[GAMING/FIRST IMPRESSIONS] This Blog is not Dead + Child of Light First Impressions

Hi all, sorry for not posting anything for the last two months... Been busy with finals and whatnot all up until last week. Now that it's summer and I have much more free time on my hands, expect more frequent updates! In the time that I've been gone I've purchased a WiiU. (inb4 "Why didn't you buy an Xbox One &/or PS4?") There are a handful of games I'm looking forward to that I'll be talking about later in similar fashion to how I'll be approaching the game that I'll be talking about today. Some of these game are Smash Bros. U, Bayonetta 2, and Hyrule Warriors. Today I'll be taking a look at Child of Light. I have yet to play this game, and this post will be about my first impressions about the game before actually trying it out. I downloaded it earlier today, but only had ten minutes and didn't want to start something that I could not finish... This will be my pre-play post. I'll also do another post after playing around with it for a few hours and a third and final one after finishing the game. So without further ado... Child of Light:

Never heard of this game? Here's some basic info.

This game feels not so much like a game, and more like a playable piece of art. And indeed, that seems to be the feeling that the developers were going for. From graphics which are almost entirely (if not 100%) hand drawn, all the way down to the game's dialogue written entirely in iambic pentameter (i.e. the whole thing is written like a poem). Every last detail of the game just seems to exude a sense of artisticness, and only time will tell if I find it entrancing, or outright annoying...

The gameplay itself seems to be solid. The overworld features a sidescroller perspective, and you receive the ability to fly early on in the game, so it seems that navigating between story events and encounters and the link will be much less of a chore than it is in many other games... The battle system features a mix between real time and turn based rpg battles, and while not exactly revolutionary, seems to be a solid and fun system nonetheless. What I haven't seen before though, is the blue sprite which can be seen in the above image. I don't mean to say that we haven't had our fair share of navi-esque sprites that have been both helpful and extremely annoying at times... I mean that you can actually use it in battle. It seems to take on a support role, being controlled by the stylus to deliver buffs to your party members and debuffs to foes. I'm not sure just how useful this will actually be, or even if it will be intrusive, but if executed well it seems to be a solid and fun addition to battles.

I'll have a chance to actually try this game out for real in a few hours, so hopefully I can get a mid-game post up in a few days, look forward to it!

EDIT: the second post for this game is completed: [link]