Despite some interface porblem the core gameplay is solid enough to keep most hardcore fans intreested.
For as long as I can remember I have always loved RPGs, ever since the first time I played Final Fantasy IV on the SNES (or Final Fantasy II as I knew it) but it wasn't until the N64 and Play Station thatI fell in love with the Strategy RPG. The first time I played Ogre Battle 64 I was disappointed. i thought the N64 finally got a much needed RPG but I was confused by what Atlus gave me. I gave up on it for a day or so untill I came back on an afternoon of boredom and didn't turn my N64 off untill well after sunset. Once I picked up on how SRPGs played and the games mechanics I couldn't stop. It quickly became, and still is, one of my favorite Strategy games.
It's been a long time since a game has had that affect one me. It's one of the corner stones of my youth and directly molded what kind of gamer I am. I later moved on to more Tactical games like Final Fantasy Tactics and Advance Wars as Tactics games seemed to become the definition of what strategy games are, at least on this continent. But then I picked up this game, the sole reason I bought a PSP to begin with.
Let me start by saying this game is very differnt from just about any other portable game or strategy game in recent history, well recent North American history. You take the role of a young hero, the hero you play as is determined by which kindom you play as, who sets out to lead an army to unify the world under a single flag the only way they know how; a bloody campaign of death and chaos bending all those who stand in the way to thier will.
Maintaining your kingdom:
When I say this game is different I mean it. You would be hard pressed to find another game like it on any portable. The world itself is set up not unlike a boardgame. There are a number of loacations that range from towns, catsles, towers caves and so forth all connected by a series of grid-like roads. You start off with a sizeable army to command and kingdom to govern. Before jumping right into combat you willwant to working improving your kingdom. You can fortify cities and castles, invest in thier markets to incears income and imporove the shops, apoint generals as resident landlords to defend from invaders and maintain order. There will be some areas where you can manipulate the land to forge new roads for easier access around your kingdom or just change the land type to better suit your army. Mind you nothing is free. Even just maintaining an army will cost you, as each general will require a sallary each month (1 turn = 1 month). This is all just the tip of the iceburg as there will be much more to do such as sending out search parties to find treasure and even more to manage.
To Arm! To Arms!
Now for the fun part, fighting! As your generals move about the map they will either run into enemy generals or random encounters (bandits and monsters). when this happens you will enter the battle mode. Each general has up to 29 infantry type units that protect them. That means you're looking at battles of up to 60 units on screen. When you run into an enemy encounter you will first get some basic stats on the enemy general and what class they and thier infantry are. Next you will choose a formation from a list that best suits the turrain and situation. If none of the pre-determined formations suits you, you can build your own. Finally you choose a battle plan that is normally four options; Crush: Rush the enemy, Wait: Let them come to you, taget Commander: Attack the Commander and ignor the infantry as much as possible or Defend Commander: Protect you own commander by building up as many walls of infantry as possible. after that combat will begin. You can oversee thing by scrolling with the analog but you're not helpless to the AI. As you fight a Limit break type gage fills. It can stock-pile up to three layers so you can use Super Moves or save them. Super Moves are usually either super powerful spells that affect all enemies, status affect powers that will either give you a boost or lower the enemy stats or a combonation of the two. Cambat will end when one general falls. The fallen general is not lost though, merely captured. If you win you can later choose to convert them (different Genrerals will have different odds of persuasion) release them or simply exacute them. It's best not to keep them too long as each turn they will consume money. if you are captured you will need to send a rescue team to save them by defeating thier captor. Be hastey, or lese they may be exacuted before you get there.
But the game is far from perfect. It's biggest flaw rests in it's steep learning curve that will scare off most new-comers and an interface that is as un-user-friendly as it is complex. The menues are made up of commands that are all abreviated into short terms that takes a while to get used to and exacuting even a simple action can become overly complex. It's a shame we didn't see NIS put more work into the game localization to claen up the interface and let the core gameplay shine though. Some may also find the game to be rather easy once you get your head around the interface. Getting lots of high-powered generals can be rather easy later on in the game and battles can often feel quite one-sided(sometimes working against you) compunded with a seemingly random AI (the enemy may sometimes use a healing item before you strike even a single blow). But there is enough depth there to keep most hardcore strategists interested for the most part.
Suprise! Sprites in a PSP RPG!
The graphics are one of the lower points of the game. just like almost all the PSP RPGs to date it uses the mix of 2D sprites on 3D backgrounds adding some nice looking spell effects to the mix. there are some very nice anime artwork durring dialouge and when a hero uses a Super Move (although it's not animated). Even though it was only localized by NIS it does still have that NIS look to it.
Epic tunes:
The sound it great. The map has a nice epic tune to it, battle themes are nice, speech is good, not great but I've heard much worse. It was nice to have the bi-language option of almost all NIS games to play with either English or Japanese.
Overall:
The game has a lot going for it but all is not perfect. there will be some minor loading (only about 3-10 seconds) for battles and there is an inexplicable lag in the appreance of text durring speech. Also this game is not for everyone. It requires a solic investment on the part of the gamer and that's something not all portable gamers will be used to. And there is no tutorial, they thow you in with the assumption that you know what you're doing so a good FAQ or guid is recomneded for first timers, or atleast keep the instructions handy.
Overall though the game is great once you get into it and figure out exactly what you're doing. It also has solic replay value with 10 storys to play though and the Kingdom of Chaos Mode which is a semi randomized "free play" mode with no story where you siply try to dominate the map somewhat like Civilization games.
Highly recomended to SRPG hardcores only.