Enjoyable fantasy RPG
As the name suggests, this is a fantasy RPG that follows on from its predecessors and while it makes for an entertaining enough quest for genre fans, its lack of originality does prevent it from being in the same class as classics like The Bard's Tale, or Ultima. It's worth playing the previous games in the series, as the plot does continue directly on from Yendorian Tales Book 1 and 2 and features a storyline revolving around standard fantasy cliches of wizards, magical items and epic journeys to save the land from doom. Gameplay-wise, this will also be highly familiar to anyone who's ever played an RPG before, with players creating their party of characters from a selection of classes, each with abilities and weapons unique to them, including magic and support skills, with standards like combat sitting alongside repair, survival and mapping. Exploration is conducted via a third-person perspective, with combat playing out in real-time in a fashion akin to the Eye of the Beholder series. Yendorian Tales really is very much a standard fantasy RPG, with all the things you would expect from the genre, but doesn't suffer overly from this sense of familiarity and is actually an enjoyable enough adventure which provides a fair amount of challenge. The graphics are fairly decent for the game's age, with some nicely detailed environments and characters and which help to create a strong atmosphere. The story, while lacking in originality, is compelling enough with some twists and turns to keep you guessing and overall, this is worth a look for genre fans.
