The third installment of author Chris Farrington’s The Legend of Whomper series opens with the titular protagonist, a chubby blue fox, seeking a healer for his instructor, the Edgemaster (or just “Edgemaster” as he’s awkwardly called throughout the graphic novel). After finding a temple of healers in comas, Whomper dreams of interacting with the rabbit Remmy, one of the eponymous Dreamcrafters, with he and Skyla flying to the jungle to another shrine where they sleep and enter the Dreamscape. Whomper reunites with Remmy while dreaming and is shown a system of visible dreams and nightmares where he can battle imaginary monsters.
Grescam, the Dreamdragon, attacks the dream city of Lagos-4 with Whomper and Skyla training so they can better deal with him. This includes tasks such as the fox fighting a doppelgänger in his dreams. Grescam reappears, after which Whomper travels to the god Lord Hypnos’ chamber, where the backstory on the Dreamdragon is revealed. Meanwhile, Remmy and Skyla battle the Lord of Nightmares, and Whomper retaliates against the Dreamdragon with help from a mystical hammer called the Dreamsmasher. After the conflicts, Whomper and Skyla travel to Hammer Forge, where the latter goes to a bar to discuss her lover’s youth.
The third entry concludes with an entertaining look at Whomper and Skyla in prehistoric life, followed by a nice anecdote featuring minor characters. In summary, I enjoyed this graphic novel, an excellent continuation of its predecessors, given the second entry’s foreshadowing of its events. As before, Farrington’s character designs are cute, colorful, and unique, even if the story isn’t wholly family-friendly. Moreover, issues from its precursors return, like awkward dialogue and punctuation errors. Furthermore, all text is capitalized, making it vague whether important terms are capitalized at their beginnings. The story also didn’t fit my entire iPad, but I would recommend installment number three to those who enjoyed previous books.
-Gaming and reviewing. -Anthro art. -Working on my anthro fantasy stories. -Reading good books. -Interacting people who are actually on my intellectual level and with whom I can relate.
Though Squaresoft’s (now Square-Enix’s) fabled Final Fantasy franchise began in the 8-bit era of video games, I had no exposure to it until the release of Final Fantasy III on the Super NES, which I happily enjoyed and replayed endlessly to the point of exhausting all its secrets. I would discover it was the sixth entry of the series due to Squaresoft’s American branch renumbering the games because of the absence of many earlier entries in English. The company would eventually rectify the numbering, and especially after merging with Enix, milk most of the earlier games financially. The Pixel Remaster collection would be among the latest iterations of the first six entries, with the sixth, Final Fantasy VI Pixel Remaster, taking the most time to release due to some fine-tuning, but was it worth it?
The game occurs a millennium after the War of the Magi when rival entities known as the Warring Triad enslaved humans and transformed them into magical beings called espers before realizing their errors and emancipating them, the Triad petrifying themselves as well. Afterward, the espers exiled themselves to another realm, magic becoming a myth and humans advancing their society through science and technology, creating a steampunk world featuring opera and the fine arts. In the decades preceding the main action, the Gestahlian Empire, headed by its namesake Emperor Gestahl, has dominated the world with a few exceptions.
The ”present” begins with three imperial officers piloting Magitek Armor: Biggs, Wedge, and the enigmatic ?????? (which I pronounce like a Tim Allen grunt), eventually identified as Terra Branford, a magically gifted maiden with a mysterious past, traveling to the city of Narshe to investigate a frozen esper. Several events follow that result in her alliance with the Returners, an insurgent organization opposed to the empire. Imperial Court Mage Kefka Palazzo plots with the emperor to hunt for espers, unseal their realm, and bring magic into the world to tighten their clutch on humanity.
From the beginning, the narrative’s Star Wars inspirations are apparent, given the adversarial empire and rebellion against it. A few plot holes and video game illogic also abound, which include three characters sharing one diving helmet to traverse an underwater trench and cranes from the imperial palace rising to grab the player’s airship when it could have just flown higher. Other tropes like amnesia exist, and the developers excised a scene that had surprisingly remained in the Super NES version’s English localization where imperial soldiers repeatedly punch turncoat general Celes Chere, as it had been from the Game Boy Advance and original mobile versions.
However, the plot has endless harmonious beats, such as the intricate backstory for most playable characters, with each receiving a notable blurb when introduced into the narrative. In the original game’s time, the greater emphasis on the steampunk genre was also a welcome break from the largely fantastical atmospheres of previous series entries. Most luminaries and their interactions are nothing short of endearing, such as the womanizing King Edgar and his martial artist brother Sabin, the mysterious Shadow with connections to Strago and his granddaughter Relm, and the clownish but maniacal Kefka as an antagonist. Despite its derivative aspects, the sixth Final Fantasy’s plot was and remains a pinnacle of Japanese RPG storytelling.
