Record of Agarest War Mariage – 50% grinding, 50% fanservice

I haven’t played any of the ‘regular’ Agarest Senki SRPGs, but I heard this was a standalone game so I approached it accordingly. Record of Agarest War Mariage fits into a long tradition of what I call “harem RPGS.” This genre mainly covers RPGs that feature one clueless male protagonist with a party full of beautiful, economically-dressed ladies who are falling all over themselves to win his affections. If you’ve played Shining Hearts/Blade or any of the Ar Tonelico games, you’ve played one of these.

While some harem RPGs introduce one or two other male party members for those gamers who like an extra sausage with their eggs, the most brazen ones (Tactics Layer and Motto Nuga-cel come to mind) don’t even bother letting the main guy take part in battle at all. Sometimes they don’t even show his face. He just functions as a “tactical adviser” or supervisor or something. Either way he’s still the leader of the pack and everyone else exists to please him. Now that I’ve said all that, you should know what to expect from a game like Agarest Senki Mariage. If you still don’t, a picture speaks a thousand words: Do please go on, this is most interesting →

Infinite Loop: Kojou ga Miseta Yume – Fun, but could have been better

infinite loop kojou ga miseta yume_frontStory: Kojou ga Miseta Yume = “The Dream the Old Castle Showed Me.” This visual novel from Nippon Ichi Software tells the tale of a prince who dies right before his crowning ceremony and finds himself cursed (or blessed) to relive the next few days over and over again as a ghost. By silently haunting the remaining inhabitants of the castle, Will hopes to solve the mystery of his own death and prevent multiple tragedies from befalling his family, his friends and the rest of the country at large.

Gameplay: Prince Will can only haunt people, he can’t actually possess their bodies and force them to do anything. But by following them on their daily routines over the next 28 days, he can learn their plans and problems and gather certain “keywords” from their conversations that can be shown to them as dreams, influencing their actions. Will can also jump from body to body using the L/R buttons, thus moving around to various places in the castle. This is essential because some people almost never interact. Princess Vanessa (Veene for short) never talks to Chancellor Nells in the next 28 days, for example. So if you want to get from Veene to Nells, you might have to jump from Veene to Jimmy the palace guard and then to Nells. Or Veene -> Mary the Maid -> Nells. That sort of thing.

Since the game really does loop infinitely as per the title Infinite Loop, permanent failure is impossible. If you do something wrong and get someone killed or fail to stop the tragedies on Day 4/10/16/22, you just get sent back to day 1 to start afresh. That said, it is all too easy, especially for people like me who are terrible at this logic thing, to get stuck in a pattern where you know what is wrong, but you don’t know how to stop it. That’s where a FAQ comes in handy: http://gamepukka.com/guide/g165_infiniteloop/il02-chart.html If you can’t read enough Japanese to follow the FAQ, you can’t read enough Japanese to follow the game either, so nothing of any value will be lost. Do please go on, this is most interesting →

Last Ranker review (spoilers, unfortunately)

last ranker_frontHave you ever played an RPG and for the first half it was so much fun you couldn’t stop playing, then the last half was pretty meh and draggy, so much so that you didn’t feel like finishing it and had to force yourself, but then when you finally finished it you were glad you did? Long lead-in sentence, but I’m sure anyone who’s been playing RPGs for a while knows what I’m talking about. I’m still a fan of Last Ranker and I would still recommend it to any fan of action RPGs, but it didn’t quite live up to the promise of the first 15 hours or so.

But first, all the great things about Last Ranker. The graphics are awesome. Bright, happy colors! Varied locations, interesting character designs, a little heavy on the palette-swaps but still within acceptable limits. I posted lots of screenshots last time and will do the same this time, just in case you still don’t believe me. Basically Last Ranker has some of the best graphics on the PSP, all without having to cover most of their outdoor locations with fog (shame on you, FF Type-0). In keeping with the colorful palette, the mood of the game is also… not quite light, but never too dark and heavy either, even towards the end. It’s actually pretty funny sometimes.

The soundtrack is excellent as well. Like, I don’t normally notice soundtracks in RPGs, but this time I had to stop and google who did the soundtrack. Yoko Shimomura, the google told me. She’s good. Not that every tune was 10/10, but everything gets an above-average mark and the best themes were really, really good. The voice acting was great as well, but some of the later-game dialogue was just so cheesy that it didn’t matter. The pacing of the speech also felt a little ‘off’ somehow, with people taking unnaturally long pauses between sentences. Overall it was quite good, though. Do please go on, this is most interesting →

Antiphona no Seikahime – Sugar and spice but not very nice

antiphona no seikahime_frontI didn’t like Rhapsody: A Musical Adventure, so what made me think I’d enjoy its sequel? Answer: nothing. Which is why I didn’t bother giving it more than 2 hours and 30 minutes of my time. I have a poor track record when it comes to enjoying Nippon Ichi Software games anyway, so I find it pretty easy to give up on their games. Speaking of which I’m supposed to give Disgaea a last chance this year, aren’t I? Hmm… We’ll see.

Since I didn’t waste too much playing Antiphona no Seikahime, I’m not going to waste much time reviewing it either. Instead I’ll make do with the few points below.

What was good

+ The story was simple and quickly-told: the bad guy has stolen Miabelle’s sister’s voice and she’s going to get it back with a little help from her friends.
+ Bright, happy colors!
+ Cute character designs
+ The characters themselves are okay.
+ The world looks fun and laidback.
+ Even the monsters are cute.
+ It’s easy and is probably aimed at pre-teens rather than people like me. Do please go on, this is most interesting →

Last Ranker – Show-and-Tell Edition

Good old Imageepoch. They make some terrible stinkers when they’re working on their own, but the games they make for other companies are usually pretty good. Case in point, Last Ranker. I wasn’t expecting much when I saw the surly-faced main character, but it has given me a very pleasant surprise. The other characters could use some work in the ‘likeability’ department, but they’re all memorable. I really like the real-time-turn-based battle system, though skills are a pain to handle. The graphics are cool, the music is decent, the jury is still out on the story.

I’m about 15 hours in and I expect to be done any minute now. I’ll save a full review for when I’m actually done. I took a lot of screenshots when I first started the game, so I’ll just post them here by way of introducing Last Ranker‘s gameplay, then I won’t have to explain myself come review time.

Story: A boy named Zig gets tired of life in his village and runs off to the city to make a name for himself. He becomes a Ranker, i.e a fighter that goes around fighting people, doing quests and keeping law and order in the world. Rankers are ranked, aha, from 1 to 95,008, from strongest to weakest, and the top 7 rankers rule the world. If you can beat a ranker, their rank is yours. Zig started out at 95,000 but has now clawed his way up to 8,397. I’m slightly bummed that I didn’t have to defeat 80,000 other rankers to get there, though. Do please go on, this is most interesting →