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| Paintverse - Into the Spirit Realm | |
| Developer(s) | Dreams Inc. |
| Publisher(s) | Dreams Inc. |
| Platform(s) | Starry Skies |
| Genre(s) | Action/Beat 'em Up/Platformer/Adventure |
| Series | Paintverse |
| Predecessor | Paintverse - Just the start! |
| Successor | Paintverse - Abstract Void |
| Release Date(s) | October 21, 2019 |
| Mode(s) | Single Player |
Paintverse - Into the Spirit Realm is the sequel to Paintverse - Just the start! made by Dreams Inc, the game was released for the Starry Skies in 2019 after a port of the original for the Starry Skies in 2017.
Story
Unlike the first game, the story is separated in multiple chapters.
Prologue - Rewind x2
The game starts with a recap of the events of the first game, the lord of the demons Spightmare returns from the dead after being supposedly killed in a war ages ago in the mystical planet of "Artizz" located in the galaxy of "Paintverse", however, a young Artizzian girl named "Pincelle" starts a rebellion just like her ancestor against Spightmare ages ago, while the rebellion sparks hope within the citizens the leader, Pincelle, eventually is caught and trapped inside an ancient relic known as the Paintbrush of All Souls with Spightmare's power as a form of irony, since the relic was once used to take down an ancient demon and save the people, however before being completely trapped she sends a portal through universes for a hero to save the world.
However, the signal, in the form of an orb starts glitching out and instead returns to the same universe where it was sent from, but instead to another planet galaxies away, Earth, where a young boy known as "Sketch Villiar" touches it and is teleported to Paintverse, where Pincelle, thinking he's the hero brought upon by her signal helps him fight and finally seal Lord Spightmare inside the core of Artizz. After Spightmare is sealed and everybody celebrates, Sketch finds out that the signal that sent Sketch into Paintverse in the first place now manifests itself in the form of a portal that can be summoned by him whenever he wants and can be used to travel between Earth and Paintverse, however as time goes on he starts coming less and less until he's not seen in Artizz again for a year.
After the short recap, the game rewinds to very early times in Artizz, where it shows a group of people wearing dark blue robes with hoods covering their faces chanting what sounds like gibberish before a portal appears before their eyes and they all smile as they see a strange dark realm through the portal filled with glowing crystals and ghost-looking creatures who fly around and play in peace, when they notice the portal they start waving at the group of people, who start moving their hands around and make some of them go through the portal, as they fly around the room and squeak, a man with a beard starts grinning and grips his hand tightly while a dark blue flame appears in it and engulfs a nearby ghost, allowing the man to control the ghost, the rest of the people in hooded robes signal him to stop as he starts chuckling and making the ghost push around the other ghosts until a woman with blue hair outright tells him to stop, making him groan as he releases the ghost he was controlling, the others say that it was a nice "session" and make plans to do another soon enough.
After the session, some of the people wearing hooded robes call the man with a beard and scold him for forcefully taking control of the ghost, saying that "the spirits must not be controlled against their will" and that in order to master the art of "spiriteering" he must learn to commune with the spirits and act as one, before they can continue the blue-haird woman tells them that she'll make sure that he doesn't repeat the incident again, in the process calling the man with a beard "Frederick", Frederick thanks the woman, calling her "Farleem" as she tells him to never do that again, as it's wrong, and that she knows he's been doing it behind the backs of the "Spiriteers".
Frederick apologizes and asks if Farleem can do something so that Frederick doesn't have to participate in the next session, as he's been leaving his "royal duties" a lot to go to the sessions and if the rest of the family finds out he won't be allowed to become king, revealing Frederick's status, Farleem says that she'll see what she can do and Frederick leaves to his room in the castle, where he turns on the lights and says hello to his "spider friends" as a massive amount of spiders fall down from the ceiling and crawl up Frederick, who creates another portal on his own to look at the realm with the ghost-like creatures but instead focuses on an even darker area hidden behind a gigantic wall made out of crystal where darker-looking ghosts and deformed monsters live, the prologue ends with Frederick chuckling and talking to the spiders, saying "isn't Hell just wonderful?"
Chapter 1 - The Same Old Story
One year after the events of Paintverse and Sketch is living happily on Earth, having completely forgotten that he can still travel between Paintverse and Earth, however, one day while in his room he feels a strong headache, he tries to walk out of his room to find some pills but quickly falls to the floor as images of demons attacking Artizz and the same ghost-like creatures from the prologue flash by his head and the words "TROUBLE, DANGER, COME BACK" are embedded in his head, the pain and shock causes him to trigger the portal to go into Paintverse, he thinks that it's a signal from Pincelle calling him for help so he goes in the portal and finds that Artizz is perfectly fine, the citizens guide him to the castle where he meets with the princess of the country of Crayleeon, "Princess Kayla".
