Summon Night: Twin Age Impressions (Now with screenshots!)

Overview
The “Summon Night” series has been all but coherent throughout the years. Starting as a strategy rpg a la FF Tactics, the game has changed quite alot since now, when it’s latest installment, Twin Age, is making it’s debut on the DS. Nintendo’s portable money printer isn’t short on good rpgs, so what could Twin Age bring on the battlefield to make it more compelling than his brothers?

Story
In a mystery world where the spirits are the prevalent form of energy and humans are some evil form of life, Aldo and Reiha, two young siblings, fight in unison to unfold the many strange happenings that their land is facing. Twin Ages follows what is standard in the jrpg universe: while not revealing a particularly interesting or thought out storyline, there’s nothing overly done in the game, resulting in a predictable and sometimes boring story, but nothing to really complain about. Every dungeon you crawl through will initiate a series of dialogue sessions, which is where most of the story unfolds. It will probably take you over 20 hours to complete the main story mode and all of the side quests, but nothing can stop you from spending more time with Aldo and Reiha.

Visuals and Sound
The sound, just like the story, remains in your typical jrpg standard. Catchy tunes will guide you through most of the dungeon crawling. It’s nothing extraordinary, but it’s no reason to turn the DS’s volume off. The game has a decent amount of subbed which is generally genuine quality, a rare feature in a handheld game.

The visuals is where Twin Age really excels. As you might have noticed, the game sports some beautifully rendered anime/manga art, the in-game sprites are very high quality figures and every cut scene sports some very nice drawings. You’ll never see the quality drop throughout the whole experience, a definite plus in the style department.

Gameplay
Twin Age is, to some extent, a level grinding dungeon crawler; that doesn’t mean it isn’t a fun game.

The overall difficulty is, in fact, not demanding. You’ll almost never be forced to spend too much time in one dungeon trying to get stronger. Each of these dungeons is divided in short bursts and ends with a boss and a dialogue event. A convenient save system lets you save at pretty much any given moment, making the game perfectly portable.

Everything is done via the touch screen. The world map is stylus guided and every menu in the game has a simple and easy to use interface.

You can play as either Aldo or Reiha and switch from one another at any time. Doing so completely changes the way you play the game, even though their skills are used in the same way.

Your character starts attacking an enemy once you tap on them with the stylus and will not stop until the enemy is dead or you give a different command. Skills develop via a smart skill tree in which you spend the points you gained from level ups to buy new moves or powers. These abilities can be activated once you put them in your canvas, a set of two columns (one on the right of the screen and one on the opposite side) where you can set skills and items for a quick use. Once selected, skills require you to perform a certain action on screen to be activated; these actions are surprisingly vary and sometimes fun to do (i.e. tap an enemy, draw a series of lines etc). Some skills can turn out to be somewhat overpowered, but the overall balance of the game does not change.

Playing as Aldo or Reiha is, as said before, a choice that will completely modify your style of play. Aldo is your typical melee/knight character, meaning that playing him will force you to go up front against enemies and use a series of offensive skills (tap multiple enemies, draw lines of attack, shoot shockwaves). Many of Aldo’s skills are bound to different weapons, for a total of 3 (Swords, Axes and Spears). This means that the weapon Aldo is equipping will not only affect his stats and looks, but also the type of skills you can use. Your canvas can also fit weapons, permitting you to swap into different ones on the fly.

Reiha is, however, a much more strategic and interesting character. As a mage, she sports a long series of skills that vary from offensive elemental strikes (fireballs, water waves) to support and buffing magic (attack up, healing). This means that you can make two completely different characters out of her. While only having one weapon type, the staff, Reiha’s wide array of skills makes her surprisingly fun to play with.

Wherever your choice falls, the AI will play as the second character and succeeds at play decently about 90% of the time.

Along with the twins your team will be able to widen with other support characters that are not playable nor equippable, but come quite in handy, especially in some of the tough boss battles. These characters are quite numerous later on in the game, and choosing from one another could be simply about your own simpathy for the characters.

At the end of each game chapter, you can choose to spend some time with one of your party members. Doing so raises there support rank, a level each extra character has which evaluates their affection for your main character. While it’s nothing game breaking, it’s a nice and welcomed little feature.

Conclusion
Twin Age is the perfect game for the JRPG fan who is looking for something different. While it is no digital masterpiece and while it’s nothing astoundingly revolutionary, the latest episode in the Summon Nights series presents itself with some great art, solid gameplay, decent story line, giving a smart and enjoyable experience. Now, if only those cutscenes were skippable…

TWEWY (DS): My Impressions

Since I’ll never find the time to write full fledged reviews, I’ve decided to open a “My impressions” category so I can post up some semi-reviews of sorts. The first victim will be my latest portable pass time, the Square Enix RPG “The World Ends With You”.

