DotEmu has sent us word that they have partnered with D4 Enterprise and are soon to release an iPhone port of the Sega Master System / MSX role playing adventure Golvellius: Valley of Doom.
“Golvellius is a wonderful addition to our license portfolio and we are pleased to bring Golvellius to the iPhone and iPod Touch for a great retrogaming experience," said Xavier Liard, co-founder and CEO of DotEmu.
Similar to (and surely inspired by) The Legend of Zelda, but with 2D platform sequences that set it apart from Nintendo’s seminal work, Golvellius is an expansive title that many gamers missed due to its limited platform coverage. Unlike Zelda, Golvellius is a rather linear, structured game consisting of seven distinct areas, where one must be completed before the next is unlocked.
The hero of the game is the brave Kelesis, a fearsome warrior bent on slaying the evil denizens of the game world in an effort to rescue the lovely princess Rena. Aside from dispatching the standard baddies in every area, a dungeon boss must be defeated for each before the next area is unlocked.
As Hardcore Gaming 101 comments,
The world is huge and varied, offering landscapes from forests to deserts to graveyard to swamps to tropical islands. The graphics in the Master System and MSX2 versions are excellent, and helps define one of the most fully detailed action-RPG worlds next to SNK’s Crystalis. The music, too, is excellent. Unlike most other games, the music doesn’t change based on what area you’re in – rather, it changes based on what equipment you’ve bought. It’s really awesome to buy a new sword and crawl back out to the overworld, where you’re greeted with a brand new triumphant theme song. Late in the game, you get an item that lets you walk across almost anything (with the exception of certain mountains which provide the world’s boundaries) which gives a feeling of godliness usually only found in cheat codes. Some of the writing is kinda humorous too. Try to buy an item without enough cash, and these seemingly nice grandmothers will spout off a hilarious slew of olde English insults mocking your buffoonery. It makes that ill-translated old man from the original Zelda seem like such a loser.
See a partial gameworld map here.
A Sega Master System video gives an idea of the gameplay.
Golvellius: Valley of Doom will debut in the App Store sometime in August.
