A RPG that delivers an entertaining story as reward for dungeon crawling and puzzle solving.
Don't get me wrong, I have no regrets in spending over a hundred overs to beat the game... But if I wanted to play a dungeon crawler or puzzle game, I would just pick up one of the few dozen ones gathering dust in my gaming closet. Heck, I would've even just started playing Diablo II instead of this if I had known it was nothing but finding your way through one dungeon area unto the next-- and hey, solve this puzzle and fight this battle while you're at it. Not that there is anything wrong with having puzzles and the occassional dungeon in a rpg, but this game goes a little overboard with over 90% of it's content being a pure dungeon crawl if you think about it(Oh, by the way... if you'll look to the bottom right corner, you'll see that you're about 30% done with this map area... Erhm! I mean player review).
Apart from the gameplay fallacies, this game delivers a nice storyline that makes you glad that you took the time in finishing it. It closes most of the gaps as to what happened to the characters after the events adequately by giving them their own four or so minutes of air time.
All in all, I suppose it is a revolutionary dungeon/puzzle solving/rpg hybrid as it still manages to provide entertainment, good characters, a nice game universe to explore, and hours of enjoyment to behold.
Perhaps if you add your own rules into this game you might get even more entertainment, as I have read about people trying to beat the game without using battleskilles or something. Who knows, it might provide more entertainment other than just spamming "Deminsion Gate" or something over and over again.
If I were asked if I would recommend this game to anyone, I would have to say "yes". While I personally have issues with the dungeon crawling feel it has, it is only because I've pretty much worn that aspect of gaming out for myself in playing countless other games dedicated to it.
Then again, what do I know? I'm more of a computer gamer nowadays, going back to consoles rpgs every now and then just to keep up with the readers of this review, anyway.
Replayability: High
Reason: Battle Trophies, unlocked difficulties, added difficulty -- But I personally took a long break before coming back and dungeon crawling all over again to the end.