Overview
At first glance, the game seems little more than a pastiche of all the things that have made the famed Japanese RPGs a massive successes in the past. There’s not one stereotypical JRPG character you won’t find in TWEWY, nonetheless the game manages to give you a unique experience that is both impressive in its use of the Nintendo DS’s capabilities and compelling in its storytelling.

Story
I suck at shortening stories, I’m gonna have to quote gamespot on this one.

The story itself is a little The Matrix, a little Battle Royale. The game follows main character Neku Sakabara as he’s forced to play The Reapers’ Game, a sinister competition in which the (mostly) evil Reapers assign players like Neku a task every day for seven days. Fail to complete the task within the set time limit and the player is completely erased from existence. Strangely, none of the other inhabitants of busy Shibuya can see Neku or the other players, although a mysterious pin that Neku finds on his person when he first wakes up in Shibuya lets him read people’s minds. What’s even more disconcerting are the large groups of strange creatures now roaming the streets. Although normal people can’t see these creatures–called the Noise–they can see Neku, and they’re out for blood. Along the way, Neku is forced to make pacts with other characters because forming these bonds and fighting in pairs is the only way to deal damage to the Noise.

There are some genuine twists in this game’s intriguing story, and there is also plenty of heartfelt emotion from its teenage protagonists, which makes for some truly touching moments. The themes explored here–finding your identity, overcoming insecurity, teen angst, coping with guilt, the weight of obligation–are nothing new for a Square Enix game, but they seem somewhat more resonant and identifiable because they’re coming from characters who use mobile phones, eat fast food, and who do other things that ground them in the same world we live in.

The single player campaign can span out to around 10 hours of compelling story, but you can be 100% certain that you’ll be replaying the game once you finish the main storyline.

Visuals & Sound
At a first glance, what really stands out in TWEWY is it’s ambigous location. The game’s story unfolds in the happy-go-lucky shopping and fashion district of Shibuya, Tokyo. The presentation of The World Ends With You impresses right from the game’s beginning. Graphically, the game just sparkles, and its stylized version of Shibuya pops with color and detail. Large, colorful character models with speech and thought bubbles are used for the game’s many cutscenes, and the battles sport some pretty effects.

The soundtrack had me initially wondering where my ipod was so I could just listen to my own music before my ears would start bleeding. After some time I decided to give the game one more chance and, I must confess, I was a bit surprised.
Squeenix managed to fit all kinds of trendy music into the game so that even if you hate 90% of the music out there, you’re bound to find one or two tunes that you’ll enjoy. The sheer quantity (and quality sound-wise) of the audio content makes every other ds game out there cry in shame.

Gameplay
Down to business, how does it play?
Luckily enough, The World Ends With You has enough originality in it to make every aspect of it enjoyable and fresh. Traversing the world of Shibuya is done through the stylus and touch screen, but battles are where it gets more complex. The game’s setting might be somewhat of a departure for a Square Enix game, but the combat is a completely new take that uses both of the DS’s screens at the same time. Neku and his partner share the same health bar, while the Noise they’re fighting appear on both screens at once (although not necessarily in the same location). On the bottom screen is Neku, whom you control via different directional swipes with the stylus on the touch screen. Neku uses objects called psych pins to attack, and each type of pin requires a specific move with the stylus to unleash its power. These moves can include rapidly tapping the screen, performing slashes across enemies, quickly scratching empty space, drawing circles with the stylus, and more. There are also some pins that require you to yell into the DS’s microphone. You’ll be able to collect over 300 pins, in which we can distinguish about 20 different abilities (the different pins differ in brand, aspect and stats). Neku’s partner fights on the top screen and is controlled via a simple (but not too much) combo system which works out with the D-Pad (or buttons if you’re a lefty).

Double real time combat can (and will) be quite confusing at first, but the people at Square Enix came up with a couple of feats that can simplify your first steps into the game (or even make them harder, if you’re some kind of sadist). Not only can you change the game’s difficulty on the fly, but you can also apply minor tweaks like playing with less than your max hp so that the battles get tougher and more rewarding.

One minor plague can be found in the game’s multiple choice dialogue system, which appears to make no sense since it forces you to choose every single viable option before proceeding through the story line. While it is what it is, a minor annoyance, it can really get to your nerves when everything else fleshes out so well.

Conclusion
The World Ends With You is what I would call a patent factory, it’s so rich and full of novel ideas, they could all easily make it into games of their own. The beautiful storyline, wonderful art and strong gameplay are guaranteed to get you coming back for more every time you turn your ds off. Oh, about that. Did I mention that your pins get experience even when the game is off?