XSEED had some surprising localizations at this year’s E3, but the one that stood out the most to me was WORKxWORK, better known outside Japan as Heroland. Originally published by Furyu in Japan, this oddball throwback-style RPG has some neat looking systems and one very punchable protagonist.

In Heroland, you play as a tour guide for an amusement park that seeks to replicate the thrill of dungeon exploration. Unfortunately, the first day of the job features no orientation, but instead a prince who was originally next in line for the throne before being demoted to 18th in line. Needless to say, he’s a bit upset, and you have to put up with him. Our demo dungeon wasn’t very long and mixed up talking scenes with a few battles.

The battle system took a little getting used to, as would be expected on the first day of work. The party has the prince, his retainer, and a couple of park assistants who provide “magical” and healing support. Left to their own devices, they’ll attack on their own until the “enemies” are all down, but the guide can issue suggestions on how to handle the combat. These are the typical ones—all out assault, conserve skill points, defend and heal, and so on, represented by flags that the guide puts up. Some of the characters are more independent than others: the magic user was still slinging spells as I had issued a “conserve SP” command in the last fight before the dungeon boss, perhaps because she didn’t really have any other options. Defeated enemies drop souvenirs that can be given to the party to increase their happiness—the extent to which this is useful is still to be discovered—or kept by the guide as a tip.

It took about 20 minutes to complete the demo, with the battle sequences interspersed by dialogue in roughly a 40/60 split. To say the prince doesn’t make a good first impression would be like calling PixArk “slightly mediocre,” but the rest of the party seems nice enough if a little beaten down by the prince. What we’ve seen is pretty well localized, with a couple of good comedic lines. Heroland doesn’t take itself all that seriously, so it’ll be a nice palate cleanser game.

Heroland is currently slated for a fall release.