentice Demon Hunters", saying that old players from the Saipan era would like it. I thought it was free anyway, so I downloaded it and gave it a try. Unexpectedly, I played it for several nights.
Let's talk about the first impression first. Although the CG animation in the game is not at the level of major manufacturers, the two-dimensional hand-painted style is coming to my face, reminding me of the "Anodia" series I played on the Nokia N95 more than ten years ago. The moment Elf Priest Alice appeared, I, an old two-dimensional person like me, really burst into tears😢. The modeling is not very detailed, but the details of the character's expressions and movements are very good, especially the agility when Alice waves her hand to prompt you to follow, which really impressed me.
In terms of gameplay, this game takes the ARPG plus light Roguelike route. To be honest, I was a little worried about whether it would be too complicated when I first came into contact with it, but I found it to be very friendly after getting started. You control the protagonist to travel across the Broken Continent. Each map has random elements, and weapons and equipment are also dropped from monsters. There is no sense of compulsion that forces you to earn money and draw cards. The battle rhythm is fast, and although the combat feeling is not as good as that of console masterpieces, it is already above average on the mobile terminal. What surprises me the most is the skill combo system. The combos feel smooth. When fighting the demon BOSS, I can experience a refreshing feeling similar to "Lost Castle".
In terms of plot, seven demons invade the mainland and seven kingdoms attack each other. Although the setting is classic, the narrative method is quite thoughtful. Each map has a fragmented story. You piece together the world view by collecting scraps on the map and talking to NPCs. I don't blame this kind of narrative. It is much better than many mobile games nowadays that directly feed the plot to the players. Moreover, the proportion of main tasks and side tasks is balanced, so you won't be exhausted all the way.
Let's talk about the key point: charging model. The developer, Hainan Youjie Interactive Entertainment, really didn't do anything fancy this time. It cost 0 yuan to download. There are no mandatory payment points in the game. The only gold points are some appearance and stamina pills, and the system will give out a lot of stamina pills every day, so you can play smoothly without spending any money. As an old player who came from the Symbian era, I know very well how precious those buy-out single-player games were. Now that I can encounter such a conscientious free game, it really deserves a good review.
Of course, there are also shortcomings. For example, the online mode matching speed is slow, maybe the player base is not enough; the equipment system is a bit monotonous in the later stage, and I hope that more random entries can be added in subsequent versions. In addition, UI interactions occasionally get stuck, so there is still room for optimization. But considering that this is the work of a small factory, it is already very good to be able to achieve this level.
Overall, if you are the kind of player who likes light Roguelike plus RPG games such as "Mysterious Labyrinth" and "Greedy Cave", or like me, who occasionally miss the time of playing RPGs on feature machines late at night, then "Apprentice Demon Hunters" is definitely worth a try. No worries, no fuss, comfortable rhythm, online plot, it allowed me to see the purest fun of mobile games.
As a veteran player, I give you 83 points for this operation of Youjie Interactive Entertainment. I hope they can operate with a stable conscience in the future. Our generation plays games, but tastes memories.