Tencent’s Lightspeed & Quantum Studios,has announced the launch of their latest mobile game, The Everlasting Regret. Players who are interested in the game can now download it from your local App or Play Store.
The Everlasting Regret is a poetic puzzle game based on a famous Chinese poem written by poet Bai Juyi called Chang Hen Ge (lit. Song of Everlasting Regret). This is a single player, story-based game that is told with Chinese ink-brush painting art style. This is the first time I’ve tried playing a full story driven game and it is quite interesting as I actually enjoy History as a subject.
The Everlasting Regret is a literary masterpiece from the Tang dynasty. It tells the tragic story between Emperor Xuanzong and his favourite concubine, Yang Guifei, who is known as one of the Four Beauties in ancient China. Since the actual history of this relationship is an affair between Xuanzong and Lady Yang, the poem seeks to romanticize the relationship using vague identities from the original protagonist.
The poem contains 120 verses which are split into 4 chapters in the game. Players will need to solve simple puzzles using the 3 available paint elements; “Vivify”, “Bond”, and “Destroy”. Each verse will give you some clues on which paint element to use. When you complete the painting of each verse, it will unlock the comments section that will further explain what each verse means. In Chinese poems, each word can represent a bigger word or even a full sentence. It may be difficult to understand the full meaning of each verse if you are not accustomed to the writing style.
Other than enjoying the story, the other interesting aspect of the game is to unlock secret scenarios with different illustrations. It can be quite straight forward on which paint element you should use to unlock the next verse. However, you can play around with the other 2 paint elements to find hidden drawings and eventually, unlock hidden achievements.
An important thing to note, once you start the chapter, make sure you complete it in a single playthrough or you’ll have to start all over again. For those of you who think that you might have missed out any of the hidden achievements, you can easily replay the chapter by selecting it on the home page.
The Everlasting Regret is a visual pleasure. The game uses the Chinese ink-brush painting art style to tell the story. Like calligraphy, traditional Chinese painting, or “guohua”, is done using a brush dipped in black ink or coloured pigments, usually on paper or silk. This form of painting is especially popular from the Han to Tang dynasties where artists painted many detailed, elaborate portraits of the royal court. You can easily take a screenshot of each painting and share them with your friends.
Finally, the soundtrack of the game is what makes the whole experience surreal. The music in the game is inspired by using traditional Chinese instruments that were widely used during the Tang Dynasty. It accentuates the tragic tale of Emperor Xuanzong and Lady Yang. I’ve actually kept the music running on the background for the past hour while writing this review and it is actually quite soothing to the mind. During the war scene, the music gets more exciting making you feel more pumped,giving you a more immersive experience.
If you’re into poems, literature or Chinese history, The Everlasting Regret mobile game is definitely a good starter for you to understand some of the basics. After which, you can actually proceed to watch some of the TV shows or movies that were adapted from the poem. The game supports four languages; Chinese, English, Japanese and Korean. If you’re able to read Chinese, I personally suggest you start your first playthrough with Chinese and subsequently in your own comfortable language. It actually helped me to understand better what each verse of the poem meant.
Publisher
Tencent Games
Platform
