A great Japanese style RPG for Xbox.
The story is about how the light world and dark world exist parallel with eachother and the dark world tries to consume the light world,so 4 characters will need to find 4 crystals to power a machine that will protect their kingdom from being consumed by the dark world.
The story doesn't have a lot of depth,but I found the characters entertaining,they consist of:-
-Tal,a good-hearted,red haired knight who fights hard in battle but his father always treats Tal like he's a failure.
-Allish,a pretty,blue haired princess who gets bored of the royal lifestyle and seeks adventure.She is bubbly,flirtacious unlike her mother,who is a very overwight,grumpy,bossy queen.
-Elco,is a scientist who works for the royals,he has a German accent and wears eye goggles,a rocketpack,and has high tech lazer/photon weapons.Elco feels guilty for something that happened to a woman he once loved.
-Buki,is a woman from the jungle woman who believes in conserving nature and has a close relationship with animals.
The character personalities are very diverse,and the characters form an interesting party.For example,Elco and Buki will have science vs religion debates.Tal and Allish are clearly attracted to eachother and they begin flirting with eachother a little bit,and as time goes by, their flirting becomes very sexual.
The story has big plot twists and another interesting aspect it has is how the characters will meet their darkworld counterparts.
The combat mixes hack n slash RPG with FPS elements.Tal and Buki uses hack n slash methods to defeat enemies.Allish and Elco use FPS style methods to defeat enemies.A problem is,Elco is too overpowered,because once you level him up highly,his powerful energy weapons will be able to inflict massive damage on multiple enemies from a distance and he can just run away from enemies and keep shooting them with his powerful weapons.
The hack n sash consists of an attack button,block button,allows you to do combos.
You'll control 1 character,and the AI will control the other 3.However,the AI commands you can give the other 3 characters are not balanced.For example,if you tell them to attack,they will attack with no regard for defense.If you tell them to defend,they won't attack at all and will just block.If you tell them to retreat,they will just run away from enemies.There should have been a neutral command that you could have given to the AI controlled characters,which tells them to attack when appropiate and block when appropiate,or perhaps make the attack command still allow the character to occasionally block too.
The game has it's own version of spells,called skill strikes.Some can be powerful attacks,healing magic or stat boosts.Skill strikes require mana for you to be able to use them.I like how the characters say a little rhyme before they do a skill strike,so it sounds like a proper spell.For example,Tal will say ''stand behind me,I shall not fall'' before he casts a skill strike which gives the party a huge defensive stat boost.Allish will say ''you can't resist my healing kiss'' before she casts a healing spell.
You can also do what's called a spirit strike,which is a very powerful attack,that will kill all the enemies on the screen and inflict a lot of damage on bosses,and you can do a spirit strike after you have collected enough spheres that enemies drop after you defeat them.
The levelling system allows you to choose which stats you want to level up (attack power,max HP,max mana,defense,skill strike damage/power etc.).
You can upgrade/customize your weapons(you can upgrade them so they can regenerate health or Mana when you damage an enemy),but you can't upgrade your armor(that is done automatically for you when you reach certain points within the game).
You will need to use each character's unique abilitiy to solve some puzzles.For example,Elco can fly to certain areas(as long as there's a special type of crystal near by to power up his rocket pack for a certain amount of time),Buki can use her daggers to scale walls,Allish and reveal invisible objects and Tal can use his strength to move large objects.
Instead of random battles,when you enter certain areas,enemies will always spawn there and the area will be sealed off until you defeat all the enemies.Although it's good how there's no randon enemies,I hate how you cannot flee a battle and how the area is sealed off until you defeat all the enemies,because when I was making my party wander around so I could find where I had to go next,these hot zones made it so much slower and annoying.
You'll start off your adventure in the kingdom,full of markets,people,giant mechanical doors that open and close when you enter/leave certain parts,and there's a spectacular looking castle and a lot of things to see.You'll travel through the countryside,seaside,caves(dark and aquatic),desert,forest,robot city,snow,volcanic wasteland,dark world etc and many villages.
What makes the game stand out is it's visuals.The world is very beautiful.The country side has lush grassy pains,the villages have cute and colorful homes and you will see blacksmiths pounding their giant hammer making weapons and armor.The world has a lot of detail,such as how you will see some of the animal humanoid people living in little camps outside of villages as if they're shunned by humans.I love the seaside town with the beautiful blue sea in the background and lighthouse,and fishing boats.In the kingdom of Illumina,you will see Elco's science lab,Queen's throne room,Tal's living quaters,soldiers training in the courtyard,you will hear people yelling what they have for sale in the markets and the markets are crowded with peope.The world has so much detail and little surprises,you have to play the game to see what I mean.
The robot city is so charming with robots acting like people who are going about their daiy lives.The robot city even has a bar that robots hang out at! And an observatory that you can use to look at the stars.But you will see how the robots are used as labor,because you will see the robots being used to dig in mines,where the robot city is.
The dark world has a very morbid appearance,with dead trees,the enemies have a more mechanical appearance,the people in the dark world a pale skinned(such as the character's darkworld counterparts).
What gives the game a Japanese RPG style feel,is the world has a cute,colorful feel to it,and so do the characters and the music and sound effects at the menu remind me of a Japanese style RPG too.Even though this game is not a Japanese game.
The female characters wear a small amount of armor,but dress in a way to show off their bodies.I guess you could say,Allish will appeal to otakus with her blue hair,nice figure,cute face,revealing outfit.
The enemies match their locations well.The enemies near the seaside are bright colored like many sea life is,and the enemies in the aquatic caves can resemble things such as giant seasnails or aquatic,mythical creatures.But you will also encounter bandits and see bandits/knights who have been decapitated,and you will see lots of blood and bodies missing limbs.
When some spells are casted,you will see some colorful effects.
At the start of the game,you will be presented with an explaination of the story,told in a poetic way.
I've read people complaining about the wide variety of accents used in the game,but I don't mind it,as it gets boring hearing only British or American accents all the time.I think the character voices match their personalities well and they speak with a good amount of expression.
Overall,a great effort was put into the game,but it's affected by poor AI command choices and Elco being overpowered.However,the use of FPS elements in combat,a visually stunning world and diverse characters make it fun to play.