Make the villain a clown, expect a circus
The latest localization, with the original Super NES version’s script a hallmark of translator Ted Woolsey, breathes life into the narrative. The naming conventions are sound, starting with the initial homage to Biggs and Wedge from the Star Wars series (with Woolsey originally mistranslating the former as “Vicks”) and continuing with other reasonable choices such as changing Tina to Terra (since the former sounds exotic only in Japan), Lock to Locke (like philosopher John Locke), magic-based armor to Magitek armor, phantom beast to esper, and so on. Corrections of Woolsey’s other errors like “Merton” to “Meltdown” and Setzer’s opinion of the empire regarding his finances (due to misinterpreting a Japanese idiom) remain from the Game Boy Advance and prior mobile versions.
However, the latest translation isn’t entirely untouchable. For instance, many nonplayer characters have the same dialogue; some lines also come across as awkward, like those during Kefka’s initial scenes when approaching Figaro Castle, along with others by the villain such as “Son of a sandworm!” (where “Son of a…” would sound better) and where he enjoys the sound of voices “screaming in unison” (when “in agony” wouldn’t have been as ridiculous). Lines also abound that Ted Woolsey wrote better like Edgar saying that Shadow would “slit his momma’s throat for a nickel,” retranslated as “He’d kill his own best friend for the right price.” Another is Locke chastising as rude a merchant who calls him a thief instead of a treasure hunter, which was faithful to the Japanese script, but Woolsey rewriting it as threatening to rip said salesman’s lungs out sounded cooler.
Even so, the script lacks spelling, grammar, and name consistency errors, and many iconic quotes flourish. Among them is the running gag of Locke terming himself a treasure hunter instead of a thief, and some of Kefka’s lines like inviting Edgar to “enjoy the barbecue” when incinerating his castle, noting to his troops why oppose rhymes with dispose, and saying the playable cast “sound like pages from a self-help book.” Many characters also sport dialects like Cyan’s Renaissance-era usage of “thou” and “thy” (which leads to Gau, who speaks in pidgin, calling Sabin “Mr. Thou” when the former word comes up) and Setzer’s utilization of gambling terminology. Ultimately, despite its issues, the localization is well-executed and doesn’t impede the plot.
Mechanically, the sixth Pixel Remaster is like its predecessors, but many differences exist. Initially, players control Terra and her two guardians from a galaxy far, far away as they pilot Magitek armor through Narshe, encountering several enemies that hopelessly try to off them. The active time system, with players still able to select between Active and Wait modes, the former letting the action continue as they navigate menus and the latter pausing it as they do so, returns and follows the same rules as previous games. Users of Magitek armor can use several laser and missile-based abilities to slaughter the enemy, with Terra initially able to cast MP-consuming magic.
There are about two other times throughout the game where the playable characters pilot Magitek armor, but the player’s active party of up to four characters will mostly fight on foot in random encounters that the Pixel Remaster mercifully allows them to toggle on and off at a whim outside combat. Battle commands in this mode include attacking with equipped weapons, with damage depending upon what row a character is in (although flails and boomerangs deal equivalent damage regardless of position); using an ability inherent to specific characters, like Locke stealing items from enemies or Edgar utilizing various Tools; casting different types of MP-consuming magic, with espers eventually allowing everyone to learn and use it; or consuming an item.
Characters can also defend to reduce damage, retaining their stances until they execute a different ability once their active time gauges refill, change their row, or attempt to escape simultaneously, which usually works except against bosses; however, evacuation time may be higher versus more powerful adversaries. Victory rewards all characters still alive or not zombified experience for occasional leveling, money to purchase goods, and later, Ability Points to acquire magic from espers. Death necessitates reloading a prior save file; luckily, autosaving occurs frequently, alongside standard save points where players can use Sleeping Bags and Tents to restore their party, reducing wasted playtime.
Ya ba dibba dibba dibba dibba dibba dibba dum
Another combat mode aside from pedestrian encounters and those in Magitek armor is strategy battles, which occur twice early in the game, where the player controls up to three parties with a maximum of four characters each, first with Locke and numerous Moogles, among them being Mog whom the player later recruits officially, and second with all mainline allies acquired up to that point, albeit lesser in number. In these skirmishes, the player can switch between parties and move them around the battlefield, able to contact advancing enemy sprites to trigger combat, which works as it does in standard random encounters. An adversarial sprite reaching the target the player must defend results in needing to reload the last save while defeating one representing a boss yields victory.
A plot point comes where the player’s characters split, and they must choose one of the parties to advance the storyline until they reunite. Other moments come, including the final dungeon, where the player must divide their party into teams and make it to the end, with party swapping working as it does in the strategy battles. Other dungeons sport quirks like the Cultists’ Tower, where players can only use magic and items. The final boss battle sequence features a structure where players must choose a base party and backup characters from the rest of the accumulated cast that replace them should one be dead when a tier ends.
