The Seven Deadly Sins: Knights of Britannia

Before we launch into our review, let's give you a bit of background. In The Seven Deadly Sins: Knights of Britannia, Princess Elizabeth is searching for the Seven Deadly Sins in order to save her kingdom. These supernatural fighters once served her empire, but they've become victims of a conspiratorial plot and have been considered criminals ever since. On the other side of the public's perception, we find the Holy Knights who oppress the Kingdom of Liones and the entire region of Britannia with their evil doings. Inspired by the young maiden's desire for justice we set out to unite the rebels to put an end to this regime, and it's here in the story that we find ourselves.

The new game from Bandai Namco and Natsume Atari manages to deliver the basics of this straightforward entanglement quite well, as it combines the successful manga novel template with nimble brawler gameplay, and so it reminds us a lot of the Naruto: Ultimate Ninja series. The story of The Seven Deadly Sins: Knights of Britannia bounces back and forth between different characters and locations while trying to maintain a chronological order for the most part, and the main missions are based on the battles of the original story, so whenever someone is rampaging it's guaranteed we'll take over, regardless of who fought when and why.

The Seven Deadly Sins: Knights of Britannia is a classic 3D brawler which looks cluttered at first glance, only to reveal its depth later on. In the story mode we regularly battle against hordes of the same enemies while alternatively duelling with the many different heroes and villains of the story every once in a while, and in the latter stages we even battle colossal enemies. The fact that the combat system allows for all of these challenges would imply that it has an extremely strong backbone, but unfortunately, this isn't always the case.

Light and heavy attacks keep areas in front of us clear while we engage enemies from a distance with ranged attacks, and an important part of these fights is the use of spells which can be used with the right bumper and the respective action button. These devour a part of the magic bar, which refills very slowly over time and is needed for many of the more advanced tactics. Just as crucial is the targeting system which helps our attacks find their targets (because verticality plays a major role in the clashes), and there's also a character-specific ability that causes enormous damage and is initiated with a small atmospheric video sequence. The controls are pleasantly grounded overall, not too overcharged, and because every character shares a similar scheme it's easy to switch between them.

In adventure mode, we often find ourselves with our hero Meliodas, the Dragon Sin of Wrath. This childish blond boy is the leader of the mighty Deadly Sin rebels and shares similarities with straw hat captain Monkey D. Luffy from One Piece, especially with his funny chatter. Developer Natsume was solely focused on re-enacting the main fights, something that can't be said about the narrative aspect of the game though, as between the beatings we have to read through text blocks that fail to reflect the detail and identity of the manga. The game tries to summarise the most important details but it doesn't shine in any particular area, and we doubt this oversimplification will add any kind of value to fans of the series.

Side stories are separated from the main narrative and they take place in various locations found on the world map, and if we want to play through a particular confrontation, we have to make sure we've already unlocked the mission before finding it on the world map and moving our tavern pig avatar to that location. Moving across the world map is a frustrating part of the Seven Deadly Sins experience, however, and once you've moved between two areas on the map of Britannia with your slow-paced Boar Hat (that the name of the portable bar that Melodias calls home), you'll see what we mean.

Progress in The Seven Deadly Sins: Knights of Britannia is made by investigating hearsay and collecting rumours (i.e. unlocking new side missions). Natsume Atari has devised a gameplay loop that rewards us with steady character development because the completion of battles leads to new rumours, which in turn unlocks missions and eventually items. Each side quest rewards us with a particular item that can be placed on a magic ability board in the Boar Hat, which increases the strength of our talents in upcoming battles. These assignments don't necessarily progress the various side stories though, as they also lead to challenging encounters instead.

Unfortunately, the transformation doesn't feel organic. Although some of the abilities' passive bonuses are pretty strong, everything can, fortunately, be completed without it. Higher tier abilities are held back by a simple skill tree system, which isn't great compensation for the fact that the side missions don't unlock in the correct order, and can even block your progress completely if you overlook a certain mission (which holds an irreplaceable reward) early on. At least you're able to learn which missions you have to complete to get a much-needed item, although this kills the flow of the game.

The worst missions in Knights of Britannia are the fetch quests, in which we take control of Elizabeth. Her goal is to make herself useful and she, therefore, enters dangerous environments to collect luminous objects on the ground with the help of an AI teammate. The issue here is that you can't defend yourself as her character and rely completely on the computer to secure your surroundings since you'll die after just a few hits, which causes the mission to restart. These fetch quests are optional but, as mentioned before, they're bound to your progression in the upgrade menu. Naturally, the sense that you'll need to complete these in order to progress properly adds to the frustration.

The Seven Deadly Sins: Knights of Britannia also offers an arcade mode for fighting against the computer or other players, although characters, stages, and costumes have to be unlocked in the campaign first. While this does offer some variety, it doesn't hide the fact that the game is flawed in a lot of other ways, as a confusingly fragmented story is presented by emotionless puppets who can't possibly match the quality and warmth of the manga/anime. Nevertheless, the title managed to pick us up at times, which must speak to the strength of the IP. The obvious weaknesses in storytelling and production would be acceptable if the game itself had experienced some love, but as it stands, Bandai Namco will probably break the hearts of a few hardcore fans looking to pick this up.