In the land of Gallowmere there was a great legend in where Sir Daniel Fortesque lead the King’s army into battle against the evil necromancer, Zarok and his army of the undead. In the end, Sir Fortesque is mortally wounded in the eye, but ultimately kills Zarok. So told by the King himself…

In the year 1386, Zarok returns to exact his revenge against Gallowmere. With all the spell he cast, one happens to bring Sir Daniel back to life. As it happens to be Dan actually died by the first stray arrow in the charge with it landing into his left eye. His army had won still drove off Zarok and they even killed his champion, but didn’t actually kill Zarok.

Now, it is Fortesque’s chance to redeem himself and live up to his own legend. As Fortesque, you must travel through 20 treacherous levels through graveyards, forests, a ghost ship, and finally to Zarok’s Lair.

Medievil is what I would classify as a action/adventure platformer. You use either the directional pad or analog stick to guide Sir Fortesque through a level. The control is a bit loose but not awful. If you only press the D-pad, he takes a brisk walk. If you double tap the D-pad he starts running as fast as his bones can carry him and his armor. By default the X button does your basic attacks, which is admittedly odd. To be fair, this game was made by Sony of Europe. The triangle button is your block button for when you have a shield equipped. You can hold the button to continuously block until the shield breaks, tanking all the damage in the process. Later on when you get the only character upgrade in the game, pressing the shield button whilst running will cause Dan to the the Daring Dash, making some sections easier to do depending on how you use it. The square button does a special attack for some weapons, if you hold the button for a bit. The circle button jumps allowing you to indeed jump across gaps for skeletons can’t swim. Finally, the L2 and R2 buttons rotate your camera. Dan himself only gets 300 HP (hit points) when you start. Through out the game you will collect life bottles which will automatically refill Dan’s health upon death like a fairy in a bottle in a Legend of Zelda game. In the game, Dan will get an entire of arsenal of weapons to use at his disposal. From things such as swords, a club or hammer, throwing knives, a crossbow, spears, lightening, a longbow with 3 different arrow types,  Dragon Armor that let’s him breathe fire and not be affected by fire, an enchanted drumstick that turns enemies into health when thrown, a battle axe that can be thrown like a boomerang, and Lightening that will only be used in the final boss battle to heal allies. You might wonder if it sucks trying to shoot projectiles, fear not if you think so because Daniel brought a little friend. A little green light that follows Daniel around locks onto targets automatically when a projectile based weapon is equipped. The game is populated with enemies to kill with the objective to get to the end. Why do they have enemies you can run past when you have to reach only the end? Why to get all the weapons Fortesque can grab. In each level, except for Zarok’s Lair and Dan’s Crypt, you can obtain a chalice to go to The Hall of Heroes. Once inside, you can walk up to the statue of a true warrior and he/she can either give you a weapon or money/life bottle/health. You can only do this once per chalice so there are 20 of them to collect. If you collect them all you get an extra cutscene and Dan get’s a statue of himself in the Hall.

Medievil is rather much inspired by Tim Burton’s macabre visual style. The music accompanying the art is something to behold because it sounds like something that came out of a Burton film as well. Despite the game’s age, the graphics are still quite nice. Adding more enjoyment to the experience is the voice acting. It’s not awful, but rather ham-filled. It adds on to the comedic and brilliant writing the entirety of the game holds.

In my eyes (that haven’t taken an arrow), the game is great and it comes recommended to those who like gothic horror and a good challenge. For those who wish to seek this cult classic out for themselves, the game has physical copies for the Playstation 1 that go for cheap. If you aren’t retro-savvy and have a PS3, then you can buy the game off the Playstation Network Store for cheap.

Have a chilling and thrilling Hallow’s Eve, dear reader.