You will not be able to put this game down for a long time..
The bad: Hit detection is not really good.
(This will probably be a shorter review than i normally do mainly since its a arcade game but dont let that make you think this game is short on replay value)
It really was hard to find anything wrong with this game not simply because its fun but because its just THAT good.
Most arcade titles turnout to be ok, mediorce or just really horrible games that you wish you hadnt spent your microsoft points on. But this game is different.
Well the story is simple, you and your fellow knights are partying for some reason when a "bad knight" shows up and steal a crystal like thing that obviously has magical powers. Not only that the four princesses are kidnapped and held in various parts of the games world. And to get to those places you must first beat the level you are currently on. Now in most RPG's you would go to a specific place and then accept a quest. But not in this case. Instead like most FPS and action games you just progress to the next level as you beat ones you are on. Sometimes there will be two paths you can take but most of the time in order to go down one path you must get something that will help you actually be able to get past something blocking that path on the other path (confusing i know) for instance, imagine there are two paths in front of you and one you cant get past but on the door there is a picture of a horn so you figure out that in order to go down that path you must first go down the other and find the horn. This happens multiple times throughout the game and of course most of the time you have to find that one thing keeping you from really getting further in the game. Not that this hurts the game since every single one of the levels is crammed with enemies and has something to find like a sword to add to your collection or an animal orb. Speaking of animal orbs, animal orbs are little animal like things that you can find in almost every level of the game. Each one has a special ability that can help you throughout the game like Pazzo which points out areas where you can dig and find treasure or food (the game's version of med packs), or Mr.buddy which is probably the least useful orb in the game all Mr. buddy does is help you dig faster and you cant even tell the difference of speed at all..
Some are raelly useful like Pazzo or hawkster which attacks downed enemies which is really helpful, or chicken which increases health, strength and speed.
Now when you level up in the game you can increase either your strength (damage done to enemy) magic (increases magic power and helps you gain new abilitys) health/defense or agility/Bow and arrow (which increases your speed your bow attack damage and how fast you can fire bows.
Before the game starts every single time you can choose a character to play as but if you have leveled up one character a lot then you will probably want to stick with that one character for the rest of the game.
After you beat a level you can travel to that place when ever you want by just using the game map, if you have ever played an of the super mario bros games before the map is pretty much just like that.
Now the weapons also effect your your skills. Like the bigger weapons will boost you strength but lower your magic. Smaller ones with increase you agility and magic but will decrease you strength. Believe me when i say this... There are lots of swords in this game even though some are pretty ridiculous like the frozen chicken sword or the umbrella sword or the most ridiculous one of all the lobster sword... Yeah i know dumb.. but still its funny to cut an enemies head off with a lobster or umbrella. Now about cutting enemies heads off. there is gore but obviously not enough to make it rated M but still enough to satisfy you gears of war gore fans.
There is four player co-op and four player multiplayer online AND off. But the thing is the game has not even been out a year yet and nobody even plays online.. but still its fun to have your character fight against your little brothers character.
And the game is a lot easier playing co-op since there are some really tought boss battles that would probably be impossible if it were not for co-op. The boss battles are still tough even still during co-op but it is a lot easier. The bosses are extremely memorable even the earlier ones. And the last one will probably be etched in your mind for years to come. Whats cool is that since you can go back and play any level you have already beaten so you can go back and beat the boss again to see how good you do against them this time.
Now smaller enemies drop some coins and sometimes bags of coins but digging is the real answer (you get the shovel about halfway through the game but like i said you can go back and do other levels) most bosses drop hundereds of coins. so you can do the bosses over again to get lots of coins in order to buy health potions, weapons, and animal orbs.
The campaign may last you 4-6 hours but since you can go back and play any level over again and with all the stuff to find and you may just want to level up.. Replay value is endless.