Princess Kayla tells him that she's happy to see him back but that she's confused as to why he came so suddenly, Sketch responds by saying that he thinks that Pincelle called him somehow but Pincelle walks on the scene in her Artizzian form, having been freed from the Paintbrush of All Souls during the one year in between the two games, and reveals that she didn't send any message to him and that Artizz hasn't had any major demon attacks since one year, Sketch talks to both about what he saw before entering the portal and Kayla thinks that he should go see a doctor, which he does but finds out that there's nothing wrong with him.
Since he's already in Artizz Sketch decides to hang around the main plaza for a while but he keeps getting sudden flashbacks to the strange images, with each time a growl growing louder inside his head until the images finally stop, however, he hears the same growl one last time, seemingly behind him, he turns around and sees that the growl comes from a Hellhorse being ridden by a demon, who uses an airhorn to call an army of more demons in Hellhorses, knocking Sketch down to the ground and destroying the plaza until Pincelle comes and knocks out the demon and scares off the Hellhorse, freeing Sketch as she tells him to try and fight on his own, after a brief tutorial on meelee combat, Sketch, with the help of Pincelle and later Seraphina takes out all of the demons in the plaza as Sketch realizes his premonition was true and runs to warn the princess.
When Sketch arrives at the castle he finds that the castle is already being attacked by a swarm of demons but that the princess and royal guards are fighting them off pretty well, Sketch warns the princess about the massive scale of the attack but is interrupted when a group of powerful demons burst into the room carrying a throne with a cloaked demon resembling a minotaur, the minotaur demon introduces himself as "Pyrrioss" and says that he has come to finally take over Artizz and all of Paintverse to fullfill his now deceased master's will, Kayla realizes that he's talking about Spightmare and tries fighting him but the demons easily overpower her, take her crown and give it to Pyrrioss who puts it on before creating a powerful gust of wind which blows Sketch away and against a wall so hard that it ends up knocking him out.
Once Sketch wakes up he finds that the castle is in ruins and is quickly rescued by the royal guards who take him to the new "Crayleeon Bunker" built in the remnants of the Homeless Hideout, a hideout for the homeless to rest and socialize in ancient times, there Sketch is sent with Prof. Sanster, who has modified the Paintbrush of All Souls, allowing Pincelle to enter and leave at will to power up the Paintbrush of All Souls, Pincelle and Sketch decide to team up once more and go to the first location is an underwater base nearby "Canvas Docks", Sketch suits up and leaves to the area.
Sketch and Pincelle arrive at the docks and find many demon carriages trying to escape with tons of container crates, Sketch stop some of the carriages and open the container crates to see what's inside, finding Artizzian hostages and some blue glowing crystals which the hostages seem to know nothing about, they wonder what the purpose of the crystals is before they're suddenly ambushed by two cloaked demons who introduce themselves as Pyrrioss' most trusted henchmen, "Acala" and "Song", who block all exits with explosives and call in a gigantic swarm of demons before running away.
After navigating their way through the, because of the container crates, maze-like docks, rescuing hostages and collecting the crystals, they find a hole demons seem to be coming out of in the middle of the docks and jump in, leading them to slide-like clear pipes that take them into an underwater base made out of glass-like domes.
The duo starts exploring the area and overhear a conversation between a woman and another demon about how they must find as many crystals as they can, as they are very important, Sketch bursts in but finds that the woman is gone, however, the other demon is still there, so he takes the chance to interrogate him about the crystals, to which e responds by saying that they're the one thing that's restraining Hell from the rest of Paintverse, and that they're collecting them for a project called "Project Krustallos" which has the objective of fully destroying the barrier separating Paintverse and Hell, allowing a full-on attack, in the process calling the crystals "Bright Crystals".
TBA
Gameplay
The game is similar to the original's system, in which you traverse through lands and fight enemies in a somewhat simple Beat 'em Up-like combat system with pretend RPG elements, however many elements are made more complex, the new features include:
Areas and Bright Crystal Shards
Instead of a simple level-to-level system like in the first game and in Paintverse - Seraphina, the game uses an "Area" system, you can warp to different Areas which work as big worlds to explore and complete missions, similarly to games such as Super Mario 64 but slightly more non-linear, some areas are interconnected with each other but most are far apart, however you can connect areas together in order to make going from area to area slightly easier.
The main reason to explore areas is to find "Bright Crystal Shards", each Area has a certain amount of Bright Crystal Shards which must be collected to reform a Bright Crystal, though you don't need to find all of the Bright Crystal Shards in every Area in order to win the game, they can be collected for 100% completion or just for fun, Bright Crystal Shards can be found hidden in specific parts of Areas, be given as rewards for completing tasks or be found by completing special missions.
Combat System
Types
The Combat System is probably the biggest overhaul, while it remains very similar to the original in many aspects, it's been heavily expanded with new combos, abilities and probably the biggest change: "Types", there are 3 Types in the game, these 3 Types are all used by Sketch, who can switch between each Type with the simple press of a button:
- Hand-to-Hand Type: The first Type the player learns, Hand-to-Hand involves the use punches and kicks, which can be done in chain with more ease without the weight of carrying a weapon. Sketch can also "Weave" while in Hand-to-Hand Type to switch his weight and move his body either left, right or back to dodge attacks and strike in open spots.
