Harvest Moon a Wonderful Life Special Edition Review

Console : Playstation 2
Genre : RPG ?

Prologue

A next serial of Harvest Moon after Harvest Moon 3 Released.In these Wonderful Life Special Edition there are some additional girl than we can get as a wife than Regular Wonderful life series, these girls is Lumina. Harvest moon a Wonderful Life stories similiarly with it's old generation. What again if it's not about a boy from the city that running a farm in the village, eh?

Gameplay

In this series harvest moon has the best quality of graphic than the another series even Innocent Life (next generation of Harvest Moon) still lost with this games full 3D graphic. But there is a consequence that Wonderful Life must be pay for it. Especially to any player who has already play Harvest Moon Back to Nature (1st series of Harvest Moon) will recognize this consequence right after trying this game. Right! There a great price for a great quality, a great quality of graphic will greatly prolonged loading game progress. Not only that, game progress running slower than any other harvest moon series. End? not yet! Wonderful Life series also lack of event. Hmph... end of my complaining section! but at least there is still good point, there are new developed crops systems like merging seed into new different variety plant (I guess, because actually I'm a little forgot) and you can plant not just mere plant but also a tree. Altough tree need more time but personally I like it better than a mere plant that will withered and died during season changing.

Shining Force NEO Review

Console : Playstation 2

Genre : Action/Adventure

Prologue
Shining Force NEO stories began with Max as the central character, he lived quietly with his father and a childhood friend. But later some incident happened, his village attacked by monster that was supposedly has turned to stoned. Then "a men behind the mask" appear, later a fight between Max's father and this men can't be avoided. Moreover one them died in this battle and Max's journey starting from here.

Gameplay
In Shining Force Neo character equipment and skill take the most rule on the games. We will keep getting killed if we don't adjust our weapon and skill depended on situation we were. For example there are some weapon or skill that really effective on some monster but has no effect to another monster (Especially when fighting against golem type monster). So the main aspect in these games determined by your ability to customized your character (Max), for a little tips while playing this one don't just relying on one type weapon. I think at least there must be one type of weapon for range and melee attacks.

Digimon World 2 Review

Console : Playstation
Genre : Adventure/RPG

Prologue

Digimon world 2 stories beginning by yourself registered as new digimon tamer, a new tamer you will gained Digibeetle(a transportation to explore dungeon in this digimon wolrd series) and one digimon as your 1st partner. But before you got your partner, you must choose from 3 club which have it's own digimon type (there are 3 type: Vaccine,Data and Virus). After you choose one of them, you will get your 1st partner digimon and begin your own journey.

Gameplay

On gameplay we will spent all most of our time to go around in dungeon by Digibeetle to find boss, key item or capture new digimon to be our partner. But this dungeon is not place for easy- fooling-around, if you're reckless you will end up in losing energy or Digibeetle HP so you can't even reach the boss floor before fighting it. Also Digimon World 2 using turn/phase system as it's main battle system just like common another RPG games, but there aren't random battle encounter in this one. So you can just avoid enemies to escaped from some meaningless battle.

Grandia 3 Review

Console : Playstation 2
Genre : RPG

Prologue

Yuki is the main character in this games, he is boy who dreamed to flying in the sky by a plane. On some night while testing his plane design with his mother above the woods, some incident happened and accidentally he met with Alfina who want become communicator and looks for her big brother. Later both of them traveling together to find out what really happened to Alfina's big brother.

Gameplay

Grandia 3 stories can be considered a short stories, but this weak spot good covered by nice dilemma between character. On battle system, I think Grandia is still in top position than other RPG with it's great graphic and unique battle systems. Also there are new combo system called aerial combo and regular feature on Grandia like magic and skill customization. But be careful, in Grandia 3 difficulty is can be considered hard (I think). Beginner RPG player maybe will get stress out for trying to beats the last boss.

