I rented Enchanted Arms (EA) on the grounds that I wanted an RPG that would remind me of the days of turn based and beautiful cutscenes; you're typical, if you will, Japanese RPG. In both good and bad terms, that's exactly what I got, and thankfully a little bit more.
You play Atsuma, your typical main character: in school, lazy, dumb, but your strongest player (so much so that he has to be in your party at all times). He is friends with the monotone voiced Toya, the smart, successful, rich in lineage blooded student with the near offense in stereotype gay admirer. Well, though you do get to enjoy them for a time, they soon leave you for various reasons.
The world goes array when the Golems, machines run on magic, start going crazy and attacking people - and Atsuma, in true dumb main character who wont listen to reason fasion, awakes a Devil Golem; a god like ancient beast that does some pretty nasty things in some beautifully rendered cutscenes.
So that brings me to the first good part, and I'll get through the good before the bad because the bad may take some wind out of me. The graphics are gorgeous. They're smooth, crisp, shiney and the tastiest eye candy you'll ever see...taste...whatever. The cutscenes involving Devil Golems are always visually stunning, it's just a shame there arn't many more cutscenes as I would expect there would be after so many in the beginning of the game.
Control is always hard to rate in an RPG such as this. So long as the character can get from point A to point B without too much trouble, the controls are good, and they are.
Combat is more than I expected. When I heard it was turn based, I assumed something like Final Fantasy. However, what I got was the modern man's version of chess, essentially. Your characters sit on a 4x4 grid and on the other side are the enemies. You can move around on your side all you like, within the designated number of squares your character can move in turn. Then you get to attack with moves that have radiuses based on on many blocks down and across they go. This definatly puts some more strategy in the game - wanting to get as many enemies hit in your attack with as many as your allies as possible and do the most damage you can.
Speaking of allies, along with the obligatory love interest, strong man, and perky young'n, you'll be able to enlist the combat skills of those wacky golems I told you about earlier. By finding them scattered about the realm and challenging them or buying their core in the shops (which are basically just floating purple diamonds...huh?) you can synthesize the machine into working operation with gems you pick up after battle. Every single golem looks great, from the down right awesome take on Odin, to the...Pizza Guy, hm, well, anyway. Finding and constructing them all is reminicent of something like Pokemon, I know, but in a way that's sort of good - the design of catching them all in that game was sound. Admit it.
And now the bad. The sound. Oh my sweet deity, the sound. Such awful voice acting I had the sound urge to just skip through conversations most of the time because of Atsuma's irritating whining and stupid catch phrases, Karin's whiney voice, and Yuki's high pitched nonsense. Really, of the four humans you get, I could only stand Raigar, the brooding big guy, only because his voice is so monotone, there is no room for annoyance. You always get the same battle music again and again and again, and eventually it just sinks into your brain till you don't hear it anymore. But oh my word the voice acting is horrible. I would suggest, if you have ears, to set the game to Japanese so all you have to do is read the things they say and though you'll hear it, in Japanese of course, the voice acting is much better.
The game is very...impersonal. In other RPGs in this fasion, going into town meant meeting interesting people, going into houses, raiding random chests, and going to the local shop to buy from eccentric NPCs. Not here. You can't go into any houses really, and shops are just floating purple diamonds that sell and dont' give idle chit chat. Something so...cold about that.
Story is...bland, I have to admit. Beyond the fact that you live in a world 1000 years after a grand golem war you're about to find yourself in part two of, there's not much to care about. You just go through the motions doing each task after the next, and there's no real thrill in doing that. Mix it up a bit for me!
Difficulty factor...well it's not very hard, really, if you up your character correctly stat wise and don't do foolish manuevers over and over and over again in battle. However, the Devil Golem fights - wowee. They definatly live up to their name: these things must have been forged by Lucifer himself to drive me crazy. You will die in these battles...a lot, and each time you better learn something from it and devise a strategy to win it the next time..or go and level up your party. Even then, you'll need to go through this process plenty of times, and if you screw yourself up with an unfortunate save that has you stuck infront of the boss: you're screwed.
If you LOVE Japanese RPGs, crummy voice acting to bad anime style dialogue and story line, you'll love this game. If you can tolerate the above and enjoy spectacular graphics fun battle systems and battling for your online ego against your friends over Xbox Live - then I would suggest first renting this game. If you're big on achievements, you WILL get them all on your first run through the game. Kind of disappointing, but there ya go.
Create an Account
Member Login
