Tales of Aravorn: Seasons of the Wolf from Ratalaika Games and Winter Wolves Games adds a ton of RPG elements to a colorful fantasy visual novel experience. Check our Tales of Aravorn: Seasons of the Wolf review!

 

Tales of Aravorn: Seasons of the Wolf from Ratalaika Games and Winter Wolves adds a ton of RPG elements to a colorful fantasy visual novel experience. The game can be played in one of five difficulty settings: Easy, Normal, Hard, Nightmare, and Visual Novel Mode. Easy makes everything a lot simpler to manage. Normal offers the standard balanced experience. Hard dials up the challenge and is perfect for those of you with experience with RPGs. Nightmare will give you exactly what you expect, so you’ll need to be ready! The last option, Visual Novel Mode, will do just what its name suggests, so you’ll automatically skip all battles in the game.

After this, you’ll first select the character you’ll control between the twin characters: Shea and Althea. After that, you can pick the class for each of the two characters between Ranger, Hunter, and Druid. Rangers are versatile, and though warriors that can use two-handed weapons, dual wield two weapons, or use a weapon with a shield, while also being able to use bows. Hunters are deadly and excel when fighting from a distance on the back row by using ranged weapons to deal elemental damage. Druids are powerful spellcasters who can cast defensive spells as well as offensive spells that can deal a ton of damage.

Once you’re done with that, the next step will be to choose each character’s attributes by distributing attribute points to boost them. The starting values will be determined by the class you select for each character, and you’ll then be able to improve their Constitution, Will, Strength, Skill, Agility, and Arcane values. You can see how each point you assign will affect a character’s hit points, skill and spell points, attack, defense, speed, and magic so that you can make the right choice to balance your party.

 

The next choice to make will be for each character’s trait, which is determined by an event that took place earlier in their life. After that, you will be able to select the twins’ starting skill out of the twelve on offer. Once you start playing, you’ll learn a new skill for every two levels you gain, up to level 6. After that, a new skill will unlock every 3 levels. In the case of the Druid, these skills include, for example, Nature’s Touch, which will heal a single target by 50% of its total HP and allies on the side by 25%, or Ice Spike, which hits a single target with water damage for 300% of the caster’s base attack while causing a Frozen condition for up to 3 turns.

As you progress through the game, you’ll be assigned quests that you must complete to move the story forward. You’ll also be rewarded for completing said quests. As to not spoil things, the first quest in the game will be to go to the village of Ninin to seek the help of Shagala, the healer, so that you can save your father. Complete this, and you’ll be rewarded with 100 experience points. The second story quest will require you to hunt a polar bear that is near the abandoned mining area, and you’ll have to kill a polar bear or capture a live polar bear cub.

There are also sidequests for you to take on, and they will vary from season to season. Between plot events, you are free to explore the map as you please so that you can take on said sidequests, visit the healer or other merchants to spend your coins on better equipment and items. Once you go back home, you’ll get to heal your wounds, and time will move on by one day. You can check how many days there are left until the next plot event by checking the upper left corner of the screen.

 

As for battles, when you enter one, you’ll get to see your enemies, as well as the battle info that you need to consider. This will establish how many party members can be in the battle, which ones have to be in the group for story purposes, and the battle type. This is important since it will affect the action. Say that it’s a hot battle type due to the weather. That means that fire spells and attacks will deal more damage! Pay attention to the enemies in the battle, and set your party members to the front or back rows as needed.

Once the fight begins, you’ll attack by selecting enemies or use useful abilities by selecting allies as targets. You could, for example, unleash a melee attack or maybe use a magic bolt to deal some magical damage. You can also use an item or decide to defend to lower any potential damage. Pay attention to the order in which each character will take their turn so that you can plan accordingly and counter what your enemies will throw at you. Once you deplete the HP of all enemies, the victory screen will let you know how many experience points you’ve earned, how much gold, and if any items have been looted.

All of the gold you earn can be used to purchase new weapons, armor, accessories, and items for your party members so that you can increase their stats and improve their odds of survival. You can also sell the stuff in your inventory that you no longer need so that you can gain more gold to keep the cycle going. Pay attention to the wares sold by each merchant, and be sure to stack up on useful items such as the Scroll of Major Restoration, which allows a mage to resurrect a knocked-out character and heal some of its wounds, or the Medium Explosive Bomb for a thief which does 50 points of damage to a single target.

 

Trophy-wise, the game includes a full trophy guide with a Platinum trophy for you to add to your collection. Since the game is a Cross-Buy title, you’ll get both the PlayStation 4 and the PlayStation 5 versions of the game. The list is split into 6 Bronze trophies, 5 Silver trophies, and 9 Gold trophies. There are no missable trophies on this list since you’ll only be required to play through the game as the trophies pop when you begin 20 chapters in the game. You can speed things up by checking out this Tales of Aravorn: Seasons of the Wolf Trophy Guide.

Tales of Aravorn: Seasons of the Wolf is a fun visual novel with a ton of RPG elements to enjoy. As you level up and add new party members to your group, unlock new abilities and purchase better equipment, you’ll progress through an entertaining story and take on a ton of turn-based battles. The game is Cross-Buy, so you’ll get both the PlayStation 4 and the PlayStation 5 versions of the game with your purchase, and each one will have its own Platinum trophy. Tales of Aravorn: Seasons of the Wolf is available for a $19.99 asking price.

Disclaimer
This Tales of Aravorn: Seasons of the Wolf review is based on a PlayStation 5 copy provided by Ratalaika Games.