Side Scroller games are the rage now, where most roguelites thrive in the flourishing indie market. This year I've played games like Rogue Legacy 2, and last year, we got Skul: The Hero Slayer. But wait, this is a JRPG game, what has it got to do with roguelites? Quite a bit, actually.
Eiyuden Chronicle: Rising is an Action RPG 2.5D Side Scroller, a lot of genre classifications, but yeah that sums up the game. The best thing for me to say is that the gameplay isn't as engaging or retains the depth that most Side Scroller games do. But the creators of Suikoden had other things in mind, and a variety of things they've embedded in this game makes it really worth playing.
Not only does it wear its novelty of classic JRPGs with grace, but the game does unique things to also modernize itself. Albeit with some vexing caveats here and there. I never played something this endearing in today's time, the game managed to grow on me the further I went into it, I have pretty good things to say about this prequel. If you didn't know, this was based on a Kickstarter campaign for Eiyuden Chronicles: Hundred Heroes. To give a taste for things to come, they've released this as a prologue to the main game.
Right from the get go, the main lead, CJ is enthused for a great adventure, but is off to a really slow start. The small town of New Nevaeh needs help with its economy and is currently inviting any visitors and adventurers they can ask to help out doing quests in order to bolster the growth and development of the town.
There's quite a lot to scavenge from both the forest and quarry, but every time you sell something here, you are charged a 30% adventurer's tax for each item, and will need a license from the town to do all this, thanks to a rather rapacious 15-year-old mayor named Isha. For that license, I have to collect stamps.
The game began pretty simple, I just had fast access to certain locations and playing as CJ, I was a fast nimble fighter, beating up all the creepy crawlies just so some people could give me a stamp for their errands. Yes, my character is very energetic about getting stamps and doesn't care about what people think, despite how exploitive this system seems, funnily enough.
Caught up in this loop of helping out people just for stamps, doing so actually helped the town grow, from people who sell you items, runes, tools, to upgrading/enhancing your gears. Getting the hang of things eventually lead me to team up with a grouchy and cynical kangaroo holding a big sword to venture out with me. It got easier to fight through creeps now that I got someone stronger.
Further I got, the more deeper I have delved into the town's problem. There are an army of henchmen looking for lens from ancient ruins, for some diabological reasons. Because of how fast things are trangressing, Isha decides to also join in my crew. She also has a more personal stake at this, as her father has gone missing after the mining excavation he led.
The character dialogues are so well written, well enough to keep you invested into each of their personalities. This was something a lot of JRPGs in the old day used to, and nothing here feels like some cheap carbon imitation of those. Story is a simple troupe of a young adventurer meeting a ragtag group, then saving the day while uncovering some heinous stuff. But again, it retains so much novelty and charm, kind of hard to dismiss anything it pulls out.
The same, however, can't be said about the gameplay in every aspect.
This is by large, a JRPG. You go to several sections of the map for combat reasons, and you fight creeps and gather resources. This would be reminiscent of a game like Sakuna: Of Rice and Ruin. As that game would require you to gather things to survive each season. There are no elaborate systems here, but as I've mentioned earlier, doing the quests for the townsfolk helps the town grow. Allowing access to better items and gears.
The stamp system is where you have to collect stamps each time you do a quest for someone. There are 3 stages of stamps to fill, and these take up 80% of the game time. And they can got pretty tedious enough for me to lose focus and feel pretty drowsy over playing the fetch quests. Thankfully, earning stamps gotten me rewards of rare resources and also allowed me to face tougher battles, which is important also the main story quests.
The combat is pretty simple, each of the three leads has different defense to attack abilities. It was all about using the right character against the right particular enemies, as CJ's attacks were fast, Garoo can stagger enemies, and Isha can hit them from a distance. After one attack, you can trigger link attacks by using the other's attack command in the right time.
Here's the kicker though, their attack commands also summon them, unless you're in midair or you summon another right after an attack, your character is stuck in a summon animation for half a second, this makes the fast-paced combat feel janky at times and obtuse as well. Also that electrical attack isn't unique to Isha, equipping different runes also adds elemental damage. Gameplay is simple, but it has these nice intricate systems in place that keep it really fun.
All those weren't possible without the hunting and gathering I had to do with my crew. I had funny rants with each store owners, had to do food deliveries, and occasionally help a kid catch some fish in the ocean. It was a bumpy ride, but a really fun trip nonetheless.
I can really see something like this rushed out, just to give people an idea of what Hundred Heroes would be like. But this game has more good going on with it, enough to tolerate the inconsistencies in-between.
I also wish more games had writing and character dialogues that were as engaging as this. Really put things into perspective here.