Returning to unique character skills, improvements from the original mobile ports remain with further refinement. Unlike the Super NES and Game Boy Advance versions, the player no longer needs to sit and do nothing as Cyan’s Bushido skills charge and can control other characters until he ultimately executes them. In the Pixel Remaster, selecting one of Sabin’s Blitzes opens a box with the button combination necessary to use it; if they err in input, they can restart until they get it right and let him unleash his fury. Turbo auto-battling from the previous collection remakes returns, with some quirks like not needing to repeat said Blitz inputs for Sabin to reuse them.
Characters can eventually equip espers that grant stat bonuses whenever they level while allowing them to learn various magic through acquiring Ability Points after combat, with each spell having a multiplier that dictates the learning rate. Depending on how one plays their cards, this system can grant them an advantage later in the game. Boosts from the previous PlayStation 4 and Switch ports of the Pixel Remasters return that can modify rewards from combat and reduce the old-school grind and brutality that the original Final Fantasy VI could often feature, making the latest iteration more accessible than ever to modern audiences.
The mechanics work pleasantly, given the agile pace of combat, diverse ways to slaughter the enemy, fun tricks like using Phoenix Down and Holy Water to off undead enemies instantly, and the mentioned Boosts to accommodate players of different abilities; however, there are a few issues. For instance, some innate character abilities can backfire, like Celes’ Runic ability that absorbs the next cast magic (even healing cast by other characters); Gau’s use of specific Rage abilities is also random and uncancellable until he dies. Other nitpicks include the inability to view enemy status benefits and detriments and some unskippable cutscenes before critical boss fights, including the last.
The final Pixel Remaster inherits most quality-of-life improvements from its predecessors, which include autosaving during transitions between areas, a suspend save, and helpful in-game maps for the overworld (which shows unvisited locations as gray dots and how many treasures remain in each location) and the myriad dungeons. Positive usability features from the previous versions, including a sortable inventory, unlimited space for different item types, optimizing equipment for each character, and an in-game clock viewable any time outside battle, also return. However, issues abound in the lack of fast travel before acquiring an airship, the difficulty for newcomers in finding many secrets without a guide, and (with rare exceptions) the unskippable cutscenes.
Bushido in the Bedroom probably wouldn’t be said literature
Nobuo Uematsu’s soundtrack for Final Fantasy VI was one of the highlights of his musical career, gloriously reorchestrated in the Pixel Remaster, with some surprises. Beginning with a title screen theme inspired by “Thus Spake Zarathustra” and sporting tracks indigenous to the series, like the prelude and overture, the soundtrack features endless variety, with every playable character having a musical motif and sundry remixes, like Terra’s theme, one of which doubles as the first overworld music. Other notable tunes include the “Spinach Rag,” of which Scott Joplin would be proud, most noticeable at the Opera House, which has a surprise as actual English vocals for the game’s iconic opera scene, consequentially sounding better than before. The sound effects are never out of place, with Kefka’s iconic digitized laugh returning. Aside from frequent silence and the slight derivation of a few pieces, the sixth entry’s sound is near-note perfect.
That the original version featured taller character sprites without battles as within could explain its lengthier remastery compared to the previous collection entries. Plenty of pluses are present, like the superb art direction, with character sprites reflecting their respective designs, the characters showing vast emotional spectra, the environments having harmonious color schemes and occasional weather effects, and so forth. The Super NES iteration utilized Mode-7 visual effects, which its respective remaster still does mostly on the overworld, but even more so in scenes like the opera performance. However, the heavy pixilation from the previous remasters returns, and the buildings on the said overworld appear flat, reversing the 3-D effects of the the last mobile version. Laziness further abounds in the battle visuals, with most issues from prior entries returning; despite flashy ability effects, the telekinetic attacking by the player’s characters persists, along with inanimate foes (many being reskins) that merely flash when executing their commands. Ultimately, the graphics don’t detriment the experience yet fall significantly short of perfection.
The sixth is the longest of the Pixel Remasters, taking beyond twenty-four hours to complete, with nods to lasting appeal as PlayStation Trophies, sidequests, mastering every obtainable spell from espers, and constantly attempting to beat the step record the game tracks. However, most unversed in prior versions may need to reference the internet to find everything, and a New Game+ is absent.
In summation, Final Fantasy VI Pixel Remaster is inarguably amazing, given its harmonious gameplay mechanics, the quality-of-life improvements over prior incarnations, the rich narrative with endearing characters, the above-average translation, the beautifully remastered soundtrack, and the solid visual direction. However, it has issues that make labels like “one of the greatest games of all time” and “masterpiece” aberrations, given the handful of scrappy game mechanics, some unfriendliness to those who have never touched previous versions, some unoriginal narrative elements, a few oddities in the localization, and many lazy visual choices bequeathed from past iterations. Regardless, it is the best way to experience the classic and ends the Pixel Remaster collection on a high note.
This review is based on a playthrough of a digital copy downloaded to the reviewer’s PlayStation 4, played to the standard ending.
