Zwei: The Arges Adventure
Filterless fashionista Pipiro and poindextrous punster Pokkle are ordinary step-siblings facing an ordinary day in their ordinary little burg...until a grand theft macguffin occurs and they decide to become unlikely heroes for cash and glory (in that order). This goes about as well as you’d expect.
Zwei: The Arges Adventure is a rpg, action and great soundtrack game
developed by Nihon Falcom
and published by XSEED Games, Marvelous USA and Inc..
Released on January 24th 2018 is available only on Windows
in 2 languages: English and Japanese.
It has received 438 reviews of which 357 were positive and 81 were negative resulting in a rating of 7.7 out of 10. 😊
The game is currently priced at 4.49€ on Steam and has a 70% discount.
The Steam community has classified Zwei: The Arges Adventure into these genres:
Media & Screenshots
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Requirements
These are the minimum specifications needed to play the game. For the best experience, we recommend that you verify them.
Windows
- OS *: Windows XP+
- Processor: 2GHz Single core CPU
- Memory: 1 GB RAM
- Graphics: 128 MB VRAM
- DirectX: Version 9.0c
- Storage: 3 GB available space
- Sound Card: Compatible with DirectX 9.0c
Reviews
Explore reviews from Steam users sharing their experiences and what they love about the game.
The oldest Falcom game available in English on Steam, from 2001. As such, you would expect it evokes 90s games even more than their entries from 3 years later. (Trails in the Sky and Gurumin) Combat is certainly very basic, with it really only having a basic attack you use the majority of the time. The mage is not very useful initially, but eventually the spells she gets can be preferrable at times (and swapping characters is very quick and easy). But likely you will use the melee attacker most of the time. Aside from that there is a mechanic where doing extended combos grants you a charge to do an ultimate attack. But that's basically as far as the combat goes. There is plenty of gear, including secret ones, that can be fun to mess around with though. To me, that's where most of the negativity ends though. The music is fantastic, with the option to toggle between the original and an arranged version from several years later. I preferred the arranged more overall, but the original does win out on some tracks. The hand drawn art design for this game has stood the test of time in a major way. It still looks magnificent. As far as I'm aware, the whole game can be played with controller or m+kb. The combat is probably better overall on controller, unless you can perfect click to move while also attacking. I couldnt, but the inventory management was a bit of a hassle on controller, so I ended up playing on m+kb with wasd to move. This proved sufficient for the whole game until I got to some of the challenging late game encounters. If I was smart, I would have played the game on controller and just grabbed the mouse when rearranging the inventory. The story is a relatively basic traditional video game story, but it has enough wrinkles to keep it interesting. One thing I noted is that it is more self-aware than Falcom's later works tend to be, and doesn't take itself seriously, even poking fun at itself. And that was certainly amusing and refreshing. The NPCs were pretty good. They update each story beat, in fairly standard Falcom fashion. Don't expect any grand story arcs from them, but their personalities were pretty interesting. Also of note, there are many items in the environment you can examine, and both main characters will display their own unique thoughts and flavor text depending on who is in the lead. I love Pokkle and Pipiro as deuteragonists. Their dynamic and the way they bounced off each other was very great. They kind of reminded me of if Estelle and Joshua had closer to a Swin and Nadia dynamic (for the Trails players who will get what I mean). I can see Pokkle's puns annoying some people, but it was honestly fun eyerolling at him. Early on, some of the puzzles were a bit terrible. With say no instructions and just a set of buttons or levers, and you just have to figure out the right combination with no idea what you are supposed to do. However, this pretty quickly stops being an issue, and the puzzles eventually grow to sometimes be these floor-spanning tasks or riddles, with actual hints on signs, sometimes with setpieces and unique individual stage mechanics. Now the biggest takeaway and positive of this game was some je-ne-sais-quoi. Even if the combat was nothing to write home about, somehow the dungeon crawling to me was fun. You never know when you're going to find some weird equipment or ability with a strange new effect. The charm was ever-present. The game was not handholdy in the slightest, but it wasn't too hard to figure out what you need to do if you talk to the NPCs. There was something in the exploration of this world, and the discovery of its inhabitants and items that was largely left up to you without a ton of guidance, that just gave me a joy that brought me back to the 90s. Is it a bit archaic? Maybe. Is it lacking many QoLs? Not really. I think it's worth a shot, especially with its new lower sale price these days.
