The splash screen of this game says "For the love of JRPGs", and never has a statement hit so hard as it does in the new Eiyuden Chronicles game. Lovingly crafted using amazing pixel art on the back of modern technology, EC is a JRPG lover's JRPG. From the characters, to the setting, to the story and battle mechanics. This game is everything you could want in a JRPG and then some. I was a bit skeptical at first when I booted the game, but EC immediately greets you with wonderfully lovable characters backed by incredible voice acting which is unheard of in a game with this budget and this many characters.
The first thing that struck me was the personality of the writing, it's very funny but not in a Borderlands kind of way where everything has to be a quip or a joke or a mockery of pop culture. Instead it's just humorous writing brought forth by the characters. Your main character is Nowa a young man joining what is basically the neighborhood watch of the local lands. He's immediately grouped with a team of five other characters, of who Lian insists that she bosses you around because she has been in the Watch for TWO days longer than you and therefore has seniority. There is a charm to it all, not just in the writing but also the way the actors deliver the lines and quite honestly this might be the best voice acting in a JRPG I've ever heard, that includes the FF7 Remake.
The battle system is incredibly easy to get into and is the first turn-based JRPG in a very long time that gives you 6 characters to control in battle at once. Which the number can get quite complicated in a normal battle system, but EC's battles are very straightforward. You're basic attacks build up SP and you spend SP on special attacks, I wonder if SP stands for anything. Those characters with magic can also use MP to cast spells. And then there are team attacks where two or more characters can use SP together to do a better thing together. That's really it. The game also has a tactics system which is more like a gambit system from Final Fantasy 12 where you can program character's behavior in battle, because from moment one the game gives you an auto-battle system.
Auto-battling is great because more normal fights don't require much thinking and it's nice just to be able to set your character's behaviors and let them power through the generic fights. However that wont work on bosses, as every boss as a gimmick that you must pay attention to in order to get through without a nightmare. Some bosses require you to duck your characters behind cover. Another boss will have you flip a switch so that a crane will drop boulders on the bad guys instead of your party. Another boss has you guess which side it'll pop out on so you can hit it with a magical Whack-a-mole hammer. The gimmicks themselves aren't particularly difficult, but the require you to pay attention even if you would otherwise be overleveled and easily able to stomp the boss in a straight-up fight.
Speaking of leveling, EC has an interesting system in that reguard as well. Every level for every character requires only 1000 exp, which to me suggested that I could either power-level myself to Godhood, or the game had level scaling like FF8 which I would have uninstalled the game immediately because I hate that shit. Instead neither was the answer. What EC does is applies EXP penatlies to your characters based on the levels of the enemies you are fighting. If you are the same level or lower, you get full exp, but as you over level those enemies the exp get's less and less. At full exp the enemy might give you 300+ exp, however a couple levels later and that enemy gives you a mere 4 exp. This allows you to over level but only to a point, which I think is fair. But there is also another system in place with the exp. Your characters can get BONUS exp if they are a lower level than both the enemies you fight AND the level of the rest of the party. This is fantastic because there are 100 playable characters in EC, which means you'll never keep up with everybody in levels on every character, but if you bring along someone new or someone who've not adventured with in a while, that character will get a big bonus every fight until they match your party. So usually a new character only needs to be in three or four fights before they are on par with the rest of the group, which is fantastic. Especially since there are so many characters, it is nice that they thought of a way to make it easy to use neglected party members if you want to.
Now this is going to hurt me and shock you all, but I think I might like this game more than FF7Rebirth for GOTY.
The first thing that struck me was the personality of the writing, it's very funny but not in a Borderlands kind of way where everything has to be a quip or a joke or a mockery of pop culture. Instead it's just humorous writing brought forth by the characters. Your main character is Nowa a young man joining what is basically the neighborhood watch of the local lands. He's immediately grouped with a team of five other characters, of who Lian insists that she bosses you around because she has been in the Watch for TWO days longer than you and therefore has seniority. There is a charm to it all, not just in the writing but also the way the actors deliver the lines and quite honestly this might be the best voice acting in a JRPG I've ever heard, that includes the FF7 Remake.
The battle system is incredibly easy to get into and is the first turn-based JRPG in a very long time that gives you 6 characters to control in battle at once. Which the number can get quite complicated in a normal battle system, but EC's battles are very straightforward. You're basic attacks build up SP and you spend SP on special attacks, I wonder if SP stands for anything. Those characters with magic can also use MP to cast spells. And then there are team attacks where two or more characters can use SP together to do a better thing together. That's really it. The game also has a tactics system which is more like a gambit system from Final Fantasy 12 where you can program character's behavior in battle, because from moment one the game gives you an auto-battle system.
Auto-battling is great because more normal fights don't require much thinking and it's nice just to be able to set your character's behaviors and let them power through the generic fights. However that wont work on bosses, as every boss as a gimmick that you must pay attention to in order to get through without a nightmare. Some bosses require you to duck your characters behind cover. Another boss will have you flip a switch so that a crane will drop boulders on the bad guys instead of your party. Another boss has you guess which side it'll pop out on so you can hit it with a magical Whack-a-mole hammer. The gimmicks themselves aren't particularly difficult, but the require you to pay attention even if you would otherwise be overleveled and easily able to stomp the boss in a straight-up fight.
Speaking of leveling, EC has an interesting system in that reguard as well. Every level for every character requires only 1000 exp, which to me suggested that I could either power-level myself to Godhood, or the game had level scaling like FF8 which I would have uninstalled the game immediately because I hate that shit. Instead neither was the answer. What EC does is applies EXP penatlies to your characters based on the levels of the enemies you are fighting. If you are the same level or lower, you get full exp, but as you over level those enemies the exp get's less and less. At full exp the enemy might give you 300+ exp, however a couple levels later and that enemy gives you a mere 4 exp. This allows you to over level but only to a point, which I think is fair. But there is also another system in place with the exp. Your characters can get BONUS exp if they are a lower level than both the enemies you fight AND the level of the rest of the party. This is fantastic because there are 100 playable characters in EC, which means you'll never keep up with everybody in levels on every character, but if you bring along someone new or someone who've not adventured with in a while, that character will get a big bonus every fight until they match your party. So usually a new character only needs to be in three or four fights before they are on par with the rest of the group, which is fantastic. Especially since there are so many characters, it is nice that they thought of a way to make it easy to use neglected party members if you want to.
Now this is going to hurt me and shock you all, but I think I might like this game more than FF7Rebirth for GOTY.
