Velious II (Rolan's Curse 2) for Game Boy

Among the games in my action box I picked out one that looked interesting. I was sceptical at first because it looked like an RPG with lots of text -- and the text would be in Japanese  -- but I trusted my instincts and played along. What a fine little game it was.

I got stuck on the first of the big enemies in the game (aka "bosses"), but I looked up the game, and it turns out you can save at any time from the menu. Then start right where you died. I think that is brave from the developers because they have to make sure the game is good enough to make it challenging.

You walk around in an over head perspective, here in the graveyard course, and again I must compare with Zelda: Link's Awakning. However, in Velious II you don't have to solve any puzzles and you don't need to move back and forth. You can always move forward. That's good for me, who don't read Japanese.

You pick up other characters in the towns. Just talk to them and they'll join you. You can have a max of four characters, and after that you have to replace one of the older ones.

TP is a kind of secondary attack point. Each character has their primary attack and also a secondary attack.

 You level up your characters by taking chests that contain their heads, as in this picture. The trick is that each chest contains one particular head, but if you don't have that member in your party, you will only get a small life powerup. Levelling up makes the characters strong and gives him more HP, as usually in RPGs.

 Here is a map and you can save in one of two slots.

After you beat the last boss you'll see a picture with each party member and their specific ending scene.

The game isn't super hard, and doesn't require any grinding.  Some of the later Big Enemies (aka "bosses") take a couple of minutes to beat. They are usuaully not super hard, but take a lot of hits. You don't actually need to beat them though, except for the end boss. Beating the big enemies might change the ending for the character that has that quest. For example, the Vampire you see in pic two has his quest in the graveyard scene.

Which character that has which quest is well explained in the game, I suppose, but I don't have the American copy.

Some of the scenes are a bit like a maze. Not that I mind that. It can be tricky to navigate around the courses but none of the quests need to take more than 30 minutes to reach the big enemy.  I wouldn't say that there are any extremely difficult parts of the game. You do need to figure out how to beat the big enemies, as you would in any game. Either learn their pattern, or take a chance and stand close and beat them with your characters one after the other. 

The music is well composed and the graphic is excellent for this kind of game. For a game that you just pick up and play I think it is great. There might be a better ending available but that's hard for me to tell. Maybe if you complete all side quests,you get to see the credits. I didn't actually complete them all.

I couldn't read any of the story but still thought it was great. Someone might complain that the game is too short. But that's the limitation with the Game Boy, because the carts are small. It's still a pretty big adventure that will keep you occupied for at least 4-5 hours if you want to complate all quests. I rate the game 5/5.