Score Breakdown
The Good
The Bad
Engrossing game mechanics with adjustable difficulty. Some quality-of-life improvements. Rich narrative with endearing characters. Great localization.Superb remastered soundtrack. Good remastered visuals.
A few scrappy mechanics. Some direction can be vague for newcomers. Story on derivative side. Translation has occasional oddities. Many graphical aspects are lazy.
The inaugural installment of the Xenoblade Chronicles series by developer Monolithsoft, released on the Nintendo Wii, was originally to be a Japan-exclusive release. However, the grassroots campaign Operation Rainfall succeeded in bringing it and other titles to North American shores. Xenoblade Chronicles would receive a port to the short-lived New Nintendo 3DS and a Definitive Edition for the Switch, the franchise seeing positive sales and reception. As such, Monolithsoft turned it into a franchise, developing Xenoblade Chronicles X exclusively for the Wii U and then the first numbered sequel, Xenoblade Chronicles 2, for the Nintendo Switch, which builds upon its precursors.
The sequel occurs in the land of Alrest, where the Cloud Sea tops endless waters and gigantic creatures known as Titans live, upon which humans and beings known as Nopon, in turn, reside, with the protagonist being an orphaned salvager named Rex, who becomes involved in a struggle among wielders of entities summoned from crystal cores known as Blades. As with other Monolithsoft productions, the story is deep with lengthy cutscenes; however, it somewhat puts quantity above quality and feels forced upon the player. There are also some tried tropes, among them a character fighting their inner demons and a world tree at the center of the game setting, with many scenes coming across as silly, making for a mediocre story experience.
Nintendo of Europe handled the localization, and while the dialogue is legible and free of grammatical or spelling errors, with occasional swearing, some of the choices of names for certain story elements like Drivers for Blade users come across as laughable, with a reference at one point to unregistered Drivers that takes on a different connotation in English. The translators also maddeningly use OK instead of okay in the game dialogue, which no professional writer would ever do. Furthermore, the Japanese convention of characters shouting the names of their commands in combat sounds ridiculous in English. Finally, the lip movement for the voice acting is often incredibly off, accounting for a mediocre localization.
Nightmare fuel waiting to happen
Regarding gameplay, the second Xenoblade shares many similarities with its unnumbered precursors, such as real-time combat that triggers whenever the lead character draws their weapon or enemies notice the party. Each of the three active characters can have up to three Blades of different elements and switch between them upon scoring enough hits against enemies with their standard auto-attacks. Every Blade has three Arts requiring enough energy amassed through regular attacks to execute, along with a passive ability, with their power increased through points gained from killing enemies.
Characters also acquire other points, alongside standard experience, that the player can invest into nodes on semicircular grids to unlock passive bonuses such as increased stats. Furthermore, each Blade has a skill grid gradually unlocked through conditions like killing a few enemies of a specific type or putting one of their favorite items into a Pouch each character has. Players can obtain additional Blades to equip by having a character bond with a crystal core, which comes in a few varieties that determine the likelihood of receiving a Blade with a unique design rather than a generic one.
Although generic Blades can become abundant, one of the caveats of a large stock is the eventual ability to send up to six on Merc Missions for a time before they return with various rewards. Standard sidequests are also available alongside the main story missions that have their prizes. Players have a limit of many Blades overall they can carry that increases at points throughout the game and can dismiss any except those central to the storyline if they reach this capacity. One of the main characters, Tora, has Blades that are unchangeable throughout the game, with their abilities increased by obtaining Ether Points from a minigame called Tiger! Tiger! at his home.
The game mechanics have many strengths, but the complexity can overwhelm players, especially since many areas don’t receive good explanations. Thus, I often found myself referencing the internet to determine how to complete various sidequests and advance the Blade grids, given their requirements of killing certain enemies and the lack of in-game compendia. Furthermore, the need to collect drops from enemies, like money and items, is a dated RPG mechanic that deserves death. The battle system also doesn’t lend itself well to combat against multiple enemies, and fights against even weaker foes can feel drawn out. Granted, the second Xenoblade can be moderately enjoyable when accompanied by an online guide or two, so the gameplay has plenty of redeeming aspects.
The game certainly wasn’t.
Control could have used some work as well. While there are markers for the current storyline and sidequest objectives, one major issue is that during fast travel (which is otherwise welcome given the myriad of environs throughout the game), the maps of wherever the player wants to go lack said indicators, so players must be in a particular overall area to see them. Moreover, the “compass” at the top of the gameplay screen, if one could term it as such, can be incredibly confusing, especially if multiple sidequest objective markers are present, with no indicator at all of north, south, east, or west. Repetition of travel within areas can also occur if players die, given the frequent inconvenient placement of respawn points. Ultimately, the developers could have striven to make the sequel more user-friendly.
However, the soundtrack composed by veteran Yasunori Mitsuda somewhat redeems the second Xenoblade, with many sweeping tracks that fit the various environments and story scenes, the former having daytime and nighttime iterations akin to the first game. The voicework for the main characters is good, aside from them shouting the names of their attacks, but those for the Blades are of more mixed quality. Still, the second Xenoblade, for the most part, has solid sound.
