2024 was a sad year for manga fans because Dragon Ball creator Akira Toriyama passed away. Not only did he create Dragon Ball, but he was also the character designer for the popular Dragon Quest series of video games.
I've known Akira Toriyama's work for a long time, but I did not know he also created a manga called Sand Land. Sand Land has a different story to Dragon Ball, but the characters have Toriyama's similar classic design to them.
Sand Land was recently turned into an anime, but it is now a video game, too. The Sand Land video game was released worldwide on April 26th for the PC, PlayStation, and Xbox platforms. It has anime 2D graphics and is an enjoyable action RPG.
One of the things I liked most about Sand Land is its easy-to-follow storyline and its likeable cast of characters. The game begins with you controlling a character named Beelzebub, who lives with a gang of demons in a world like a huge desert.
Much like deserts in real life, the world in Sand Land is dry, and water is hard to come by. The only way the demons are able to rehydrate themselves is by stealing bottles of water from the greedy army that is occupying the land.
The real story begins when an old man human named Rao approaches the demons to propose to them a very special mission. Rao wants to demons' help to find a spring with fresh water that is rumoured to be located in the south side of the dry desert. He thinks this spring should rectify everyone's problems with the drought.
Rao has a car, so his space is limited, so only Beezlebub and his best friend Thief are able to take on this mission. Later on in the story, they are joined by a blonde girl named Ann, who is a good mechanic like Bulma from the Dragon Ball series.
Our heroes' mission to find the elusive spring isn't going to be an easy one because the army does not want them to find the water. This is because the water belongs to the greedy king , and he doesn't want to share any of it with anyone. We also learn more about Rao's backstory and why he wants peace in the world.
The story is rather interesting, and all of the good characters are likeable. You truly want to root for the good guys because the King's army is greedy and evil. It's much like real life, as some governments out there aren't nice to poor people…
As for the gameplay, I initially thought Sand Land was a beat-up style of action RPG. This is because Beezlebub is the only playable character during hand-to-hand combat as he can use martial arts to beat up the King's army and other enemies.
Beezlebub uses his fists most of the time and you can also unleash a special move to deal more damage when you earn it. Sadly, the other characters aren't playable during combat but they will aid you if you need help.
That being said, there was a section in the game where Thief became a playable character. In this section of the game, Thief needed to use stealth in order to steal some food and water because the gang was low on supplies. The stealth isn't the best I've seen in a video game, but I admired the variety in gameplay.
Surprisingly, you will find out that hand-to-hand combat isn't the majority of the gameplay in Sand Land. Later on in the game, the team is able to steal a tank and this is one of the most important vehicles in the entire game. You will need the tank to traverse the desert and also fight the army with it!
You push up on the analogue stick to drive forward, and you press the right trigger (R2) to shoot your weapons. You have a machine gun turret or you can fire rocket shells at enemies too. Ammo is thankfully unlimited, although you will have to reload often. Ann is able to make the tank's weaponry more powerful if you can find better parts for it.
I enjoyed the tank battles much better than the hand-to-hand combat in this game. Another vehicle that the team acquires is a mech called the 'Jump Bot'. There are several other vehicles you can ride in this game , too, but you will have to play through the entire game to unlock them all!
Sand Land is a huge open-world video game, but you can visit towns and camps to replenish health and repair vehicle damage. Some towns also allow you to do side quests and Ann is able to repair and upgrade your vehicles in a place called Spino too.
I also admire the fact that towns offer you fast travel as well. This saves you a lot of time backtracking if you want to recover your health or upgrade your tank in any fashion. The tank is somewhat very powerful against most enemies, but you need to upgrade it often to face harder boss fights.
The only major thing I didn't like about Sand Land is that it sometimes takes a long time to level up. This is because defeating enemies doesn't give you enough experience points for some odd reason or another. Instead, you will have to defeat bosses and finish missions to get more XP.
Other than levelling up, I had a fun time playing Sand Land on the PS5. The anime graphics look great, and the vehicular combat sections of the game are really enjoyable. I recommend you give this game a go if you are into manga and anime video games.
Verdict: 8.5/10
