Brave Story shines as this summer's sleeper hit, and is undoubtedly one of the best original RPG's to ever grace the PSP
During a summer drought of games coming out, Brave Story might just be the oasis players have been thirsting for.
Pros:
- A solid 3v3 turn-based battle system that will be familiar to anyone RPG veterans
- An uplifting and immersive soundtrack full of light beats
- A variety of plot characters with distinct personalities, with cute and adorable supporting roles
- Beautiful character models, inarguably the best from a technical aspect in any RPG on the PSP
- Does not require much “grinding” (read: it’s a relatively easy/pick-up-and-play game)
- A fun and addictive crafting system, as well as a bunch of mini-games and data to collect for the hardcore to spend countless hours completing
- Witty and funny dialogue (generally speaking)
- Fast, and I mean fast, load times
Cons:
- Random battles are on the frequent side
- No field maps make traversing dungeons a pain
- While character models look great, the field map environments, towns, and world map feel almost bland (by comparison)
GAMEPLAY:
Brave Story: New Traveler is set in the world created by Miyuki Miyabe's manga series by the same name. However, unlike the other, unreleased games that also borrow from the franchise, New Traveler presents an original experience, one that anyone who is not familiar with Miyabe’s works can also enjoy. New Traveler has you play the role of Tatsuya (age 10), who is, in fact, a new traveler (In old RPG fashion, our hero does in fact remain mute). The basic premise of the game consists of you leaving Japan and entering the magical world of Vision in an attempt to save your dear female friend Miki, who is sick with an unknown disease.
Travelers are those from another world who visit Vision, a realm created by the “Goddess,” in hopes of having their one wish fulfilled. Each traveler must embark on an arduous journey with his or her companions, collecting gemstones and eventually reaching the Tower of the Goddess, where his or her wish will be granted.
The story in New Traveler is deep, and the world of Vision does feel like it is alive due to the immersive atmosphere created by the game’s gorgeous graphics and catchy tunes. In fact, you might find yourself actually wanting to talk to the various townspeople in the game to gain a peek into the back-story for BS:NT. While completely optionally, talking to the various starseers (scholar/philosophers) and officials at the local branch will you intriguing insight to topics such as the Goddess and Highlanders. Props to XSEED for doing a terrific job on the localization, keep the majority of witty dialogue (of which there is a lot of) intact. A combination of the solid localization and the world of Brave Story being new to me made New Traveler the first RPG in a while in which I was actually interested in the sub-plot. In addition, much like the various races present in the recent FFXII, New Traveler’s world of Vision offers an array of quirky races including the ankhakin (human), kitkin (cat), beastkin, bankin (gnome) and waterkin (lizard), all of which are unique and different.
The Brave Story franchise is new to players in the States. So then, what does this game mean to the average RPG player? Certainly, BS:NT is nothing revolutionary. In fact, the actual gameplay mechanics implemented in New Traveler are every generic.
The battle system is pretty much ripped from any Final Fantasy and/or Dragon Quest game. Battles are randomly initiated from the field map and consist of three of your party members fighting against any number of enemies in turn-based combat, with the characters with the highest Agility attacking first. Character stats include the usual HP (health points), Strength, Constitution (Defense), Agility (Speed), and Wisdom (Magic). One thing Brave Story does differently from most other RPG’s of our time is the inclusion of BP’s, or Brave Points. Fundamentally, these serve as your typical MP (magic points). However, BP’s are recovered in New Traveler not by using items but by dealing damage to the enemies. This eliminates the need to be BP-conscious because fighting a few more battles easily allow you to regain them. This mechanic in turn leads to relatively easy healing, in fact nullifying much of the use items would have had. It isn’t amazingly balanced, but then again most RPG’s aren’t.
Instead of having the usual Magic spells and Skills for your characters, your party instead uses Bravura and Unity commands, both of which use BP’s. Bravura is essentially synonymous with skills, with each character having his or her own skillset. Unity on the other hand incorporates two or three of your party’s members in an combined attack. These are especially powerful as they deal the most amount of damage in the least amount of turns (it counts as one person’s action), although they will have to be learned by using the same party members for prolonged periods of time. Later on, many will find themselves spamming bravura and unity skills frequently and in concession.
Although New Traveler is not a hard game by any means, the regeneration system for Brave Points does provide a sort of challenge, requiring a little bit of strategy and forethought before charging into hard/boss battles.
Another interesting change is the lack of tem (currency) gained after battle. Instead, monsters will drop item loot which are specifically trophies which you will need to sell to make money. It’s different, and does promote the use of Unity skills (i.e. Partners in Crime) to steal more loot from the enemies.
GRAPHICS:
From a technical standpoint, Brave Story is easily the flagship RPG for the PSP with it’s vivid character models and lush environments. The developer Game Republic (best known for their Genji and the upcoming Folks Soul) has crammed an amazing amount of details and textures into New Traveler (which is a TINY game in terms of size in MB’s). Everything from the shading effects to the twitching of Yuno’s ears (cat-girl, meow!), New Traveler, graphically speaking , is everything you could want from a portable game. It doesn’t hurt that the camera, while fixed the majority of the time, is not intrusive at all.
