シャイニング・フォース フェザー (日03)

Day three, err, yeahhh~

Finally recruited both Teida and Yurias last night, but haven't really gotten anywhere past that, on accounts of abusing the existence of the training room (side quests, as well). By this point, a number of things are unlocked, ranging from weapon upgrades (which operates in an eerily similar fashion to the system in Tales of Hearts) to training room boosts, and so on.

Anyhow, Teida's actually a valuable asset to the Force, right off the bat; she plays like a wolf man (well, she's a cat girl, so, yeah) in past Shining Force games, meaning she comes prepackaged with high strength and agility, much like my build of Jin. Additionally, her movement rate's also pretty high, coming around second only to Beiru; not only that though, her Force MAX ability plays out like Jin's, too, being a standard area-damaging attack, making her even MORE valuable than normal. Overall, her strength is slightly lower than both Jin's and Beiru's, but her agility certainly compensates for it; the only major downside so far is how hard she tends to get hit, even with decent equipment.

Yurias, on the other hand, doesn't really strike me as anything stellar. He's your standard magician with your standard map-based spells, complete with ridiculously low defense; however, the main drawback is that boosting up his spells (in-battle, that is) don't really increase its power, rather its range, meaning that he won't really be hitting hard anytime soon. As of now, he's only dealing out ~200 per spell, as opposed to, say, Beiru's 800/combo.

As far as older characters go, both Jin and Beiru become surprisingly more handy with a weapons boost or two. Boasting well over 120 attack, Beiru really serves well as a sweeper unit, cleaning up any enemies that don't die from Jin and Teida's assaults. The one drag about the game, though, is how easily it can be manipulated - even against higher level enemies, if you keep away, wait until your Force gauge is maxed out, and charge in with Force MAX strikes from Jin/Teida (as of now, Jin's is dealing a solid ~1400 per strike), very few enemies wind up surviving; of the ones that do, you can just have Beiru or Miriam pick 'em off easily. Speaking of Miriam, her personality and voice makes a certain raptor's heart melt, even though it's really nothing new.

The story itself is picking up slightly, with the focus on the villains becoming more and more apparent. Again, it's nothing terribly new - Shuuhou was apparently a great leader, until the mysterious Ravinia changed him (A MAN CHANGING BECAUSE OF A WOMAN? UNHEARD OF!); Shizuma and Jin are friends (complete with the whole "oh, we're just acquaintances" deal) on opposite sides of the battle lines; Rongan's honor is tested against the new Shuuhou's questionable policies; and so on. Like mentioned, it's not particularly unique, but it DOES tackle the plot from a great many perspectives; coupled with voice acting (which has gotten pretty enjoyable by this point, heavily thanks to Rush and Miriam), it's actually pretty enjoyable, to say the least.

In relation to the actual game play, Gyaon's antics are hilarious to say the least, and Barbazon's first appearance (and subsequent fight) is definitely an early dose of epic, David and Goliath style. It's really a shame, though, since on that particular story mission, the whole herd of Minotauros at full health was annihilated by Jin's Force MAX (Barbazan was left at, like, ~50 health). Never mind that, though, the presentation's all where it's at! ;;>_>

Oh, and you remember that laser cannon in Shining Force 2? It's not back, but miniaturized as an enemy~ XD

シャイニング・フォース フェザー (日02)

So, day two (granted, it hasn't even been a full twenty-four hours, yet) and most of the initial hype's worn off. Just finished up Miriam's chapter completely and still definitely wishing for more Force members - it's kind of annoying when the old games START you off with, like, ~five, but you're only limited to three in Feather, as of the first few chapters.

The movement in the battle system annoys me more than ever - especially RIGHT after playing through Devil Survivor, the lack of tiles can get pretty annoying, especially when they don't let allied characters move through one another; a high-movement centaur getting trapped in by his own mates? LOLWAT.