- Close-Range Weapon Type: The second Type the player learns, Close-Range W. Type involves the use of, well, a close-range weapon, like a club or a blade. Sketch, in this Type, wields Pincelle as a mix of both, as he swings it like a sword but in many combo finishers and heavy attacks he swings it like a club, while Sketch is in this type he can "Parry" to counter attacks and stun the opponent, leaving him defenseless.
- Projectile Weapon Type: The third Type the player learns, shortly after Close-Range W. Type, Projectile Weapon Type is exactly what the name implies, Sketch wields Pincelle as a gun and can fire multiple different elemental blasts in different ways, as well as squirt paint to paint surroundings and create puddles for enemies to slip on or traps such as puddles of electric paint to shock foes.
Rapidly switching between Types to create even bigger combos is the key to mastering Paintverse - Into the Spirit Realm's Combat System.
POW Bar
Each character in the game has a POW Bar, a small gauge divided in 3 halves, every time they take damage the POW Bar rises a little, once an entire half is filled it can either be spent on a temporary massive boost on Speed, Attack and Defense, a health refill, or an energy blasts shot directly in the direction the player is facing that does small damage but pushes enemies back and stuns them. The amount of halves you have filled up change the power of the boosts, the range of the energy blast and the amount of health refilled, however if you fill it all you can also waste it all for a super powerful attack to take out tons of enemies, this super powerful attack is known as a "POWverload" and while you only start with one, as you go along you gain more and more POWverload attacks.
Platforming and Sprinting
The platforming aspect in this game is upgraded a lot, not only giving you new moves such as the "Paint Hook" to swing from platform to platform and catch platforms too high for you, but also giving you the ability to "Sprint" to make higher jumps and reach more areas, Sprinting is an ability that can be performed by holding down a button while running, Sketch will run way faster than usual and after a while he'll gain so much momentum he'll still sprint without having to hold down the Sprint button, however he has way worse traction and if he hits a wall head on he will be stunned for a bit.
Sprinting also allows you to perform another technique, "Wall Kicking", if you're Sprinting at high speeds and you jump to a wall/platform besides you, you will kick off the wall and bounce off to the opposide site with even more momentum while gaining a bit of extra height, if you land on an enemy that isn't a Mid-Boss/Boss after a Wall Kick you'll perform a "Trickster Bounce" in which your character bounces on the enemy's head to gain more momentum and even more height, even throwing weaker enemies down to the ground and stunning them.
Multiple Playable Characters
As opposed to the first game where only Sketch was playable, in this game you unlock other playable characters as you go along, unlike Sketch these characters cannot switch between Types and are stuck to specific Types, however, they excel at these Types and have a lot of techniques Sketch doesn't have. After entering an area once you have a selected a playable character you can't change your character until you find one of the Safe Zones in the Area where you can switch between characters.
Exporbes, Force Fountains, Skills and Skill Limits
If you defeat a lot of enemies they may start dropping "Exporbes", tiny glowing orbs that can be cashed in the main "Force Fountain" in the Burushia Main Plaza or in any "Safe Zone" to obain Exp. Points which can be either saved up or spent at any time to upgrade a character's stats, which are Speed, Defense, Attack and "Charge". Speed, Attack and Defense are self-explanatory and Charge is how long charged attacks take to charge, the more Charge you have the less time they take to charge.
Every character in the game has an "Skill Limit", a limit on how many "Skills" you can equip to yourself, Skills are dropped by enemies, bought throughout the game, crafted or be given as rewards for completing tasks, these Skills include things such as increasing the damage certain attacks do, decreasing the amount of knockbacks your attacks do to make more combos, increasing your health and more, your Skill Limit can be upgraded by defeating enemies.
Inventory, and Bellador
Every character has an Inventory Limit, technically you can bring as many items as you want but if you exceed the amount of weight your bag can hold your character will be wore down and his speed will decrease, that's why throughout the game you can do things to increase your Inventory Limit, though the main method is to put items that your bag can't hold on your "Item Storage System", which you can access at any time in the main hub or in any Safe Zone, similarly, you have a "Private Virtual Bellador Bank" to store "Belladors", which are the game's main currency used for buying items, since every time you are defeated you lose a certain amount of money.
Safe Zones and Beacon Spots
Throughout Areas you might find Safe Zones, small enclosed areas with a pod which you can enter and check a computer to switch playable characters, check your progress, withdraw and deposit items from your in your Item Storage System, cash in Exporbes at the Force Fountain and even get out your Private Virtual Bellador Bank at any time.
Meanwhile, Beacon Spots work more like Checkpoints in a way, once you activate them you can choose to warp to that spot instantly and save time, however to activate a Beacon Spot you need to pay Mitch a certain amount of Bellador or use up special "Mitch Coupons" that can be dropped by enemies randomly or can be obtained by doing special tasks for him.
