Video Game / Maglam Lord

Slay monsters. Forge weapons. Find love.

Maglam Lord is an Action RPG with Visual Novel elements, developed by Felistella and published by D3 Publisher (Japanese) and PQube (English) for the Nintendo Switch and Play Station 4, with a Steam port released later. Gameplay is a mix of side-scrolling Beat 'em Up gameplay in the same vein of older, 2D Tales of... games and a dating sim, where the player forms bonds with their partners, goes out on dates with them, and maybe even find love.

In the world of Eusdeal, a land of Gods, Demons, Divine Beasts, Faefolk, Demi-Humans, Humans, and so much more, war, strife, and suffering is a seemingly inevitable, constant occurrence. The immortal Gods stand for Order while the also immortal Demons stand for Chaos, but both are unable to peacefully coexist or tolerate the other's existence. Caught in the middle are humans, mortal creatures being used as resources for raw magic force, Followers as their loyal servants for administration, research, and of course, soldiers for war.

Of particular note are those blessed with Maglams, mystical weapons that can slay the immortals themselves. The Allmighty Oldin had decreed that no immortals may kill another, so they bypassed that rule by granting these weapons to their human followers as proxy soldiers.

Then came the Bladelord Killizerk, the one immortal capable of not only wielding maglams but forging them as well.

Terrified at their free spirit, their sheer destructive capability, and their ability to kill both Gods and Demon Lords with impunity, an Alliance is formed by the Leader of the Gods, Grangenion. After a brutal, costly assault, Killizerk is heavily weakened, enough to seal them away for good...

... But then, Killizerk finds themselves reviving in a very different world than they remembered, in a very different time.

Between their almost-death and revival, Eusdeal has changed. The Gods and Demons are no more. Peace reigns in the land. Humanity reigns dominant, slaves no more, the realm is renamed Arcadio, and the old patrons are replaced by the Administration, a government body that only seeks the happiness and safety of its citizens—including Killizerk.

It comes at a catch, however: since Killizerk is the last known living Demon Lord, they're now classified as an endangered species. Worse yet, they've lost most of their power and can't even sustain themselves in battle for very long. Desperate to regain their former glory and chuck the restrictions that come with being an endangered species, Killizerk goes out to find new partners to wield their maglams, kill the wild Mutabeasts to take their magic for their own, and hopefully find someone to love and repopulate their species with.

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Tropes:

• Adorably Precocious Child: Lyrica is always polite and friendly to everyone she meets. We don't see her parents because they run a flower shop, and Lyrica doesn't want to get in their way.
• Ambidextrous Sprite: The battles deserve a mention for having ambidextrous 3D models. Within battles, the characters are so that their weapon is always facing the camera. There is no animation for the characters switching hands, so, from the player's perspective, the game just teleports the weapon to whatever hand is facing the camera. This does not happen outside of battle.
• All There in the Manual: The game has a substantial amount of lore hidden in Satyus's records.
• Amnesiac Hero: The game starts with Killizerk waking up after terrible fight with their memories not fully intact. The Bladelord seems to recall some events, but not a whole lot. For example, the Bladelord has to be retaught how to make blades (the maglams), despite being previously rather infamous for them.
• Ancient Artifact: The gods created the world with a few of these in it called Relics. They are immensely powerful and indestructible. The ones encountered in-game are the Philosopher's Stone (also called the tinctura) and the Wishing Ring. Both double as characters in their own right. Whether all the Relics are aware and active like that is unclear.
• And the Adventure Continues: The game ends on this note. Yes, the Goddess Aimamiel has been defeated and the Bladelord is no longer trapped within Arcadio, but the Bladelord is still considered a Hazardes in the outside world and will be hunted by practically everyone who sides with either gods or demons.
• Anti-Frustration Features:
  • If you're aiming for Overseer Mamie's ending, you can still raise her affection even after Killizerk and company become persona non grata in the Administration's eyes by continuing to pay the "Happiness Tax".
  • Maglam's names will glow blue when you can craft an unknown Maglam or can now craft a higher tier version of it.
  • Though the walking speed is already fast, you can make it even faster to traverse the levels at top speed or outrun any enemy encounters.
• Artistic License – Biology / Pregnancy Does Not Work That Way:
  • Overseer Mamie and Balga allows Killizerk to date and seek their soulmate, because if Killizerk (the last Demon Lord) had an heir, then Demon Lords wouldn't be endangered. Simply put, that is not how Real Life species conservation works. ^note Barring some form of asexual reproduction or Mystical Pregnancy, as how demon lords reproduce is never elaborated on in-game, most of the available love interests either are a completely different species from Killizerk or MOAV, who is robot with no interest nor known ability to reproduce. Any hypothetical children Killizerk has with them would be a hybrid with little value conservation-wise. The only hypothetical offspring that possibly wouldn't be a hybrid would be with Satyus. This is also not getting into the issue of Killizerk's biological sex and whether the Demon Lord would be capable of Homosexual Reproduction.
  • Despite the glossary explicitly stating that demonkin are just immature demon lords and that whole species are known as "demons", the endangered species list has the Bladelord as a different species from Satyus and Balga (Demon Lord and Demonkin, respectively). Also, Balga was a fully mature demon lord with the title "Ironlord" before his fall, so he probably wouldn't count as demonkin.
• Big Bad: Overseer Mamie/Goddess Aimamiel. Not only are they responsible for the events of the game, they even become the final boss after they're driven insane by their plans falling apart all around them.
• Big Good: Shockingly enough, Grangenion, Leader of the Gods, and the one who formed the Alliance that tried to seal off Killizerk in the first place. War and crisis really does make strange bedfellows.
• Children Are Innocent: Lyrica and all of the children at the daycare accept the party without any questions, despite the Bladelord being known both as a dangerous Hazades and Demon Lord and Acklao publicly causing riots via Mind Control and cursing people.
• Cursed with Awesome: After Darius awakens to his Hero powers, the Demon Lord's Curse inflicted on him now becomes an incredibly useful power-up and tool for combat and helping others.
• Eating Optional:
  • Acklao mentions at one point that he doesn't actually need to breathe and only does so out of habit. Considering how the Wishing Ring (and Acklao by extension) was trapped under permafrost for a very long time while he was somewhat aware of what was happening around him and, at one point in the story, is tossed into the Void Between the Worlds and lives, he probably doesn't require anything to survive.
  • MOAV doesn't need to eat, but he can if he wants to analyze something or if it'd be rude not to. He can't actually taste what he eats; however, he just analyses it.
• Fascist, but Inefficient: The ultimate flaw of the Administration and Arcadio as a whole. Trying to have complete control of a world and its citizens, completely isolating it from outside interference, all while having to deal with internal struggles is just not feasible and eventually leads to the breakdown of the system and especially Overseer Mamie/Goddess Aimamiel.
• Foreshadowing: Several moments and inconsistencies hint at the true nature of Arcadio.