Conversely, the visuals are of a lower standard. While the cel-shading looks nice, alongside good colors, pretty environments, and realistic lighting, many typical offenders of three-dimensional visuals exist. These include blurry and pixilated environmental texturing, terrible collision detection, occasional choppiness, reskins of enemies, and a horrid camera at its worst in narrow quarters. Another issue when battling enemies is that it can be hard to determine what direction they’re facing, with some Arts having a better effect depending upon this factor. In the end, the visual experience is middling at best.
Finally, the main quest is lengthy, somewhere from forty-eight to seventy-two hours, depending upon how long the player wishes to spend with the side content. However, the difficulty of enjoying the game without the assistance of the internet may deter many from spending additional time with the game, along with the absence of achievements inherent in Nintendo Switch games.
In summation, Xenoblade Chronicles 2 was, in my experience, a disappointing sequel, and this comes from someone who had enjoyed the first entry. The evolved game mechanics often feel like a chore, with players needing to reference the internet to get the most from them, and there abounds a deal of user-unfriendliness regarding control. In terms of narration, the second installment overstays its welcome, and the graphics suffer from the standard aesthetic and technical issues evident in most Nintendo Switch games. There are some genuine positives that include the soundtrack, and most other areas have their redeeming aspects; however, my overall experience was, as the Nopon would say, “Meh.”
This review is based on a playthrough of a physical copy purchased by the reviewer to the standard ending.
Score Breakdown
The Good
The Bad
Lots of systems to mess around with. Deep plot. Great soundtrack. Tons of side content.
Combat depth can be overwhelming. Narrative feels incredibly drawn-out. Average visuals. Too long.
When Atlus’s Etrian Odyssey for the Nintendo DS saw its North American release, most gamers found it a throwback to old-school role-playing games, given a fully customizable party, first-person dungeon exploration, and sometimes punishing difficulty. Given its success, it was natural that a sequel would see its release soon afterward, later given a 3DS remake and years later remastered for Windows and the Nintendo Switch as part of the Etrian Odyssey Origins Collection as Etrian Odyssey II HD, allowing new generations to discover the original version of the first sequel of the dungeon-crawling franchise.
Upon starting a new game, the player must create a party of five characters of diverse classes, with some new selections in the sequel, which include Gunner and War Magus. Before choosing a party, it’s a good idea to give their skill sets a once-over to ensure that whatever party the player selects can work harmoniously. For example, the Survivalist has certain skills that can grant specific allies the initiative in a round of combat, which can, for example, help healers execute their healing before the enemy kills whomever the player wishes to heal.
Battles in the labyrinth are random, with an indicator gradually turning red to indicate how close the player is to encountering enemies, a feature that, like in the first game, alleviates the typical tension associated with random encounters. Fights follow the traditional turn-based formula of inputting commands for the player’s party and letting them and the enemy beat up one another in a round, with agility determining turn order. The player puts their characters into a formation consisting of a front and back row, each able to hold up to three characters, with characters in the front row dealing and taking more damage and back row characters taking and dealing less damage.
Commands include attacking with an equipped weapon, defending, using items, attempting to escape (with up to five opportunities and an increased chance of success with a skill all characters have), changing the front and back row formation (if all characters in the front row die, the back and front rows will switch), or using a unique Force skill when a character’s Force points are at maximum. Defeating all enemies results in the player acquiring experience for all participating characters who are still alive, not to mention monster parts that the player can sell at the shop in town for money (since monsters don’t drop money themselves).
Violating the Hippocratic Oath
Sold parts gradually unlock more powerful equipment and consumable items. In some cases, gear and consumables are of limited stock, so the player must acquire more monster parts to unlock the equipment and items again for purchase. What happens when the player dies in combat depends upon the difficulty setting: the lowest challenge, Picnic, transports players back into town with no experience lost, while higher settings result in a Game Over but the chance to preserve the dungeon map.
Leveling results in the player acquiring a skill point they can invest in a character class skill tree, with upper-level skills requiring weaker skills to have a certain number of points to unlock them. Bosses end each Stratum, their difficulty depending upon the challenge mode, and as a hint for those playing on standard or advanced settings, using bind skills on their head, arms, and feet can be pivotal. Ultimately, the game mechanics are virtually flawless and accommodating to players of divergent skill levels.
The interface is mostly the same as it was in the first game, with a linear structure and a hub town where the player can perform various tasks such as buying new items and equipment, recovering health, and so forth, with expectant features like the ability to see how gear increases or decreases stats before purchasing it while shopping. The ability to map walls automatically also reduces some of the stress of dungeon cartography, and there are some improvements in dungeon navigation, primarily magnetic poles every couple of floors that provide teleportation shortcuts. Aside from the lack of visibility of stat increases or decreases when pawning equipment, control is very tight.