Radiata Stories Review

Console : Playstation 2
Genre : RPG

Prologue

Another RPG by square enix, Radiata stories main character is Jack Russel a son of a heroes in radiata. The stories begin when Jack trying to be Knight of Radiata through it's exam. He was confident enough that he can passed those test with his current ability, but reality talk different he was totally beaten by ... (it's secret) but with some unreasonable reason at least he is being accepted to be a knight of radiata. His adventure continued from there...

Gameplay

Battle system on radiata is easy to be understand, it's just like Star Ocean 2nd Story or Legend of Mana games. We control one character only on playing, while the other character will be automatically played by cpu. Although we can't control other character, but we can still give them a command. As addition There are 2 path on Radiata Stories : Human Path and non-Human Path, non-human path happened when you chose to chase Ridley and the other option will lead to human path.

Phantasy Star Universe Review

Console : Playstation 2
Genre : Action

Prologue

A great sample of an action game by SEGA, on this game we play as Ethan Waber who live in era where human civilization has greatly advancing and live in another galaxy called Gurhal Systems. In these Gurhal Systems there are a sun surrounded by 3 planet, each planet resided by a kind of human race. They are CAST, Newman, and Beastman. After a long wars between this 3 planets finally an era of peace was born. But after arround 100years era of peace a new threat has occurs on gurhal systems and this is where the Ethan Waber stories began.

Gameplay

There are two variety of gameplay in Phantasy Star Universe, story mode and free mode (I forgot what exactly this mode section called). In the story mode we play as Ethan Waber and his adventure on Gurhal systems, in free mode we can make a charracter through 4 different race : human, CAST, newman, and beastman. For additional information : a saved character in free mode can be used as your main charracter on Phantasy Star Universe Ambition of the Illuminus. On gameplay we take a control a character and go through various mission, each mission usually need additional tool/equipment to complete. A good point of Phantasy Star Universe is their weapon customization, party form and character building.

Weapon Variety

Just like a regular weapon there are 3 type weapon: range ,spell and melee (This reminds me of DotA-allstars games ^_^ ). For melee category there are sword, 2 handed sword (big sword or what it's exactly called), double sword, dagger, claws and spear. Each has it's unique character, for example dagger has a weak attack their attack speed and combo are really good and for 2 handed sword they are slow but wide range attack and really powerful. Next for spell casting weapon, we can choose rod or long rod. If we choose normal rod we can still use 1 empty slot for other weapon but we can only use 2 kind of spell. But if we choose long rod we can't add additional side weapon but we can use 4 kind of different spell and usually powerful but take a more time to casting spell. And the last for range attack there are gun, twin gun, rifle, laser cannon, machine gun (actually it's like sub machine gun), and shotgun. But on gameplay I prefrer rifle than the other weapons, because of their long-ranged attack and good accuracy and damaged.

Wild Arms 4th Detonator Review

Console : Playstation 2
Genre : RPG

Prologue

Wild Arms 4th Detonator main charracter is a boy called Jude Maverick who lives and raised in a hidden village, this village actually was mechanical object that keep flying on the sky and has stealth ability. But someday this hidden village was founded by some group of people who seek ARMs that being keep in this place. Then a little conflict happened but at least the ARMs called Shapeshifter has been saved and take Jude as it's host. But due to Jude's lack ability of controlling ARMs situation became more complicated especially when main mechanical part of this village damaged. In the end this village can't be saved and all villager must escaped from this village at once by emergency pod. This is where Wild Arms 4 stories really began, where Jude finding out what happened to the outer world really are..

Gameplay

Wild arms 4th Detonator served a new different battle systems, as subtitute an old battle systems they use hex battle systems. Actually it's very unique but can make a battle really difficult especially when a player careless. Also there are some special team attack, when Jude and his friends combined their attack together. But actually feature that I can remembered well is an ability to turn off random encounter in some area around save point. This is really useful when you getting bored by encounter monster and do meaningless battle.