  • Despite having been born from Eusdeal, there is oddly no history, records, or living memory of the transition from a period of constant strife or why the Gods and Demons have suddenly disappeared.
  • Humans dominate the population with every other non-human mortal race suddenly being endangered, but how did entire populations just get wiped out like that?
  • The first time you take Overseer Mamie out on a date and introduce her to Guru G.G. as a consequence, she's suspicious of him because his business is unregistered and probably illegal. This is because Mamie is actually the Goddess Aimamiel and runs the Administration by herself, G.G. is another Spanner in the Works much like Killizerk was.
  • When Julette's show goes horribly wrong and she's separated from her team, the group notes that they never found the bodies of her staff. While it's assumed they've been eaten by mutabeasts or got away in a separate direction, the truth is they were only puppets of Overseer Mamie/Goddess Aimamiel, and were not humans or sentient at all.
• Fish out of Temporal Water: After being sealed off and revived, Killizerk finds themselves waking up in a highly modernized world with movies, television broadcasts, and amusements parks. Or so it seems until Arcadio's true nature is exposed.
• Gameplay and Story Integration:
  • Maglams have been known to take on the forms of ranged weapons like bows and blunt weapons like hammers, but Killizerk can only ever forge edged and pointed weapons like swords, axes, and spears, because they're the Bladelord.
  • Satyus is used as a partner as everyone else is currently unavailable. As you're warned that their body can't possibly handle the stress of handling a maglam and Killizerk's power for very long, the party's first priority is saving Darius and you immediately switch to him as soon as he's rescued. Satyus then proceeds to leave the pool of selectable partners.
• Gameplay and Story Separation: Charme's character portrait always has a massive shield and in cutscenes she is shown making great use of it. Her battle model neither has a shield nor does she bring it out to block, instead using her maglam like all the other characters.
• Gender Bender: One optional mission has Killizerk's gender explicitly switched to the one the player didn't pick to "gain a new perspective". It doesn't last, is over with the mission, and doesn't seem to affect the mission in any way.
• Gender-Inclusive Writing: Regardless of whether the player chooses the male or female Killizerk, the Demon Lord will always be referred to with they/them pronouns and traditionally male titles (such as "Lord Killizerk" or "Master"). With that being said, the game sometimes slips up and refers to the protagonist in passing as male, and a couple of characters also compare the Demon Lord to a prince regardless of which version of Killizerk is present.
• God Is Flawed: For all their power and being for Order, the Gods of this game are not wholly benevolent beings and have a number of character flaws. Of particular note is Aimamiel, the Goddess of Compassion whose attempts at bringing peace and relief from suffering cause even more of it to everyone, including herself.
• God Was My Co-Pilot: Guru G.G. turns out to be none other than Grangenion, the leader of the Gods and the one who formed the anti-Killizerk Alliance in the first place.
• The Government: The aptly named "Administration" is a government in charge of guaranteeing the citizen's happiness and citizens, doing their best to ensure that everyone gets to live a satisfying life.
• Immortal Breaker: Maglams have the unique distinction of being the only weapon that can kill an immortal being. With the notable exception of Killizerk, only mortals can use them, which is why Maglam wielders are used by the Gods and Demons to wage proxie wars against their immortal enemies.
• Intrepid Reporter: "Julette's Vivid*Voyage" starring the eponymous Julette is an adventure show, specializing in exploring uncharted territories and in the Overseer's words, giving the people a taste of adventure from the comforts of their couches. After she gets fired after a show goes horribly wrong, Julette continues to venture out and report to satisfy her journalistic spirit.
• Ignorant of Their Own Ignorance: Unlike Killizerk and the rest of the party, the citizens don't seem to question the inconsistencies and strange details of Arcadio, like how it seemed to suddenly spring up out of nowhere without a history or memories of its transition period from war-torn Eusdeal or the disappearance of the Gods and Demon Lords driving most of the conflict.
• Intoxication Ensues: Alone, separated from her (likely dead) team, and hungry, Julette finds some mushrooms in the Majestick Woods and makes the poor decision to try and eat them. After briefly enjoying their salty, savory taste, she realizes too late that they're poisonous. The party catches up with her and MOAV uses his chemical analysis functions to determine that they've got hallucinogenic properties and are loaded with amphetamines, which lead to Julette going into a blind, hallucinating rage.