While one can argue that the first Etrian Odyssey sequel is light on plot, it isn’t forced down the player’s throat like in contemporary high-end video game releases. Plenty of positives include intricate backstory (especially elaborated upon towards the end), tavern quest subplots, and mysterious characters such as the adversarial dungeon-crawling duo Der Freischütz and Artelinde. The translation is equally solid, although it features some of its preceding remaster’s missteps with awkward lines such as “It’s a horde of enemies!” when targeting all monsters in battle.
An Etrian autumn
Yuzo Koshiro’s soundtrack, like in the first game, is one of its high points, with plenty of catchy, memorable tracks for each Stratum and enemy engagements, the primary battle theme changing midway through the game. Sound effects could have used more diversity at times, but otherwise, the sequel is an aural delight.
The sequel uses the same remastered visual style as its predecessor, relying on anime character portraits for the player’s characters, people in town, and occasional people in the labyrinth, with three-dimensional dungeon visuals that look nice and colorful, While the monster designs in battle look nice, they’re still inanimate, and a few reskinned foes abound. Still, the game looks good in high definition.
Finally, one can breeze through the sequel in as little as twelve hours; however, plenty of lasting appeal exists: a postgame Stratum, filling the compendia, tavern quests, and Steam achievements, which can push it well beyond that length.
In summation, Etrian Odyssey II HD is, like its predecessor, a great remaster that sports quick combat with adjustable difficulty, making it more accessible to players who would not usually enjoy such RPGs. Control and the signature cartography are also tight, the audiovisual presentation is solid, and the story has some good twists; however, many may admittedly find the narrative shallow. Regardless, the remaster of the first Etrian sequel accomplishes the goal of the remaster collection of bringing the old-school-style dungeon crawler to new audiences. Given the endless possibilities of character and party customization, it will keep prospective players occupied for a fair time.
This review is based on a playthrough to the standard ending with no postgame content attempted.
Score Breakdown
The Good
The Bad
Lots of classes and formations to mess with. Tight control. Solid audiovisual presentation. Endless lasting appeal.
Plot is thinly developed. Many areas where the graphics could have been better.
One of the last roleplaying games for the Nintendo DS was the AlphaDream-developed Mario & Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story, the chronologically third entry of the Mario & Luigi subseries of RPGs. Years later, on the 3DS, the very first game in the subfranchise, Superstar Saga, would receive a remake with added content, the second game, Partners in Time, overlooked. However, the third would receive its own rerelease entitled Mario & Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story + Bowser Jr.’s Journey, which is essentially two games in one akin to the enhanced port of Superstar Saga.
The main quest opens with a disease known as The Blorbs affecting residents of the Mushroom Kingdom, causing Toads to become morbidly obese, akin to Violet Beauregarde from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and its film adaptations. As Princess Peach and her cohorts, including siblings Mario and Luigi, discuss what to do about the pandemic, Bowser invades. The classic Mario antagonist is defeated, sometime after which he eats a Vacuum Shroom, making him engorge everything in sight, including Mario, Luigi, and Peach. The game’s action frequently alternates between Bowser and the Mario brothers as they unknowingly work together.
Bowser Jr.’s Journey follows Bowser’s son in parallel events as he conspires with his father’s seven primary minions, the Koopalings, their origins pretty much unexplored, alongside Junior’s matronage. The game tells both its stories well, with plenty of humor and a semblance of originality, at least in the Mario mythos, with other media like the film Fantastic Voyage exploring body exploration when miniature, and RPGs such as the original Star Ocean have featured the goal of curing a mysterious affliction. The translation is an admirable effort, given its humor, but odd onomatopoeia abounds like “oog” and “muh,” and characters addressing Bowser’s son as “Lord Junior” sounds asinine.
Luckily, the main quest fares well in the gameplay department, with enemy encounters visible on side-scrolling (within Bowser’s body) and top-down maps. Mario and Luigi can jump on or hammer them to get the initiative, dealing premature damage when the subsequent battle commences. Fights are mechanically like those in Superstar Saga minus fire and thunder attacks, the siblings alone facing several foes, able to deal damage by jumping on them, hammering them, or using BP-consuming attacks with minigame-esque sequences that can either be easy or hard to master.
Bowser himself faces off solo against various enemies, able to get the initiative in fights with his own map abilities, and can punch foes, exhale fire on all, or use point-consuming minion skills that can ultimately be more powerful, if ably executed, than his standard free attacks. Sometimes, he can inhale enemies for the Mario brothers to finish off, with all participants in combat after a victory receiving money and experience, the latter allowing them to level occasionally. In these instances, their stats increase, and players can use a roulette mechanic on an individual stat for a bonus increase that lessens at a certain threshold.
