I absolutely adore the Golden Sun games. I played them for hours when I was little, holding my Game Boy Advance near the light that shone in through my bedroom window while I was supposed to be sleeping. Its music is iconic and the composer – Motoi Sakuraba – has lent his talents to Tako no Himitsu: Ocean of Secrets, a GBA-style action RPG that just got a new demo on Steam.
For a lot of us, games like Golden Sun and Fire Emblem were our introduction into the rich worlds and dense mechanics of RPGs. Tako no Himitsu: Ocean of Secrets looks like the perfect love letter to that golden GBA-era. It has an overworld map you can run across, but rather than turn-based combat, which was the norm at the time, it’s an action RPG, meaning the pace won’t get slowed by triggering battle scenes.
Instantly, you can recognize the music in Ocean of Secrets as that of Motoi Sakuraba, the legendary composer who made music for Golden Sun, Dark Souls, and Tales of Arise. The sounds he creates really help transport me back to my childhood.
In Ocean of Secrets, humans and octopuses once waged war with each other, but now wild animals have started disappearing. You control six different party members each with their own abilities and backstories, and fight with them in real-time combat.
Just like the Djinn in Golden Sun, you can encounter different octopuses in Secrets of the Ocean and use them to aid you in battle and to solve puzzles in the world.
If you’re as nostalgic as I am then you can check out Ocean of Secrets’ free demo on Steam, right here.
There are also plenty of old games that you can try if you want to relive your childhood or explore the history of games. Alternatively, why not check out some awesome indie games?
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