Great gameplay, immense character list, weapon creation and truly funny moments make the sub par story acceptable.
When I played this game I overlooked the games weapon creation and battle skills. I started playing on hard-mode with the outlook of finishing Tri-Aces always present final dungeon "The Seraphic Gate". I am a bit of a power gamer and harder modes give me a reason to pull out all the stops and take advantage of all the game has to offer to increase the strength of your characters. In this, Infinite Undiscovery delivers. And when fully utilizing the games battle system and character skills its selling points become apparent. In stead of building on a grand adventure this game gives the player a battle system that is most likely one of the most entertaining any RPG every had to offer. I tend to shun games with random encounters and as this game is real-time you can simply choose to avoid enemies or choose to engage them in combat. I tend to choose the latter. The games battle system is very satisfying and newer battle skills become more powerful and more visually appealing as you level up.
As with other Tri-Ace games, magic is rather underpowered. Either enemies have high resistance or your magic stat simply isn't on par with physical weaponry. It's necessary to have a healer in the party that keeps well away from enemies to be able to resurrect you or other members. Other than that, magic users aren't useful. In fact I played through the Seraphic gate without one. Simple logic dictates: if you kill the enemy before they hurt you, you don't have to worry about taking damage.
This is most likely also the reason why the main stories glory diminished over time. Capells background is rather interesting when it is revealed, but hunting chains attached to the moon with a silly power hungry kid as your final boss is a rather bleak outlook. Tri-Ace usually sets the starting point in some middle of nowhere village with unsuspecting populous and then slowly builds the foundations of some grand device. This is where Tri-Ace takes a wrong step. It's devices are shallow and do not deliver. I have come to accept this after playing countless of Valkyrie Profile and Star Ocean games. For me Tri-Ace builds solid gameplay and since fighting is usually the most time spent on the game it's not a bad thing to focus on. People however complain far too often about how bad the story of a JRPG is. In all honesty only very few JRPG's have a story worth mentioning. Shadow Hearts comes to mind and perhaps a few Final Fantasy titles. In the end though, these games are aimed at young Japanese kids where the "boy who can't really do anything, but becomes a hero anyway (with or without amnesia)" is something that sells. I say, deal with it.
Apart from the large plains the games visuals are absolutely stunning. Time has been well spent on designing different types of countries and villages. Although the size of the larger kingdoms are less daunting than they could have been. As characters enter a city in amazement and speak about its grandeur and size you'll be disappointed to find its a single street with only 3 houses to enter.
I could tell Tri-Ace is trying something different with the animation of clothing and hair. They almost got it right, but not quite. Somehow they forgot that hair is lighter than they depicted and that it has a more natural flow, ie. it moves more slowly. It certainly doesn't move as chaotic as it does when a character takes one step. Maybe they'll get it right eventually. That aside animation is well done.
Voice acting is decent. Aside from Capell everyone's voice is acceptable. Most of the time emotions are well expressed and cut-scenes, although perhaps too abundant, enrich the story.
The Seraphic Gate turned out to be small compared to its counterparts in previous Tri-Ace games. Even so it was fun to reach level 200+ and dish out 60K of damage per hit. Overall this game is well worth the experience and time I put in it. If you're looking to play a game with a compelling and mature story, than this might not be for you. If it's great action and characters you're looking for while feeding your RPG needs then this game definitely fits the bill.