Just about the best RPG to come out in the past year. It's just plain fun to play.
The combat system in Rouge Galaxy is mediocre, but is its only real down spot. It's basically the same real time system that every new RPG seems to have. It's nice that the battles take place right there on the city streets though and there is no cut to a battlefield. Mostly the battles are simple hack and slash button mashing and the skills system is solid but the same thing we have all seen before. The only real nice features of the combat system are that every character has a main and sub weapon, normally a melee weapon and ranged weapon of some kind. This allows you to switch up your attacks a bit rather than always hacking away with the same weapon. The other nice feature is the action bar, as you attack it runs out. When it runs out completely you have to wait for it to recharge to attack again. Some skills will drain it completely while blocking an enemy attack while waiting for it to recharge will refill it instantly. It keeps you at an even pace yet doesn't run out fast enough to really slow you down and it refills fast enough that you're not out of the battle for too long.
The best part of Rouge Galaxy is the character and item development options. Character skills are gain through what is called the Revelation Flow. You place items in slots to gain abilities. It heavily reminds me of FFXII's license system but done right. Many of the items needed for skills can take time to find, it seems that the items you need a lot of typically are the ones that you don't find that often. It helps your skills progress at a steady pace but often leaves you forced to make decisions on which character will use an item to learn which skill.
Item development takes two paths, the Frog Log and the Factory. The Frog Log is a fairly standard item synthesis system... but with a frog. A frog named Toady joins your party and when you max out a weapons experience, which takes 10 or so battles normally, you can feed it to Toady. When he eats two of the same type of weapon he will synth a new more powerful weapon out of it. It's a fairly simple system but it works perfectly.
The Factory system is rather confusing and intimidating at first but once you get the hang of it you can make some very useful items and weapons. You gain blue prints for items talking to people and must set up the factory to process and combine materials. It sounds a bit simple but at first its very confusing. Once you figure the system out though you'll be making new toys in no time. The Factory also adds a bit of strategy to your item management cause often you will find yourself needing to decide if you should use an item for your Revelation Flows or to make a new weapon or accessory.
The graphics in Rouge Galaxy are perfect. The town and dungeon designs are nothing overly complex but still look beautiful. Characters and monsters are all rather well designed too. Each of your characters has several different outfits to find throughout the game and it gives you a good variety of different looks. My only real complaint on the monster designs is it seems that too often as you progress the the game you fight the same monster, just more powerful and colored different.
The sound was very well done for Rouge Galaxy. I've never been a huge music lover but the music fits well. All the cut scenes and conversations have voice acting and it was well done. The only real downside to the voice acting is your characters randomly say things as you wander around and after a while it gets a little redundant. While it make annoy you after a while it is helpful to remind you of your next goal if you don't play for a few days or wander off on a side mission.
All in all Rouge Galaxy is a lot of fun to play and defiantly worth your time.