I’ve had a really fun time with this game! I didn’t get all the subquests and didn’t find all the hidden dialogue, but I got all the optional chapters and clocked in at around 25 hours of gameplay. There’s not much variety in terms of game mechanics or minigames, but the base concept is so solid that I didn’t get tired of it until the very end when I found out I had missed two optional chapters before the end.
The voice acting in this game is amazing. I can’t think of a single instance of dialogue that made me cringe, all the performances are fine at worst and genuinely enhance the game experience at best. Like mentioned previously, it consists mostly of British accents.
Two names I want to highlight are Blake Ritson and Colin Ryan. The former has voiced a couple of Dark Souls characters, Alvis in Xenoblade and Aymeric in Final Fantasy XIV. Here he voices Jirall, a member of another royal lineage set to marry Callista before Zael arrives and messes up everything. He is the usual high and mighty yet cowardly minor member of a rich family you’d expect to see, but Blake really puts on an amazing performance and gives some nuance to his descent into madness.
The latter is most well known for his performance as Alphinaud in FFXIV, and his voice as Yurick here kind of sounds a lot like it (though respecting the nuances of the character). I might be a bit biased because I like Alphinaud, but I also think his performance is very good. He manages to nail the specific kind of apathy someone like Yurick would feel toward the world, and keeps his playful arrogant tone present even after the warming up.
The characters play off each other extremely well. You’d think having two pervert drunkards in your main JRPG party would make the experience unbearable, but my favorite lines of dialogue came from these two. Syrenne is blunt and simple minded (not in a bad way), making her character great for demonstrating how the war affects the common people. Lowell is mostly pure comic relief, but it's a high quality one, and he does have some sentimental moments towards the end of the game.
Dagran is probably the weakest of the cast, but only because his role throughout the story starts to rapidly decline as the game goes along until the very end. A good handful of chapters have him be on the sidelines or completely absent, but for good reason. He’s the most down to earth out of the cast, so his commentary could get boring if it weren’t for the wackier side of the party bouncing off him.
Zael is fine. I can see some people calling him generic or boring, and I wouldn’t exactly disagree. As the main driving force of a JRPG, he’s what you think he’s gonna be. No crazy twists, no super unique backstory – just a boy, his sword and his forbidden love.
When I heard that there were 44 chapters in total, I thought my playthrough would be at least 50 hours long. But the definition of a chapter here is different from the usual JRPG format. A chapter is usually only a couple of combat screens, a full map, or a breather in between those. And I like it! It gives focus to the moment-to-moment gameplay, having each encounter feel unique and well planned. There are no random enemy encounters, but there’s optional ones that you can do as many times as you want.
The combat system is probably the most unique aspect here. It’s mostly in real time, but with a focus on strategy. By default there is no attack button, you simply run up to enemies and Zael attacks them with his blade automatically. You can also use his crossbow to shoot enemies and survey the environment for setpieces that can be used to your advantage.
There’s a variety of enemies, but most of them are humanoid and have a clearly defined role: mage, healer, archer, warrior, or leader. This is where the tactical part of the game comes from. The strategic aspect comes not so much from what attacks you can use, but what kinds of enemies to attack first and how to get to them. If you’re familiar with RPG tropes, you’d correctly guess that killing off the healers and mages is your number one priority. Each enemy encounter has them in unique formations and environments that make that goal different and more difficult each time.
Of course, this system isn’t perfect. Your mages in particular have the tendency to get stuck in positions where their spells are hitting walls instead of enemies, and some of the combat situations are mechanically unfair due to your attacks having lower priority and speed than your enemies later on. But I wouldn’t say it’s a hard game overall – in fact I had a very easy time with it until the final boss. I’ve made use of the optional enemy encounters a couple of times, but mostly because I was excited to see the new combat situations I’d be put in and not for grinding.
The exchange of mechanical depth for positioning and theoretical strategy based gameplay isn’t for everyone, though. I’ve seen some people complaining that the game is too boring or repetitive for them and I can understand that. The controls also aren’t perfect, but I can’t say much since I was using the classic controller setup (and also emulating the game). One thing I’ll say is that aiming sucks with the joystick, and also that, even if having attacks be done automatically is the best choice in my opinion, there are moments where you want to weave through a crowd of enemies but you keep hitting them instead because of the proximity.
The music is fine! A lot of the songs aren’t very memorable outside of the game, but they blend into the environment well enough that they still enhance the experience in the moment. There’s a handful of songs that are memorable even without the gameplay though, such as Dance of the Dead and Invitation to Madness. By the way, the music was composed by Nobuo Uematsu! The Final Fantasy guy.
And finally, the graphics are really pretty for a Wii game! There’s some places where the textures look like mud, and I can’t say I’m particularly impressed with a lot of the character textures, but the environments are very well done. It’s one of the few Wii games that utilizes shaders to their full potential, and it shows. While sometimes they can make the scene just look blurry for no reason (the rain effect in particular is very funny), the lighting is phenomenal and the VFX are pretty elaborate.
