This past week at E3, we were able to sit down with the most recent entry in the indie series, Trine, and get some hands on game play and sit down with Trine 4: The Nightmare Prince. Published by Modus and developed by Frozenbyte, Trine 4 is shaping up to be a worth addition to this indie darling platform puzzle series.
Continuing on with the series known puzzle platform gameplay, Trine 4 continues on with the tight controls and interesting abilities of the three main characters, which the player can switch between at any time.
There are new abilities for all three characters, allowing all three characters to not only participate in the puzzle aspects of the game, but to also play a role in the combat sections in each stage.
During the hands on portion of our preview, we were able to take on the role of the Knight by himself as he entered a cursed castle. Using his shield and down smash attacks, we had to make our way through the castle to the eventual boss fight.
During the boss, not only did you have to attack him to lower his health, but you had to use your various abilities to allow the sun to shine through the boss’ room to weaken him. Some of the areas that would allow the light to shine were hidden, so even during boss battles, puzzle mechanics also appear.
We were also treated to a sit down section for the game, where the developers showed off three different stages for the upcoming game and each of these stages were absolutely gorgeous.
Perhaps my favorite of the stages was the one based off the autumn season. In this section of the game, we came across a bear that needed help. After helping the poor creature out, he continued to follow us throughout the stage, rolling about to different sections.
Even in the demo build, there were plenty of secrets to find, some of which requiring the use of each of the characters to find out how to reach the hidden section. With a lot of the puzzles and stage designs, water and light were playing a large role.
Puzzles made the player grow various plants or use light to burn their way through obstacles. Probably the most unique thing about all this, is the fact that when playing in multiplayer mode, some of the puzzles will change, asking different actions from each of the players.
Don’t worry about the multiplayer being up to 4 players however. In multiplayer mode, different players can choose to control the same character at the same time. So you could potentially have three knights and a wizard on the screen at the same time.
Trine 4 impressed me greatly with it’s visuals and varied gameplay, adding in new abilities and locals for the fairy tale-esque series. Along with a few other games, Trine 4 was one of my top games previewed at E3 and is looking like a great game and must have for fans of the series.
Trine 4 is slated for release this Fall on PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Xbox One and PC. You can find our original coverage of Trine 4 here.