• Jackass Genie: Acklao's tends to half-ass or maliciously interpret grant wishes on a whim. He can grant wishes properly with the wisher's original intent in mind, but he usually doesn't. He will even grant wishes without the person's consent by "reading [their] heart," even if what he does goes against what the person actually wants. He does grant the wishes of children correctly, but, then again, the children we see in-game have relatively simple and straightfoward wishes, such as wanting a piggy back ride or wanting to play with him. He claims that he grant their wishes correctly because children are pure of heart, but Acklao also loves to twist truths and lie, making it hard to tell whether he's being genuine.
• Laser-Guided Amnesia: Somehow, Killizerk has forgotten all about how to forge maglams alongside most of their power, removing much of the threat they could have posed to the Administration and Arcadio. This was deliberate tampering by Overseer Mamie.
• Last of His Kind: Killizerk is the last Demon Lord within Arcadio. This trope may also apply to some of the other endangered species of Arcadio, as players only encounter one individual of various endangered creatures within dungeons. The game also notes how rare any magical species are in Arcadio.
• Last-Second Ending Choice: Provided you've already maxed out her relationship value, Overseer Mamie/Goddess Aimamiel's ending is achieved by choosing the "Heart" dialog choice before the confrontation with her. You could have chosen someone else to confess your love to or your strong, platonic bond to some other member of the party but it will be overridden by this choice.
• Laughing Mad: One of the most common, disturbing signs that Overseer Mamie/Aimamiel is beginning to snap and be corrupted is her sudden, insane, uncontrollable bouts of laughter.
• Little Bit Beastly: The Beastkin Demi-Humans resemble humans except for animal ears, tails, and superhuman senses. They also tend to be a lot more wild and fond of nature, such as Julette having been an expert hunter and tracker in her youth before becoming an idol and reporter.
• Level-Up at Intimacy 5:
  • Under "skills" for each playable character is "Relation X", with the X representing what grade Killizerk's relationship with that character is. It can be improved by using the Dating Dojo (which also shows in hearts how the relationship is going) or by playing that character during missions. The higher the grade, the stronger the bonus, with the max being "Relationship SS".
  • During the second-to-last mission, the stat decreases that occur during the level can be avoided entirely by having an high enough affection with certain characters. The characters in question are Julette, Charme, Darius, and Acklao.
• Mad God: By the final dungeon, the Goddess of Compassion, Aimamiel, has fallen and is completely off her rocker. She no longer listens to reason and assumes that everyone either hates her or wants to make fun of her and her work. Despite her previously compassionate nature, by that point, she responds to practically every attempt to communicate with her with violence and accusations, founded or otherwise. Not even her own grandfather can snap her out of it. Her forced laughter as she decides to kidnap, re-educate, and eventually execute the playable character is also worth noting.
• Magitek: Ars Magica is an innovation of humans, combining magic and technology. MOAV is explicitly stated to have been a product of this, being a completely sentient, independent AI, intended to be an immortal-killing machine with the Philosopher's Stone as his power source.
• Mechanical Lifeform: MOAV is a humanoid robot with a personality, thoughts, and opinions. He also has no desire to actually become human and is fine the way he is. Part of his character development in particular is him accepting that he's alive, just not in literal sense, and not just a tool to be used.
• Multiple Endings: The game has several different endings, depending on whether or not you romanced or declared your strong, intimate, but platonic feelings for a certain character. There is one for each combat partner plus the Overseer, Mamie or rather, Aimamiel the Goddess of Compassion.
• No Hugging, No Kissing: Downplayed. The dating sim elements are light. There are dates, but no hugging, kissing, or even holding hands. Most dates amount to two characters hanging out and maybe sharing a meal. The most raunchy the game gets is a few visits to a mixed-sex hot spring where Bathtub Bonding happens. The game doesn't really go past the characters smiling and praising each other's personalities and skills. The dating sim aspect can also be completely avoided by the player after its introduction, and the game doesn't punish players for not participating in it.
• Older Than They Look: Said word-by-word in-game in reference to all the play-able characters. Julette in particular mentions that she's much older than she looks, old enough to be threatened with the possibility of being aged out of being an idol. The Bladelord, however, refers to Satyus as "a baby," implying that he's still rather young, and, when in an establishment that sells alcohol, Satyus refuses to drink due to not being mature enough.
• Our Genies Are Different: One late-game character qualifies. The Wishing Ring, a Relic known to cause tragedy and ruin, one day somehow gained a human-like body, awareness, and personality. Now going as Acklao, his vaguely Arabic fashion choices, ability (and compulsion) to grant wishes, ability to teleport, and his dedication to his master (once he has one) has him resembling some kind of genie being tied to a ring rather than a lamp.
