You done me proud, Sonny.

10/23/2017

Here is Sonny, a turn-based RPG.
Sonny is a 'recent zombie', who apparently has the courtesy of maintaining his original human intelligence, but not his memory.
Resurrected by a rather kind blind casual man, Sonny goes into an adventure to find out what happened to him and who he is. (Sonny is not even his real name, it's simply how his friend calls him so)

If you are into Turn-Based RPGs, such as Sinjid, another game made by the same author, Krin, then this might be the game for you.

You have the option of choosing 4 classes;
Destroyer, Strength-oriented class that can be good for both offense and defense.
Guardian, pretty much a jack-of-all-trades that can be good with both melee and magic.
Assassin, great at being quick to kill, but weak in health.
Gunslinger, masterful with Magic, poor with melee and defense.

Sadly, if you're looking for total uniqueness, these won't offer you. Sure, they get their own stat upgrades (Guardian is good with all stats except speed, so he won't be an outstanding class in comparison to Destroyer, who is better with strength so his magic is never if ever raised) and also their own inventory that they can acquire, but that's pretty much it.

The abilities in Sonny are the same for all classes, but which is best depends mostly on their skills and combat situation.
Each time you level up, you will gain one point in abilities and skills, use it wisely.

Gameplay for this game is very good, but not the best.
Since it is turn-based, you must make sure by turns to kill your enemy before he kills you. You have many ways to deal with an enemy in the rounds.
You can use up to 8 abilities that will give different (sometimes similar) effects for each class. Most (nearly all) of them rely on Focus, which you also get a bunch of ways to regenerate it, but it's mostly precious, so you best try to conserve it.

As said before, nearly all the abilities are different from eachother. Some give an effect that is the same (Such as "Break" and "Shatter Bolt") but they are either better for another class due to the stats different (For example, "Break" is great for melee classes while "Shatter Bolt" is better for magic classes), better for a different situation (For example, "Heroic Motivation" might be better, even if you don't have much Strength or Magic because it dispels a negative effect on you or your teammate, compared to "Reform" which only heals you and doesn't remove any negative buffs and besides it is only best used on melee classes since it has no stats on Magic for it).
The only best abilities are, if not obvious, situational. There will be times where stunning is better than doing heavy damage.

All the enemies are unique, but you can easily learn them, their abilities, their stats and even their behaviour (for example, does "Frost Zombie" go frenzy whenever he gets hit? Is it random? etc). Some of the enemies may have unique abilities that you can't use, this is especially true on later stages.

There is a "Team" system, which you get it in Stage 2 after you find Veradux.
Sadly enough, the system is very flawed; Whichever 'tactic' you choose for them, chances are you'll think "How stupid are they?!", because there are times when Veradux, at 50 Focus but only 10% of his health, should have healed himself yet he goes ahead and stabs an enemy with Subversion (meaning damage gives HP instead).

There are times where you have to grind so you can level up.
Sometimes, the game can be so luck-based that when you do a special ability that is very necessary (such as one that heavily hurts an enemy), you will probably miss.

I do like the Graphics in this game. It's pretty much a semi-grindy retro, you will see details out of shadowy edges but that's it, you won't exactly see well-detailed eyes, noses or the like.
The animations made for it are a bit basic, but I kinda like the style of it. I don't think it makes it "classic" but rather very mechanical, as if transmitting that the whole premise of this game is about how trite it is. After all, the whole concept is about how trite it is to always fight zombies and never be part of them.
What's weird though is the environment, that is the locations. You start from White November, a research ship that has been recently (at least seems so) been invaded by the zombie infection, then you travel to "Ishiguro's Rest", a haunted beach.
A beach, alright, that sounds fine, but why haunted? And why is it haunted with ASIAN-themed ghosts?
You then travel to the Great Plains, in there you'll meet a bunch of shamans that seem to be taken from a very bad Wild Western movie or so. Yep, Native Americans.
The only explanation would be that this game does not rely on real-life places, at all. I don't really like it, it is immersive though in a way that from a ship you get into a beach, but then the beach is haunted by Asian-themed ghosts and the whole Great Plains just scream "America" especially with those Native American-influenced shamans.
(Do be wary that the reason these exist is explained in the story, I am only disliking how sudden all these changes are)

As for Sound, Sonny is one of the very few old Flash Games that have voice acting. I do think the voice acting is actually nice, but not exactly too 'immersive', but still good enough.
I like the sounds used, they may be generic but they sound nice and that's all that matters.
The Music used in Sonny is also rather wonderful, even though not varied. In the stage selection menu, you will either get one that plays a guitar and some background relaxing electro sounds or one where it's more electric and then ends with being a bit up-beat, but still not enough to be fit for a typical combat.
It gives a feel of wanting to take a rest, but you can't because you must figure out what happened and who you are.
The combat music though, well, it's kinda boring (but not so shitty you want to disable it) unless you're fighting a boss, now that one is kinda cool.

Overall, this is a game that you should try for sure if you're into turn-based RPGs. Even if you're not into it but want to try it as a first-timer, it may be worth a try.

In case you want to know about the story...SMALL SPOILERS AHEAD.
The world is coming to an insane end. Everything is now a dystopia, with technological advances being into making fantasy-oriented medieval/pre-wars as well as supernatural happenings all over around.
But the worst are the zombies. There is a 'zombie apocalypse' going on which everybody has found out. Attempts at trying to contain it have been made, with ZPCI being the leader of it. Yet to contain it is not the only option, there are also many researches going on about making a cure for it.
But here is what's sinister; ZPCI is a private company, they get paid for doing anything zombie-related. Why would they have any benefits from having a cure?
For this reason, the ZPCI not only hunt zombies but also anybody who is related to zombies, especially if they are looking for a cure.

The story beings with Sonny, a recently-resurrected zombie who retains his human intelligence, yet has no memory as to who he is or what happened.
His resurrector and friend, Louis, helps him get out of White November, a research ship from where Sonny was resurrected.
When they fight through the now-zombie-infested ship, they get ambushed by the ZPCI, Louis dies while Sonny kills them all out of revenge.
Louis, on his last moments, gives Sonny a tape that 'has all the answers'.

Sonny goes on a quest to find out how to unlock this tape.

Physical Qualities
Gameplay
Replayability
Hack Power
Overall Rating