Monster Story: New RPG meets Angry Birds

Monster Story
Monster Story is a brand new game launched today by Phoenix Age, the developers of one of the early RPGs to hit Facebook, Castle Age. Monster Story is a very interesting hybrid of many popular games. It brings in the treasure seeking aspect of a game like Treasure Isle, brings in a bit of Pokemon style pet battling, and uses the Angry Birds style mini-game for its combat. While it's still early and it's not perfect, this game has definite unique potential to be a standout hit for a more core type of gamer on Facebook.

Each player has their own avatar and can pick between a male or female. Each avatar starts with one pet that is used for battles. This pet can be upgraded and enhanced, and new pets can be found along the way. A player's avatar traverses across different game maps, taking quests from NPCs and digging/clearing through squares to find new weapons and armor, coins, and XP. Along the way there are monsters that stand in the way that need to be battled.
Battles in Monster Story are entirely a clone of Angry Birds. Your pet has a bow and arrow that you aim with the mouse directly at the enemies. Defeating the enemies is done by simply causing them to fall or be squished by the structure they are standing on. Fights earn the player XP and items. Boss fights use a slightly different mechanic more similar to Worms in which you have to aim at an NPC's pet across the screen and hit it enough times to deplete its health bar. Combat is more engaging than many Facebook games which are a simple random dice roll or click fest. Stars can be earned depending how quickly and expertly you defeat an enemy, and you can always go back to challenge the enemy again.
As mentioned above, Monster Story has an inventory and paper doll system not dissimilar to other roleplaying games. You can deck your avatar out with new weapons and armor, which can be found while adventuring and digging or purchased from the store. Items have statistics on them such as attack power and defense, and some have special status such as +firepower or +ice power. Items can be purchased for gold or for Monster Cash, the hard currency within the game.
Overall, the game has a cute art style that is polished and stylized. The entire game feels pretty good to play, but given that it's early there are definitely some bugs to be had. I had a ton of fun with my first experience playing the game,enough to make me want to log in and keep going. The quests, new pets, and battles make it fun to actually sit and play the game for awhile. I managed to use my energy wisely and keep my first session going for over a half hour before I needed to wait awhile and regenerate. Monster Story is a really neat concept that takes some of the best features from other games and combines them in a way that feels new and fun.