The game is Japanese, and yes, it is very much based on anime-style art. RPG players used to playing only Western-developed RPG’s such as KOTOR or any other game with more realistic graphics might not enjoy the super-deformed characters in New Traveler, but that is up to everyone to decide for themselves. Miyabe’s artistic presence is clearly felt and represented quite well, and you can’t ask for more than that.
The only downside to the graphics would have to be the subtle difference between the quality of the character models and the environment textures. It seems that Game Republic spent the majority of their efforts into making the characters themselves look amazing, leaving the environment and dungeon field maps and such to look… quite dull. The color gradient isn’t as varied as it could have been, and that in turn does emphasize the dungeon-crawling aspect of the game more than it should. Not a huge deal though, and easily overlooked by most.
SOUND:
You play a 10-year-old boy and your main companion during the game is a young female kitkin around your age who is overly enthusiastic about everything. That about sums up the tone of the music in New Traveler. Beats are varied, but they all share the common theme of being uplifting and fun. New Traveler’s songs are masterful symphonies when compared to the lackluster BGM of the recently released Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology.
Despite the localization being as good as it is, the lack of voice-acting in the game is an extreme letdown. New Traveler’s dialogue just begs to be voiced aloud, and it will frustrate anyone who is interested in the story and characters that all the dialogue has to be read. The only voices in the games are in-battle, for which XSEED was kind enough to leave both the English and Japanese tracks. One has to wonder though, given more money and/or time (or localization by let’s say… Atlus? perhaps), New Traveler could have been even better with solid voice-acting giving the characters even more personality.
VALUE:
The MSRP for New Traveler right now is $40. My thoughts on this? Pick it up. Now. Supporting the game when it’s at full price benefits XSEED, so that they can bring more games to the States in the future. It’s about time someone other than Atlus is bringing over great niche JRPG’s. I would fully recommend New Traveler to any fan of RPG’s. If you’re not, BS:NT will still be something worth picking up by anyone once it drops in price (won’t be for a while).
The main story will take the average gamer over 30 hours to beat, with bare-bone speed runs taking roughly 25 hours and not much less. However, there is much to be said about New Traveler that it gives the player a lot of things to do aside from the main story.
For one, there is a deep accessory synthesis system similar to that found in the Tales or Atelier series. Materials are gathered from defeated enemies and fused together to create enough bracelets, rings and necklaces to open up a jewelry shop. Each piece of jewelry will require a design, which can be found in barrels, chests, etc… and can be disassembled into the parts that were used to created them (no wasting materials). There’s over 100 designs to be found and accessories to be made, and since they enhance your characters’ stats, it would be well worth your time to collect and make them all.
In addition, there’s a bestiary of 148 entries to fill. Hardcore players and completists will want to fill in all the information, and it’s a fun little side goal for those to care. There’s a lot of stealing to be done!
Finally, there’s… bird catching, and brawling (think cockfights). There are forests in the game where you can enter and play a mini-game to catch cute, fat-looking birds, which combine into a mega bird. These captured birds each have stats, and you can fight with them in epic 5v5 battles versus various NPC’s scattered around the world. Defeating each one nets you a feather, which can be turned in for loot later on. You can also trade in your actual birds to members of “SNOB” for various items. It’s not for everyone, and many may think it’s a waste of time but the option’s there.
TILT:
New Traveler has its faults. While I did not bring these up in the above sections, I think it is important to address them nonetheless. New Traveler is a pretty basic dungeon crawler, and while there’s no problem with the camera, there is with field exploration. The biggest complaint from me concerning this game is the lack of field maps. This leads to a lot of unnecessary confusion for the player, and can lead to substantial amounts of backtracking if you are not paying attention. The corridors and pathways aren’t always narrow enough for the whole area to be seen on the screen, and it does get disorienting when you have no idea if you’ve been to an area before or not. Couple that with the frequent random battles and you could find yourself annoyed in minutes.
If you can get the possibility of the above happening, then New Traveler will be a pleasantly good experience for you.
BOTTOM LINE:
Brave Story: New Traveler, while generic in mechanics to modern console RPG’s, offers the most complete old-school RPG experience there is on the PSP. Don’t let the fact that you’re playing a 10-year-old boy get to you, this game is as enjoyable by people new to the RPG genre and veterans alike. XSEED and Game Republic have teamed up to bring you this summer’s sleeper hit. This game literally came out of nowhere and surprised everyone (including me). Don’t pass this opportunity up to enjoy a true RPG.
Reviewer’s Note: Please don’t compare Brave Story: New Traveler to Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology. They are two completely different games, one feature a free-roam real-time battle system while the other is turn-based. Tales is more action-oriented, but also set in the Tales world and not that friendly to people who are unfamiliar with the series. If you want my opinion, they’re both great games (if you’re a fan of the Tales legacy).
SIMILAR GAMES (PSP): Blade Dancer: Lineage of Light, Final Fantasy I, Final Fantasy II, Dragoneer’s Aria (upcoming)
Note: I would not recommend any of the above games.