Sudeki tells the tale of a disparate group of characters, each offering different skills, who need to save their world from evil. The game begins with the introduction of Tal, a warrior in the army. Fairly early into the game the player also meets Ailish, a princess, Buki, a half-human, half-animal ambassador, and Elco, a scientist. It's a familiar story, especially for an RPG, and unfortunately not a particularly long or gripping one. This is partially due to the characters in the story not being particularly interesting. We didn't form a connection with them as we sometimes do in other games. We also found that the story was left in the background a lot with the main focus on the current task, usually getting from one place to another, to the point where we would have trouble explaining the story in any great detail. It does pick up towards the end, but by that stage it was barely enough to pique our interest.

What struck us more was the look and sound of the game. The world of Sudeki is a visually brilliant one, rich in colour and detail. Within the towns the buildings are quite intricate, the streets filled with market stalls and other curiosities. Moving parts or machinery litter the scenery, each looking like they should actually work. Outside the towns the countryside is filled with lush green foliage and features common to a rural setting. Leaves gently falling from trees or butterflies flitting about add to the peacefulness of the world. The draw distance is similarly impressive with high vantage points offering some fabulous views.

The characters also look and move great. The population in Sudeki is characterized by its individuality and detail. The playable characters are well animated when running, climbing and fighting, with the best visual effects coming with the special attacks in the battles. The work on the enemies is similarly thorough. This is even more impressive with the relatively large variety of monster. Bosses are even better represented with some fearsome examples. A similar amount of attention has been given to the aural world as well. The towns sound busy, with market-dwellers shouting about their wares. Each town or village sounds quite distinctive as well. The countryside is a lot quieter, with just the sounds of birds breaking through the silence. Walking near certain things also adds to the ambient noise, such as rushing water when near a stream or bees around a hive. Overall the aura of Sudeki is excellent, encouraging gamers to slow their pace and admire the world as they travel.

A lot of focus has obviously gone in to the appearance of Sudeki. The relative lack of interactivity within the environments almost makes the world feel quite sterile though, something to be looked at and admired but not touched. There is little to be gained from exploration of each area. Even the characters players will meet, of which there are many, are rarely useful to talk to, giving the impression that they are largely there to lengthen the game-time. Most characters will give their point of view about where the story is, but provide little in the way of great insights, hints or side-quests. In fact the game in general is a bit short of side-quests or anything else to do outside of the main story. There are some extra quests to be found but they are generally limited to small collection quests and certainly nothing comparable to other RPGs.

Sudeki also doesn't compare well with other RPGs in terms of the customization or leveling up options. When enough experience is gained a character will level up, allowing them to improve one or more of four attributes. Health, skill power, strength and skill power strength can all be improved, as well as the opportunity to add character-specific skills. This does get a little limiting though, and while there is a trade-off players will need to make in improving one attribute over another it does still seem rather shallow. Extra attributes can also be added to weapons, but again this is rather narrow in scope. Special skills also seem rather limiting, with each character only getting a choice of a few skills each. A lot of recent RPGs allow a lot more customization and variety, and a lot of the replayability of a game stems from this so Sudeki seems to be quite restrictive in this respect.

So with Sudeki rather limited in terms of the typical RPG accoutrements the focus goes onto the combat aspects of the game, and in this respect Sudeki redeems itself to a certain extent. Thankfully random battles are not a part of the game, leaving combat to certain areas. Once combat begins each area is sealed off, creating an arena for the action to take place. Most of the arenas are quite large, and characters are free to move all around them as they fight. The fighting itself is in real-time, and resembles an action game more than a typical RPG. Two types of combat are represented, with Tal and Buki using melee weapons and Ailish and Elco using ranged weapons.

The melee combat is one of the best aspects of Sudeki and encourages good timing and positioning. The attacks are based around combos of three timed button presses. Time the button presses well and a combo results, and in some cases allows a further three quick attacks. If the attacks are mistimed no combo results, although there is still a little damage. It's a system that works well in this type of game, and puts a fair amount of onus on the player to do well. Combine this with proper positioning to avoid a counter-attack and the existence of multiple enemies in the arena and the melee combat becomes enjoyable and challenging.

With the melee combat working so well it is something of a disappointment to switch to the ranged weapons, which Ailish and Elco use exclusively for two main reasons. Firstly, the view changes to a first person view, which cannot be altered. While this does offer a better vantage for seeing where the character is firing it cuts down the visibility of the rest of the battle. Most of the battles are fought over a reasonably large area, and keeping track of the rest of the members in the group is critical.

The other major problem is the reduced gameplay options. While the melee fighters have combos to work with the ranged attacks are just single button presses, and depending on the weapon used this could be limited to one button press every three or four seconds. There is also the tendency to spend the battle running backwards, firing at chasing enemies. The ranged combat does have the advantage of exposing the characters less to damage, but the combat is just not as rewarding.

The other major gripe we have about the combat is the lack of intelligence from the other members in the party. Whilst the player is controlling one character the other characters are doing their own thing in a fight. Players can switch between the characters and control them periodically but this takes a lot of work and makes fighting battles seem like a bit of a chore. The other option is to leave the other three characters alone and just concentrate on fighting as the current character. In theory this should work, but it doesn't. Invariably the attacks of the rest of the party are weak and they leave themselves open to attack.

Even in a relatively easy battle the rest of the team can be decimated leaving players to struggle on alone. There are some options to pre-programme the objectives of the other characters by focusing them on attack, defence or retreat but this doesn't work quite as well as it should. A more intelligent AI could have solved this, and indeed we have seen this system work quite well in other games. Instead we were left fearing combat, rather than welcoming it.

As well as their skills in battle each character also offers special skills while exploring the world. Tal is strong and can move large objects. Ailish has psychic power and can see invisible objects. Buki has climbing claws, allowing her to reach high places. And Elco has a rocket pack, allowing him to reach places the others are unable to walk to. A lot of the puzzle solving is based around using these skills. However it rarely reaches a great level of sophistication, and solving each puzzle is generally fairly obvious. Sudeki could have had a greater role for these skills as they had the potential to form some tricky puzzles.