• Philosopher's Stone: It is one the indestructible Relicss that exist in the world. In this game, the legendary philosopher's stone's (also known in-game as the tinctura) stated function to convert anything into anything else. It also powers and repairs MOAV, a robot, and grants him information, such as how the wishing stone works, though the stone itself also stops him from revealing too much about the wishing ring by powering itself off temporarily.
• Police State: When the party discovers that Arcadio is Aimamiel's Small, Secluded World, she begins to use her puppet government troopers to try and kill the party and otherwise police the citizens into compliance.
• Power-Up Food: The characters each have food items that will provide a percentage-based recovery of HP and sometimes SP, along with raising their affection. Specifically:
  • All of Killizerk's favorite foods are very calorically dense and often sweet, like sugar biscuits, ice cream, and homemade riceballs. They're also the only ones that will raise the Demon Gauge and allow them to unleash their might in combat.
  • Darius enjoys very simple foods for home cooks, like fried potatoes, omelets, and curry. This is probably because he's been the cook for him and his sister Charme, as her super-strength and being lethally untalented at the culinary arts forced it. He also believes a Hero should at least be able to feed himself no matter what.
  • Though she also enjoys salads, Charme is mostly fond of sandwiches. It doesn't matter if it's sweet or savory, be it at a chicken sandwich, a hot dog, or a fruit and cream sandwich, so long as it's between two slices of bread she'll enjoy it. This may come from always carrying a massive tower shield around and constantly being unable to use one hand.
  • Julette, fittingly enough for being a beastkin and a huntress in her youth, is extremely fond of dishes made from animal products, such as parfaits using eggs, beef bowls with the meat layered on thick, and especially soups and soup dishes made from bone stock, like ramen.
  • Despite being a robot powered by a magical Relic, MOAV has a surprising fondness for sweets, just like his master. Though, it should be noted that he has a very, very odd preference, enjoying "Cubic Sugar" which "transcends the very concept of sugar", "Biocorn" that can be eaten as is or turned into high-fructose syrup, or "Mega Choc-ice", a combination of cacao and sticky ice cream.
  • Acklao has a very... unusual, exotic, and refined palette. If he's not enjoying something that's apparently every ingredient known blended to together into a "Chaos Smoothie", he's admiring the notes of "depravity, pride, and honey" from a dish from a fallen kingdom, or just enjoying the luxury of the finest seafood and ingredients cooked and prepared in the most meticulous and grandiose ways possible.
  • Satyus enjoys food with high nutritional value over flavor. He wants to grow up big and strong, so he can properly wield the Bladelord some day.
• Reference Overdosed: The game has a lot of Shout-outs to various other works and even memes. A lot of them are in the character titles, such as Acklao, the Wishing Ring, going by the "The One" and another literally being "With This Ring". Others are hidden in regular dialogue; more within the weapons (one of the swords, for example, is called a keyblade); and others are within the missions, such as how one client wants you to send his regards to King Dragon, and by that we mean the client wants you to kill him.
• Really 700 Years Old: While it's unclear when their consciousness woke up, relics were created at the start of the world. This makes Acklao and MOAV's cores as old as the universe. This may also, to a lesser decree, also apply to Killizerk and Balga.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here:
  • Divine Beasts are rare in Eusdeal, as they've grown sick of the constant conflict to want to be a part of society and have secluded themselves as a result.
  • After Charme tries to cook Killizerk a meal with Acklao providing unhelpful commentary, Killizerk is so horrified by the inedible mess she's made and her unsubtly threatening them to eat it that they decide the best course of action is to flee the cafe as fast as they can.
• She's a Man in Japan: A strange internal example. The game changes Satyus' pronouns between scenes and settings during the story. In some scenes, other characters, including the Bladelord and Balga, will consistently refer to Satyus as they/them and gender-neutral terms (ex. grandkid), and, in other scenes, characters will consistently refer to Satyus as he/him and male terms (ex. grandson). There seems to be no rhyme or reason behind the change either. One of the dating events with Satyus at a hot spring seems to imply that Satyus is supposed to have an Ambiguous Gender, as the Bladelord doesn't know what Satyus will look down there in the bath, but, considering how the Bladelord has lost their memory, the Bladelord may also really not know. The scene covers Satyus completely up via a magical, in-universe Lens Flare Censor anyway.^note It is possible that Satyus goes by both they/them and he/him pronouns, but it's hard to tell without Word of God confirming whether that is indeed the case.
