Move’s Sorcery looks to trump Wii’s Skyward Sword

Posted on 22. Jun, 2010 by Chas Guidry in E3 2010, PS3, Previews

Sorcery, a high fantasy action title in development by Sony Computer Entertainment for PlayStation Move, looks like the kind of game expected to flood the Wii’s library before players realized how limited the system’s motion control was when it first launched. But unlike Wii, it appears Move will launch as the most accurate motion control on the market making Sorcery’s 2011 release an anticipated one. Adding to the excitement is the game’s potential to outperform the latest Zelda, which is also expected to be released next year.

Wii may have launched with The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, but the game was actually a port of the long-awaited GameCube release with added motion control. While players repeatedly tapped the B button to have the hero Link execute sword combos on GCN, they had to repeatedly shake the controller to achieve the same effect on Wii. These gestures were vague and yielded the same results as long as the contoller detected the minimum amount of motion. This basically amounted to pressing an invisible button in a way that failed to properly mimic Link’s on-screen actions.

Now, Nintendo is attempting to rectify Twilight Princess‘ gimmick controls with true one-to-one motion in The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. While players’ motions will now decide the trajectory of Link’s slashes, they will still fail to sync up with their on-screen actions. That’s because Link is wielding a sword while players are wielding a wand. In Sorcery, however, both the hero and the player are wielding wands throughout the entire experience.

In Sorcery, players control a wizard’s apprentice capable of flinging various deadly spells using Move’s wand-like controller. The player is required to execute short, snapping motions to cast these spells and so is the apprentice. The basic attack, a quick bolt of energy, can be tossed in any direction with one-to-one motion, and since the player and his avatar are performing the same motions, there appears to be no disconnect between the two. This concept of maintaining the same motion between player and character is carried over into the apprentice’s abilities.

In Skyward Sword, Link requires the use of a variety of tools, each with their own control schemes, to perform various actions. In Sorcery, the apprentice can perform several different spells using the same wand control scheme. He can freeze enemies in a block of ice, sweep them up in a whirlwind, engulf them in a wall of flame, and presumably much more. And while each spell has its own unique properties and uses, they are all manipulated by the apprentice’s and player’s wands. More abilities can be accessed by combining spells. Firing an energy bolt at a frozen enemies shatters them to pieces, and flames can be channeled into a tornado to wield a powerful fire storm using the whirlwind spell.

Even with true one-to-one motion control, the challenge of how to account for the weight and resistance of actions depicted on screen has plagued games aiming to capitalize upon this innovation. Sorcery appears to be offering an answer: Have the player and character wield the same item in the same way. There’s a lot more to see of both Skyward Sword and Sorcery before any decisions can be made, but both have something to prove. One has to show fans of its series that it can climb out of the rut its been digging itself into lately. The other has to prove its a contender because of its seemingly clever design and more powerful hardware despite its lack of a legacy. Both are off to a good start, but it looks like rooting for the underdog might pay off in the case of Sorcery.