You get lost in the world of Eternal Sonata but some quirks make it a little less appealing.
The world within Eternal Sonata is filled with beautiful palates of color and design. There is absolutely no difference in gameplay graphics to cutscene graphics. Eternal Sonata uses a turn based fighting style BUT...with some positive changes! First of all, during each party members' turn they have a set amount of time to run to the monster they want to attack and to attack it and/or use any other skill or item. Magic users within your party do not have mp or anything, the use of spells are only restricted by the amount of time you have during your turn. Another very cool addition...there are light and dark areas within the fighting area, when you are standing within a light area you can use a light attack/light skill and when in a dark area or an enemies shadow you can use dark attacks/dark skills.
As you go on your journey throughout the game and after completing a certain task (like beating a boss) your party gains a "party level", when you gain a party level your party gains more benefits for battle but sometimes a negative aspect as well since the positive ones are so good (like you now get to chain your skills with those of your party members during one turn buuuut...once you do your command buttons change).
The problems I had with the game were basically just little issues or annoyances. It seemed like there were some majorly long and unnecessary pauses during cutscenes making the feeling of the scene a bit awkward... Another this is that the characters (especially the younger ones) seem to use some way too expressive hand motions that are just way too corny. Then when a certain person losses a certain love of his he doesn't even get emotional about it! HIS LOVE DIED and his voice doesn't even crack! Then he sees that love again and what does he do? He talks to her like he just saw her 10 minutes ago and like shes never been DEAD!!! That part....rrrr....it made me have a "wtf" moment. The biggest issue I would have to say was the ending...it was the most confusing ending I have ever experienced with a game. It probably would have been less confusing if they focused more on the myth of astrals and magic users and less on count waltz.
I liked the educational cutscenes talking about Chopins real life to tie it into the story of the game; I actually learned about his real life!
Overall I liked the game but it wasn't without some flaws; I can see others overlooking most of the issues that I had with it but either way I say that Eternal Sonata is definitely worth playing!