• Shipper on Deck: Love Guru G.G. encourages Killizerk to date and find their soulmate, though he doesn't seem to care who Killizerk actually ends up with as long as Killizerk fills the "hole in [their] soul".
• Small, Secluded World: Arcadio is eventually revealed to be a small section of Eusdeal, isolated from the rest by Aimamiel's barrier.
• Spanner in the Works: Killizerk ends up being this to Overseer Mamie/Goddess Aimamiel, because she never intended them to be part of Arcadio in the first place.
• Sweet Tooth: Several characters have an extreme fondness for sweets, like Killizerk. If someone is offering to apologize to them, they have the option of asking the one apologizing to take them out and treat them to something sweet.
• The Teetotaler: Killizerk, for some unexplained reason, refuses to drink alcoholic drinks when offered multiple times. The only other character shown to refuse is Satyus, who isn't mature enough to drink.
• Third-Person Person: MOAV always refers to himself as "this unit." He also refers to himself in this way as "it", but that probably has a lot to due to him being a robot and viewing himself as less of a person than his fellow teammates.
• Turned Against Their Masters:
  • Maglams used to be much more prolific, being granted by Gods and Demons to their Followers... until humans began to learn how to create maglams themselves and could now turn those weapons against their former masters, if they so wished. It's gotten to the point where the immortals have all but wiped out any humans who had knowledge, save for a rumored few who pledged their loyalty to patrons in exchange for keeping the knowledge and their lives.
  • MOAV was designed to wield maglams for the purpose of killing both gods and demons who posed a threat to MOAV's human creators. Instead, he ends up working and fighting for a demon lord.
• Underground Monkey: One of the most egregious examples in recent JRPG releases. With the exception of the elements they wield, there are only about 10 or so common enemy types and since all of them tend to share the exact same weapon weaknesses and elemental damage is just a nice bonus, you can basically plan for any "unknown" entry in a new mission by figuring out which family of monsters they belong to. Somewhat subverted by the endgame when the strongest variants now change their species weakness types, such as Undying and Manaform enemies becoming much more frequent, but the weapon weaknesses and attack moves are virtually unchanged.
• Wall Around the World: In the Majestick Woods, the party finds a mysterious glowing wall. This is part of the barrier around Arcadio, separating and isolating it from the rest of Eusdeal.
• Wanton Cruelty to the Common Comma: The font used in text boxes doesn't allow for accented letters, and instead replaces them with a question mark. The most common example of this is a date spot called a "caf?" instead of "café". Notably, in the Dating Dojo menu, which uses a different font from the regular text boxes, "café" is spelled properly.
• Weapon Specialization: Though all characters can use all three weapon types, most of them have skills that let them specialize in one.
  • MOAV and Satyus specialize in axes.
  • Darius specializes in swords.
  • Charme and Acklao specialize in spears.
  • Julette is a notable exception, in that she has skills for all three but doesn't have the higher tiers.
• What Happened to the Mouse?:
  • Characters in the faceless side missions are rarely heard from again, especially if the faceless NPC speaks. Some of these side missions can leave the characters in precarious conditions. One example features a worried mother trying to find her lazy son. When the party finds him. Acklao had merged him with a tree (his wish was to be self-efficient and Acklao interpreted that as the guy wanting to live as solitary as a tree), and he unable to feed, drink, or resist insects biting him. When the party finds him, he begs for someone to kill him, as he is unable to move. The party then swears to find the caster so the curse be undone, but the player never finds out if the guy was ever separated from the tree. The last we see of him is his mother camping besides him in order to take care of him.
  • Lyrica's overly trusting and friendly nature seems like it would make her an easy target in the war-torn world outside of the safe Arcadio. We never see her, or any of the other residents, after Arcadio falls.
• Welcome Back, Traitor: Satyus betrays the party and gets most of the party thrown in jail to be Brainwashed after the Administration turns on them, but, after some scolding from the Bladelord, immediately begs for forgiveness, explains how he only did what he did under duress, and is readily accepted back into the gang after everyone is rescued. Killizerk also gives him a title referencing this event: Traitorlord.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: Aimamiel, the Goddess of Compassion, AKA Overseer Mamie. She just wants to create a world of peace where the people can live happy lives but ends up trapping them in a Small, Secluded World, being unknowingly forced to conform to her ideas of order and a "happy" life, all while trying to fend off outside interference to no avail.