Bowser Jr.’s Journey is also mechanically like the Minion Quest in the 3DS remake of Superstar Saga, with customizable unit formations introduced, some of which can grant all participants in combat bonuses. Also new is the ability for Bowser Jr. to have a second officer, with players ultimately able to make Junior of melee, ranged, or flying type. The automatic real-time battles transpire with the Rochambeau formula, where melee units beat ranged units, ranged beats flying, and flying beats melee. Minions randomly and collectively or individually execute special skills, which the enemy faction can cancel. However, players can accomplish the same in return, with other Captain Point-consuming skills in the mix.
The gameplay mechanics in the main quest generally work well, aside from some annoying enemies and wildly unpredictable antagonist attack patterns (with the warning indicators the player can turn on and off in the game menus often not helping here). However, Bowser Jr.’s Journey is a different ballpark, necessitating frequent grinding to stand a chance against story maps, and leveling itself carries an all-or-nothing risk if the player loses even one of a stage’s fights. While some battles may leave players with beans to grant free experience and status increases, leveling units on lower-level maps can be difficult, and overall, the subquest could have used a once-over.
Control, though, fares worse, with the developers loving minigames, most mandatory to advance the storyline and repeated at times. One that requires the stylus near the end, in particular, enraged me. Players can also accidentally switch between the Mario brothers and Bowser, given the proximity of the 3DS’s face buttons. Furthermore, while the primary storyline features detailed in-game maps, they aren’t wholly foolproof, with some passageways to other chambers not even indicated, leading to the player losing themselves at times and having to consult online guides. A redeeming aspect is that the game menus are easy to navigate, but interaction could have used a greater reevaluation.
Returning composer Yoko Shimomura’s soundtrack, however, is good as always, with most characters having their own squeaky voices that are fortunately skippable in most instances, although there are some common silent parts of the game.
The graphics are nearly identical to those in the 3DS rerelease of Superstar Saga, which isn’t a bad thing as they border on perfection, and many areas, like the various chambers of Bowser’s interior, contain superb design, along with character and enemy sprites that face most directions. The only real shortcoming is the lack of three-dimensional capability.
Finally, finishing both games will last players around twenty-four to forty-eight hours, with some lasting appeal (particularly in the main quest) of achieving one hundred percent when it comes to things such as digging around the world for stat-increasing beans alongside achievements in Bowser Jr.’s Journey as well. However, no New Game+ modes or narrative differences exist, and the mentioned minigames and grinding can be frustrating.
Overall, the collection has many things going for it, such as its enjoyable gameplay systems, humorous parallel narratives, superb aural presentation, pretty visuals, and reasons to play onward. However, there are issues, particularly regarding Bowser Jr.’s Journey, with the repetitive grinding necessary to make it to the end, not to mention problems with the main quest like mandatory minigames and the ease of getting lost a few times despite in-game maps. It’s certainly not the best Mario RPG of all time, but it’s far from terrible and warrants a look from fans of Mario and Nintendo games.
This review is based on playthroughs of the main game and Bowser Jr.’s Journey to their standard endings with many achievements not obtained.
Score Breakdown
The Good
The Bad
Solid game mechanics. Humorous storylines and translation. Great audiovisual presentation.
Button timing can be tricky. Bowser Jr.’s Journey a bit grindy. Some irritating late-game obstacles.
When I first played the original Super Mario RPG over two decades ago, it synced well with me given the effective fusion of gameplay from Nintendo’s mainline Mario games and roleplaying game elements with the cooperation of Squaresoft. While the Big N would cooperate with other companies to produce more RPGs featuring their mascot plumber, none would truly convey the true spirit of his initial RPG adventure, even if good in their own respects. With help from AlphaDream, Nintendo would produce a sequel to Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga entitled Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time, which would attempt to build upon its predecessor’s roleplaying game formula in the subseries’ debut on the Nintendo DS.
The first Mario & Luigi sequel opens in the Mushroom Kingdom of the past when Mario, Luigi, and Princess Peach are babies, with an alien species known as the Shroobs taking over the castle, the Mario and Luigi of the present teaming up with their infant selves to defeat them. The narrative is rife with issues such as the fact that the aliens seizing Peach’s castle in the past has no effect whatsoever on the present, along with the off-putting baby element. There is occasional humor, such as leet-speaking Hammer Bros. that serve as bosses at one point in the game, aided by a translation that is generally free of error yet full of occasional oddities, but otherwise, the plot is nothing to write home about.
Partners in Time’s game mechanics have much in common with those of Superstar Saga, including the encounter system where the adult Mario brothers and their infant equivalents, separately or together, can touch enemies wandering fields and dungeons to initiate combat. Whilst holding the Baby Mario and Luigi, the adult brothers can only jump on enemies to receive the initiative, and only the babies can hammer foes to gain the upper hand, doing so in both instances difficult at times, given the pitiful range of their hammers and the erratic movement of wandering monsters.
If the adult Mario brothers are holding the babies when initiating combat, each acts as a single unit (meaning only two turns on part of the player to attack the enemy, the same going for whenever the adults or infants are separate in field exploration), with turn order based on speed and the consequential question of who will go when, although thankfully, each executes their command immediately after the player’s input. Should the enemy off one of the adult Mario brothers, their infant equivalent will take their place on the battlefield, players luckily able to resurrect the deceased adult brother with revival mushrooms, of which players can mercifully keep plenty.