Actual battles though, are as much eye-candy as ever, especially once you really get the combo/tag system rolling. Aside from that, overall pacing is a bit slow, at least until you get higher Force regeneration rates; at the initial default of 30/turn, it's far too restricting, especially when that only allows for, like, one or two attacks. In the grander scheme of things, it's a bit more strategic and understandable, as it prevents constant attacking.

As far as actual characters go, Jin is pretty standard and Miriam suffers from bad initial stats (like most other Shining Force archers), but Beiru's an utter tank - crank a few bonus points into his strength and he easily plows through enemies; couple it with his naturally high movement and, well, yeah, you get the idea.

Also, in addition to including a training room (THANK YOU), Flight-Plan was awesome enough to throw in a battle viewer right off the bat. It's essentially like an exhibition mode where you can see how your new formations/attacks fare against enemies you've already felled, but more importantly, it's all the eye candy you could ever want, again and again and again. This is definitely something hand-held SRW games need to pick up on. <3

シャイニング・フォース フェザー (日1.5)

Update. Finally finished the first mission, as opposed to writing all that above while still in battle. ;;>_>

Anyhow, the dialogue definitely got better once Alfin got introduced into the mix, though Jin's still nothing particularly new so far, especially in how he phrases words. To be honest, Alfin didn't strike me as terribly unique, either - her initial introduction scene (where she wakes up) definitely reminded me of combination of Toaru Majutsu's Index and MISAKA, in terms of looks and personality (just without the moe and quirks), respectively.

The game's definitely got a fun factor to it, though; with a battle system as varying as this one, grinding (see: Ji's bad/good? habits) won't be as dreadful. I'm also way excited for more epic enemies, especially with how well they've executed things so far. Boss fights, especially - I've high hopes for those~

Overall though, it doesn't really feel like another Shining Force game (especially the old one), which is perfectly understandable, considering the time gap. It actually feels more like an entirely new addition to the Shining Force family, but still uses its background and elements (centaurs and golems, for example). Don't get me wrong, it's been loads of fun in the entire hour I've played (HAHA), but just don't go into it expecting Shining Force 4 and you're bound to have some fun.

Oh, and the opening? No bearing on the game itself, but I love it~

シャイニング・フォース フェザー (日01)

Long rant short, I've been anticipating a (more) traditional Shining Force game ever since enjoying the original three~four, but being terribly disappointed by more modern additions to the series. Search up physical information yourself, if you're more interested, as this is more or less going to be a long, continuous quasi-journal of thoughts on the game.

Contrary to a lot of the promotional art they put up, the actual in-game portraits don't really grab me as much initially; they're just not as well-defined as, say, Tales designs. Granted, it's not that big of a deal, and the presence of voice acting more than makes up for it. The voices themselves seem slightly above par, after, like, half an hour into the game, but the cast list itself is enough to keep me patient.

Now, about the dearly anticipated battle system, it's really iffy for me right now. The biggest drag is definitely the map movement system, namely removing the tiles SRPG fans are so used to, but it may also just be that I'm too used to traditional styles, so we'll see. On the other hand, the actual battles themselves are phenomenal, easily with enough sprite variance to par with, say, GBA/NDS SRW; granted, that's not saying much, but this is definitely one of those 2D/3D sprite hybrids that HASN'T been an utter failure, at least to me. Characters move flawlessly and fluidly, despite a quasi-complex system (with attacks being comparable to Tales ougis, for example). Specifically in battles, it's definitely a graphical powerhouse, as far as the NDS is concerned... And that's after just playing with two unique units on my side, too.

I will say this, though - the character designs jump out, like, fifty-fold, come actual battles; Jin (and company) definitely look pretty generic via their portraits, but they absolutely shine in battle. Flight-Plan definitely deserves some praise for execution, even being able to convey characters' personalities through how they fight - even with voice acting, Jin's aggressively hotheaded nature doesn't really shine until he charges an enemy. Love Beiru's swords, by the way~

The storyline isn't anything particularly grabbing so far, but then again, few games catch on within the first half hour or so. Anyhow, I'll update this as I go (maybe), especially after I, you know, actually GET Alfin on the team. Definitely can't wait to get more Force members. XD