Amazing game that shows how far rpg's have come while also showing that progress isn't everything.
Aaaah Lunar. Having first played Lunar on the Sega CD back in the days (and not liking it that much), I don't know what pushed me to buy Lunar on the PSX when it was released. Nostalgia? Or maybe it was the complete lack of rpg's released in the past couple of months? I don't know, but I never regretted my choice.
I think that Lunar on the PSX must have had a great revision to its text, because I remember the old Lunar as being a pretty dry game as far as emotions go. But the new one, man, it has one of the best scripts I've ever seen, and it tells the simple story in a way that makes it seem much more interesting than it probably is.
The story in Lunar is quite simple. Alex always dreamed of going on adventures like his hero, Dragonmaster Dyne. And one day, he gets his wish. Although it starts out innocently enough, eventually his little adventure takes a turn for the worst and young Alex must save the world, and the one he loves. Original uh? Not really, but the way the script is written makes up for any inherent simplicity in the story, and because of that, I rank Lunar as having one of the best stories in a game ever based on emotional impact.
Let me tell you that this game will make your eyes watery and your hands sweaty. And you will laugh, oh yes you will laugh.
Gameplay is pretty basic. This is a very old school rpg, ala Final Fantasy 4, where you don't have any choices in the progress of your characters. Battles have an innovative function however, it's like a mix between a typical rpg battle system and a strategy rpg. You can move your characters on the field, and distance is taken into account. So if you have a big and slow character, he will not be able to walk far to hit enemies, and vice versa. Which makes bows kinda cool although they don't hit hard. And near the end of the game, you really see why you need to disperse your characters on the battle field because bosses will start using area of effect spells on you, so watch out! You also have a bunch of those at your disposal though, so group those monsters up and watch em burn :) All in all, the battle system is a breath of fresh air, mostly, but I do feel like the normal monsters you face are too powerful and take too long to kill. I'm a big fan of the 15-20 seconds Final Fantasy style random monsters battle system and taking almost 2 minutes just to kill some noname monsters is just too long. Although, the trick to that is to start using your magic abilities in fights, which makes them go much faster but will cost you a lot of money in mp regenerating items. Aside from the battles, this is your typical rpg system with levels, mp and hp. Nothing special, just classic stuff. It does the trick.
The graphics are old, I mean this is a remake of a 1993 game and it shows. Although it sports nice 2D sprites, and some of the in-battle spells look good, I cannot call this game anything other than adequate looking. Although, it does seem to look slightly better than Lunar 2, i'm not sure why. But who cares about graphics? This is a ps one game not Xbox Next or whatever. They have a certain charm to them but that's it.
Sound is generally very good. I have to tell you, I just LOVE the music in this game, and I love the music soundtrack that comes with it. I've always been a bastard for game soundtracks and this one isn't any different.
As far as voice acting goes, it does what it is supposed to do, but voices on your characters. It works most of the time although it could have been better...especially in battles. Man you will want to KILL your characters, especially Nash, after you hear them say "Check this out!" for the 35th time in a boss battle. They have a special line for every spell they cast and it gets old, fast. The voice acting seems to come true when it matters most however and the music is awesome so this warrant a high score from me.
Overall, Lunar is an amazing game that I think is well worth the price of admission, even though that price is rather high. But you do get a very nice collector's box with it, with an awesome hardcover manual, a 'making of' cd AND a soundtrack cd (weeeeeeeeeeeeee for the music!) ! And don't forget, when you buy Lunar, you buy a piece of RPG history.
A must buy.