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An incredibly unique little game oozing with the same charm as other Falcom games of their time. Beautiful artwork throughout. The levels were incredibly difficult to master. 100%ing this game is no joke and I actually had to abandon the mini-game related achievements, which is unheard of for me (just wasn't able to commit the time to mastering them). But that's where I found the majority of my enjoyment with it. Casual playthroughs likely won't experience the game on the same level. and because of that may not find the same level of appreciation I, however, very much enjoyed my time with Zwei!
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Zwei is such a wonderful little game. It's back at a time where companies really explored and tried more odd things. And while this 2001 action RPG is not pushing any boundaries, it's charming in it's own way while putting itself out there from Falcom's other mainstay titles: Ys and The Legend of Heroes. For one, the visuals are gorgeous. At first, I wasn't too big a fan of the character designs. But, over time, they grew on me as well. But everything else is so lush with life. The areas, visually, do feel distinct from one another. Though, my main issue is still with the characters. I find, especially with some in the village, they tend to bleed together a bit, making it hard to differentiate some of them. Luckily, if you want to see it that way, it's not with any of the characters which are mandatory for plot triggers. But, seeing as you'll be in the village often, I wish every character had a bit more flair. The music might be my favourite soundtrack, thus far, of the Falcom games I have played. This isn't to say Ys has some lesser soundtracks, but while all of them work quite well, some of the tracks don't harmonize well with the game as a whole. Some of the Ys games have amazing OSTs, but some of the songs make me struggle to identify where you are in a game. However, Zwei relies on it's soundtrack to breath life into all the areas you'll be going through. The story isn't anything to right home about, but I did find the writing charming. I do want to note that, if you don't like Pippiro (Female Protagonist), you really might not get into it. But, for me, she reminded me a lot of Threads of Fate. Namely, Mint, the female protagonist in that game. Both are abrasive, greedy, and really looking out for themselves. They do have their good moments, at times, but it always has this air of 'because it benefits my end goals', and I loved that about Mint. And I love that about Pippiro. Pokkle, her brother, is okay, but doesn't add all too much with his sister around. While this is a definite point of contention, I found the writing fun. Now, for the meat: gameplay. In all honesty, this is where Zwei will either turn people off or interest people. It's an action RPG, going through four main areas before unlocking additional zones later. While the visuals do change, it doesn't change the fact that the areas in these zones do start to blend together. There is a timing mechanic in the game, allowing for critical hits if your timing is good enough, but nothing ever stops you from just continuously attacking as the game goes on. Though critical hits are fairly important for bosses and tougher enemies as it does stun them, especially early game. On thing to note is how money is seemingly useless, as well as equipment, for most of the game. The money I used was saved early on for an expensive piece of equipment, but I never found myself wanting or really frustrated I didn't have any. In fact, I was drowning in money from not having spent nearly any in the game. This is also because equipment just doesn't matter all too much. While this might be pushing it as many to give buffs to some stats, many drop your attack, which I found myself rolling my eyes at. The best defense is a good offense, after all. But the biggest hurdle might be EXP. In traditional RPGs: kill a monster, you gain some experience. However, in Zwei, monsters don't have EXP. In fact, the only thing they do give is money and food. And when checking that food, you find out that eating your healing items gives you EXP. And that is, balancing when to level up, save your items until you have a bulk to make a better one, or saving them for actual healing; that is where this game's unique balance lies. While seemingly not too intricate, I did find the balance interesting enough. I was under leveled for a bulk of the game, but soon was on par with where the game said I should be. But it took a while for me to jump over that initial hurdle. In fact, it might stall people, I feel, who just can't get used to that balance all too well. Some smaller things I also want to note. The game does have a pet mechanic, but I didn't find it all too engaging. Mostly for getting some additional items, but nothing much else. I also found a couple of small issues. Namely, some triggers were a bit finicky and I had trouble getting them to trigger at times. Nothing all too gamebreaking, but it is something to note since it happened maybe two or three times. Lastly, this game does have some plot triggers. This could be quite easy enough or had me saying 'How was I supposed to know that?'. While a point of irritation, it certainly isn't the end of the world. Zwei is by far not a perfect game. However, for the price of $14.99, or less on sale, you truly find yourself with a wonderful, unique game Falcom through together. My first playthrough took around 12 hours, but could be done quicker if you pick the game up quite well. I would definitely recommend a look at this game and hope you found it as strange, fascinating, and adorable as I did.
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Last Updates
| Steam data | 23 November 2024 16:31 |
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| SteamSpy data | 19 December 2024 08:17 |
| Steam price | 25 December 2024 04:45 |
| Steam reviews | 23 December 2024 05:57 |
Online players
6
Developer
Nihon Falcom
Publisher
XSEED Games,
Marvelous USA, Inc.
Release
24 Jan 2018
Platforms