Get ready to mute the volume several times during story scenes.
Together with their baby forms, each Mario brother has several commands from which to choose, including jumping on foes to damage them, whacking them with hammers to do the same, using a recovery or stat-increasing item, using one of many Bros. Items specializing in different forms of attack (which substitutes for a traditional RPG magic system), whether focusing on individual or all enemies, or attempting to escape, which luckily always works even if it costs players a few coins. Separately, the Mario babies can either jump on or hammer foes, while their adult forms can only use the jump command to damage foes, with many Bros. Items requiring all be present on the battlefield.
As in prior Mario RPGs within and without the Mario & Luigi subseries, successful execution of attack commands necessitates careful button presses, which can be significantly trickier in Partners in Time given the use of all face buttons to control the respective adult and baby brothers. Bros. Bros. Items, especially those involving the use of all grown-up and infant Mario siblings, can feel downright tortuous in this regard, with even the slightest error in timing can completely throw one off, and the dual-screen action doesn’t help matters. While players can solely rely upon jumps and hammering to off adversaries, doing so, especially against tough bosses (and the translation team made the North American version harder), can consume sizable time from the player.
Timed avoidance and counterattacks can be incredibly tricky as well, especially when the game utilizes both screens and enemy attacks involve precipitating matter, and while many enemies do have a sort of tell as to which Mario brother they’ll target, their actions can be horribly unpredictable and have catastrophic consequences for the player. Many bosses, especially towards the end, can be downright brutal, with one of the last taking me well over an hour, given the degree of healing and incorrect button pressing, and throughout my entire playthrough, I never fully got used to the battle control.
Defeating enemies nets the party experience, money, and maybe items, level-ups naturally increasing one of the adult and child sibling’s stats, players further able to obtain a bonus increase to one stat with a slot-reel system that can be irksome, given the potential to stumble upon the lowest possible perk. All in all, the battle system has many great ideas and is fun at times, and there is some margin for error given the high threshold of healing items, but the overreliance on Bros. Items necessary to make combat go by quicker really bogs things down, and certain mechanics are unclear such as whether accessories affect one or all characters, along with the use of Beans collected from digging spots all across the game’s areas, whose use I had to use the internet to determine.
Separately, battle control for the Mario brothers is okay, but together, not so much.
Control doesn’t fare any better. While there are some genuine good puzzles, the menus are easy to get a handle of, and there is general clear direction on how to advance the central storyline, controlling the adult and toddler Mario brothers when they’re separate can be somewhat nightmarish when it comes to advancing through the game, with the mentioned awkwardness of the battle system applying every bit as much outside combat. There’s also a dearth of quality-of-life features such as a suspend save and auto-saving, with the placement of save points being incredibly iffy at times, and towards the end there is a particularly irksome minigame necessary to proceed in the main narrative. Ultimately, Partners in Time isn’t the epitome of user-friendliness.
Sound, however, is one area where the game doesn’t fall on its face, composer Yoko Shimomura’s music being all-around solid, although the sound of Babies Mario, Luigi, and especially Peach, are nothing short of demonic, and led me to mute the volume numerous times.
The visuals largely mimic those of the Game Boy Advance version of Superstar Saga, for the most part not a bad thing, given the bright colors, pretty environments, good sprite character sprite designs, and such, although many reskinned enemies exist, there exists the oddity of certain individuals walking in place to indicate they’re talking, and the need to pay meticulous attention to the action transpiring on the top screen in addition to the bottom can sour the graphical experience.
Finally, the first sequel is around a twenty-hour game, with nothing in the way of lasting appeal given the unengaging experience, what with the Bean-collecting sidequest necessitating use of a guide and lack of in-game data on how many are in each of the game’s stages, along with a dearth of other features such as plot variation and a New Game+.
When all is said and done, Partners in Time proves to be a disappointing follow-up to Superstar Saga, what especially with the additional gameplay dimensions to consider regarding things like four characters to control and that action on two screens, accounting for unwieldly control and heavily artificial difficulty. The narrative isn’t particularly engaging, either, given the badly implemented baby and time-travel plot devices, and while the audiovisual presentation does have its positive areas, they can’t compensate for a lackluster experience. The first Mario & Luigi sequel would since go out of print and sell for extravagant prices online, certainly not worth paying, and is probably best left in the ashcan of gaming history.
Score Breakdown
The Good
The Bad
Some gameplay is fun at times. Music is okay. The visuals, too.
You never fully get used to the game. Ridiculous plot and concepts. Not short enough.
Most things computer-related outside hardware (with some exceptions), writing (especially when it comes to video game reviewing), and anthro art, especially given my recent use of FireAlpaca’s bilateral feature that really shaves time when doing said art, etc.
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