Post by Bytor on Apr 28, 2011 16:39:15 GMT -5
-Visuals- 8.5/10
What is good is good...what isn't can be pretty darn bad. The game is basically divided into three different graphical areas. The areas in the space ships and technological areas look absolutely fantastic. I have seldom seen any games that captured a futuristic scientific environment so very well. Everything looks as you'd imagine a spaceship from the future would in a society which is advanced enough to not only traverse the universe but also advanced enough to make the ships and areas they are living, working and traveling in aesthetically pleasing as well. You can almost imagine you are watching a full blown Hollywood sci-fi movie and not playing a video game. The character renditions are also, for the most part, very nicely done as well. Having said that they are certainly typical for the JRPG genre. Girls look hot, aliens look just enough alien to not be human (while still somehow looking hot) and guys have spiky hair and all wear clothes more reminiscent of a Renaissance festival combined with a 1950's sci-fi B movie. But c'mon, you should expect that. Facial expressions and animations were nowhere near as good as I have seen (I swear Lymle is a robot) but also not as bad as I have seen either.. And the good ends...the backgrounds outside of the technological areas is the ultimate in hit or miss. Some of the jungle/forest flora and fauna is at best hit or miss, and more often it's a miss, somehow managing to look like a smoother pixelated PSX game, and to make matters worse the frame rate in battles (and way too often in more crowded "dungeons" drops drastically and has a huge slow down. It's weird actually. It's almost as if two people were designing, both the developers kids and he couldn't hurt the lesser talented ones feelings by saying your work sucks, but your siblings is great! Too bad really. If these environs would have looked better I'd say it's really a great looking game overall, but they are often so bad it simply makes the good look mediocre.
PS those pictures are examples of the good...
-Sound- 7.0/10
Possibly the absolute worst voice acting ever...in any video game...in any genre...actually in any media. I switched it to Japanese and while I didn't understand a word of it I at least wasn't cringing every time Faize and Lymle spoke. Seriously, though, part of the problem was certainly the writing. I understand JRPG's traditionally are overboard with the dialogue and even going to the bathroom is an emotionally monumental endeavor but this sets a new standard...unfortunately a standard in the wrong direction, yes, it's truly that bad.
-Gameplay- 8.0/10
Everyone, and I mean everyone seems to love the battle system. I guess I am in an unreal minority because I thought the battle system, while great in theory, absolutely sucked in reality. Maybe everyone else saw the same glaring faults I did but overlooked them due to the aspects that were good, if so then I suppose it's me, because NO way I could overlook the issues I encountered and be honest about the game. Basically the system is a real time fighting system. This is customizable by using various controls to exact special attacks and/or utilize a mini menu which allows usage of items or various other special attacks. You can also switch between controllable characters by simple use of the shoulder buttons, otherwise the allies in your party (you can utilize three at a time in battle) will preform actions which are preset in the menu. This aspect is really nice as you have ultimate control over the way the battle is fought and switching out allies is simple and quick. Special attacks are relatively easy to accomplish using a "rush gauge" by itself (which supposedly makes attacks faster and also prevents being knocked down as easily) or in conjunction with a "dodge action" which will then enable you to preform a devastating "blindside" attack. All of this is not only great in theory but also works pretty darn well and is pretty easy to accomplish. Now, here's the issues. For one, if you get knocked down (and you will frequently) the game kind of pauses your ability to act for a second or so, problem here is if several enemies are attacking you you can (and will frequently) get knocked down again and again and again and again and again until you are pretty much dead...and yes, it happened way, way to often for me. The other issue is the lack of ability to effectively block or counter attacks, basically it might work, it might not, it's pretty much a crap shoot, strikes me as a tad silly to be honest. Seriously it really is too bad, what could have been a great system to me failed miserably. Now like I said I understand most people disagree with me and all I can think is that they feel the good out weighs the bad...I don't, Character customization is great in this game. The amount of things you can own and upgrade is awesome and fans familiar with the item creation system (and Welch) will love it's inclusion. I found it to be fun, but time consuming and to be honest I didn't think the gains were worth the time and effort. Exact same goes for the many, and I swear there must be hundreds, of side quests. They were time consuming. Really...I have discovered an area and finished it in the main story line but in order to travel back through the area I have to travel pretty much the same way I did the first time? Really? No fast travel (other than through space) at all? Really? Seriously? Man it takes forever and a day to get from point A to point B and a quarter of the way through the game I was absolutely done with side quests that took forever and rewarded me with some experience and money and pretty much nothing else and worse yet added nothing, and I mean nothing to the story. And certainly the story needed some help. Now, don't get me wrong, the game is not horrible, just at times I really wasn't having much fun. A shame, if the mechanics would have worked like they should have in theory then this game would be awesome! As it is it's just pretty good.
PS HOW MANY FREAKING HIT POINTS DO SOME OF THE BOSS'S HAVE!?!?!?!?!?!
-Story- 8.4/10
This starts off as a great story. Unfortunately it degrades very quickly into a typically bad cliche. I mean seriously, what is the point of taking over and destroying the universe? Once it's gone what's left to rule, lol. So there's the end, here's the good part. Earth has basically destroyed itself in WWIII and humanity is living underground. They finally have peace but the Earth's surface is destroyed. In an attempt to find a new home they develop the technology for travel and send ships out into the "star ocean" to find suitable planets for colonization. It really does start off interestingly enough, then steadily but surely it it becomes basically predictable and uninteresting. A shame, Tri-Ace really had something interesting and riveting in the beginning.
-Overall- 8.4/10
What it is and what it could have been. It simply never lives up to the great start. I feel it actually got worse and worse as I played. I'm sure part of that was due to me getting tired of the bad and not enough of the good. And I so, so wanted to love this game. But I didn't...