Difficulty:

Hard

Time Spent:

10 Hours or Less

The Bottom Line:

"Been there, done that"

Strategy RPGs have been relatively neglected on the Xbox 360, and for this reason alone this game is noteworthy. If you do not love SRPGS (FF Tactics, Fire Emblem, Front Mission), this game will not win you over. If you are a fan of the genre, and you have exhausted your options, then this game is worth a look. That's it, in a nut shell.

Music--This game's soundtrack is standard fare as far as Japanese RPGs go. The battle tracks are mostly crunchy guitar riffs with a baroque feel that will remind you of games like Guilty Gear and BlazBlue. The rest of the game is filled with understated tracks that neither enhance nor detract from the experience.

Graphics--Terrible. I realize that SRPGs should focus on a tight battle system and unit balance...but it is most definitely 2010. A retail game released by a known developer should not look like a hastily put together indie game. The character design is standard anime, but the sprites look sloppy and muddy while in battle. The game has very few battlegrounds, and they are poorly done with pixelated textures and odd bits of foliage, that look straight out of Donkey Kong for the SNES, scattered about.

Characters/Story--This should be crucial for any RPG game, in my opinion. The story is far-fetched. Yes, it's fantasy, but the events that unfold do not seem consistent or believable. It's honestly a pretty textbook save-the-world JRPG story that suffers from terrible pacing. You get bits of story after every six or so battles (which amounts to conquering little dots on the map), the battles are fairly long so you will most likely not remember or care about the 30 second snippet of story you are working towards. The characters are one dimensional. The story begins with the main character essentially throwing away his life to save a random girl to whom he has no connection. The rest of the characters feel just as synthetic. The game does not have English voice overs, offering only the original Japanese. Some will appreciate this, but I suppose most wont care. If you play RPGs because you love being immersed in a world with characters that move you, this game will not amuse you.

Gameplay--Oddly enough, there is not much to say. If you have played any SRPG, you will not be surprised, although you might be a little bit disappointed. The battles play very much like FF tactics, but there is no terrain and seemingly no benefit to standing behind/to the side of your opponent. It is a very stale experience. The "new" mechanic in this game is the ability to link together various characters by placing them in certain configurations on the map's tile set. This allows you to string together your characters' turns and unleash very long combos. It's interesting at first, but it does not really add a layer of strategy, because there is little risk involved with leaving your back to the enemy.

On the bright side, this game is very long. If you love SRPGs and a bland story with standard characters does not disturb you, then you'll get a lot of mileage out of this one. For all but the die hard genre fans: this is a pass.