There are a lot of minor complaints that pile up and make me not give this game a full rating, but they're very closely tied to the story and if anything I want more people to play this game and give it the recognition it deserves.
The voice acting in this game is amazing. I can’t think of a single instance of dialogue that made me cringe, all the performances are fine at worst and genuinely enhance the game experience at best. Like mentioned previously, it consists mostly of British accents.
Two names I want to highlight are Blake Ritson and Colin Ryan. The former has voiced a couple of Dark Souls characters, Alvis in Xenoblade and Aymeric in Final Fantasy XIV. Here he voices Jirall, a member of another royal lineage set to marry Callista before Zael arrives and messes up everything. He is the usual high and mighty yet cowardly minor member of a rich family you’d expect to see, but Blake really puts on an amazing performance and gives some nuance to his descent into madness.
The latter is most well known for his performance as Alphinaud in FFXIV, and his voice as Yurick here kind of sounds a lot like it (though respecting the nuances of the character). I might be a bit biased because I like Alphinaud, but I also think his performance is very good. He manages to nail the specific kind of apathy someone like Yurick would feel toward the world, and keeps his playful arrogant tone present even after the warming up.
The characters play off each other extremely well. You’d think having two pervert drunkards in your main JRPG party would make the experience unbearable, but my favorite lines of dialogue came from these two. Syrenne is blunt and simple minded (not in a bad way), making her character great for demonstrating how the war affects the common people. Lowell is mostly pure comic relief, but it's a high quality one, and he does have some sentimental moments towards the end of the game.
Dagran is probably the weakest of the cast, but only because his role throughout the story starts to rapidly decline as the game goes along until the very end. A good handful of chapters have him be on the sidelines or completely absent, but for good reason. He’s the most down to earth out of the cast, so his commentary could get boring if it weren’t for the wackier side of the party bouncing off him.
Zael is fine. I can see some people calling him generic or boring, and I wouldn’t exactly disagree. As the main driving force of a JRPG, he’s what you think he’s gonna be. No crazy twists, no super unique backstory – just a boy, his sword and his forbidden love.
When I heard that there were 44 chapters in total, I thought my playthrough would be at least 50 hours long. But the definition of a chapter here is different from the usual JRPG format. A chapter is usually only a couple of combat screens, a full map, or a breather in between those. And I like it! It gives focus to the moment-to-moment gameplay, having each encounter feel unique and well planned. There are no random enemy encounters, but there’s optional ones that you can do as many times as you want.
The combat system is probably the most unique aspect here. It’s mostly in real time, but with a focus on strategy. By default there is no attack button, you simply run up to enemies and Zael attacks them with his blade automatically. You can also use his crossbow to shoot enemies and survey the environment for setpieces that can be used to your advantage.
There’s a variety of enemies, but most of them are humanoid and have a clearly defined role: mage, healer, archer, warrior, or leader. This is where the tactical part of the game comes from. The strategic aspect comes not so much from what attacks you can use, but what kinds of enemies to attack first and how to get to them. If you’re familiar with RPG tropes, you’d correctly guess that killing off the healers and mages is your number one priority. Each enemy encounter has them in unique formations and environments that make that goal different and more difficult each time.
Of course, this system isn’t perfect. Your mages in particular have the tendency to get stuck in positions where their spells are hitting walls instead of enemies, and some of the combat situations are mechanically unfair due to your attacks having lower priority and speed than your enemies later on. But I wouldn’t say it’s a hard game overall – in fact I had a very easy time with it until the final boss. I’ve made use of the optional enemy encounters a couple of times, but mostly because I was excited to see the new combat situations I’d be put in and not for grinding.
The exchange of mechanical depth for positioning and theoretical strategy based gameplay isn’t for everyone, though. I’ve seen some people complaining that the game is too boring or repetitive for them and I can understand that. The controls also aren’t perfect, but I can’t say much since I was using the classic controller setup (and also emulating the game). One thing I’ll say is that aiming sucks with the joystick, and also that, even if having attacks be done automatically is the best choice in my opinion, there are moments where you want to weave through a crowd of enemies but you keep hitting them instead because of the proximity.
The music is fine! A lot of the songs aren’t very memorable outside of the game, but they blend into the environment well enough that they still enhance the experience in the moment. There’s a handful of songs that are memorable even without the gameplay though, such as Dance of the Dead and Invitation to Madness. By the way, the music was composed by Nobuo Uematsu! The Final Fantasy guy.
And finally, the graphics are really pretty for a Wii game! There’s some places where the textures look like mud, and I can’t say I’m particularly impressed with a lot of the character textures, but the environments are very well done. It’s one of the few Wii games that utilizes shaders to their full potential, and it shows. While sometimes they can make the scene just look blurry for no reason (the rain effect in particular is very funny), the lighting is phenomenal and the VFX are pretty elaborate.
There are a lot of minor complaints that pile up and make me not give this game a full rating, but they're very closely tied to the story and if anything I want more people to play this game and give it the recognition it deserves.
Llamadev
1 year ago