Grandia 2 Review

Console : PC
Genre : RPG

Prologue

Have you ever ask, are there are some RPG's for PC? I found the answer after I play Grandia 2. Yup! Grandia 2 is one of RPG for PC. For a playstation gamer like me, I really shocked from first time I play it. "What the hell? How can I miss a great RPG like this" maybe just like that my 1st expression I played Grandia 2. Okay enough for expression! Grandia 2 stories is tell about ressurection of Valmar (it's Demon God or something). Valmar part was scattered around and resides in people. For example Wing of Valmar that later became part of your party, Horn of Valmar that later became a sword, also there are enemies that resided by Valmar part.

Gameplay

Battle systems on Grandia is more advanced than common RPG, because we can't just attack after we input command. There are delay time before action and after command, also even you already has action there are still range between you and target that you must be considered. Not only that, in Grandia 2 battle systems you can also cancel your enemies from act (like cancelling enemies spell, attack, etc) but your act also can be cancelled by your enemies... This is the rough one!

Feature

Feature that impressing me so much maybe just it's battle systems, but there are one another features that I remembered. It's skill customization, where we can levelling up our special move skill level.

Contributed by dapit

Atelier Iris 3 Grand Phantasm Review

Atelier Iris 3 stories about Iris and Edge, Iris is a descendant of Alchemist who can create a new item with his ability. Their story begin when Iris know that she has a legenday book called Escalario. Escalario it's self is a sealed book that can granted any wish to the one opened it, in addition in those world only Iris that can opened it, because she is the only one left alchemist in those world. Realize that their world starting to crumbling, Iris and Edge continued to searching Escalario gem/fragment that they need to open Escalario. Later they will meet another charracter that will fight alongside with them.

Atelier Iris 3 has many uncommon featured, in example : burst mode, character customize mode, item creation through alchemy, etc. Altough the graphic just 2D but this RPG still has a good composition.

Arc The Lad 3 Review

Console : Playstation
Genre : RPG/Strategy

I'm not sure this game genre strategy, also I'm not sure enough this game can't be called RPG. Whatever... Okay back to the topic, Arc The Lad III stories is about a young lad named Alec. In these stories, in past Alec was being rescued by a Hunter (a group of people that fulfill a requested job and earn money) and because of that moment he deserved that someday he want to be a Hunter too. Alec adventure begin when his village is attacked by a group of bandit, because of these condition he must go to the near city and applying a request on the Hunter Guild ASAP. Can Alec make it to save your his village?

Arc The Lad III has some unique features, but I forgot it. Just kidding, there are 2 features that this games has than common RPG games. They are : cardish (turn enemy into card, and then you can summon it later) and Item/Weapon Synthetic (Item Creation). Also there are something that I can't forgot, the guild job. There is some a little funny stories there.

Breath of Fire 4 Hint, Bug and Review

Console : Playstation
Genre : RPG

Review

Breath of Fire 4 stories is about a young-dragon named Ryu. Ryu was founded by Nina in the dessert near abondened merchant cargo while Nina on the way to a desert village. Later together they are travelling around the world and meet with another companion.
Breath of Fire 4 has a unique feature like faeries village development and master feature. Master feature allowed any character to study under a master and they will received bonus status effect for which master they are studied. Faeries village development allowed player to develop faeries village to get supported item/skill/etc in that used later in battle.

Hint

About BoF4 Breath Attack : Breath attack damage usually very depend on HP , so this is very helpful when you fight again Last Boss or any Breath attack monster. For example when you fight again Last Boss their Breath attack damage gradually will drop each time you made a damaged on them. When the damage of Breath attack totally meaningless it can be used for indicator that their HP already in low condition and you should finished them off!
About Faeries Charge : Faeries skill (Faeries Attack, Faeries Breath & Faeries Charge) are very depending on number of faery and level of barrack, I don't know how opinion of another gamer about this skill. But that I know Faeries Charge is the best skill for finishing off final boss. Okay lets get to the Point, Faeries skill AP consumption are very large (on my opinion) than any other skill. But there are some item/skill( I totally forgot) that cut AP consumption, or in another way equip faeries skill to any charracter with high CP (high CP = high AP restoration). Okay, one problem solved! next is how to efficient the damage of Faeries Charge. Just like I mention in text above, for final battle you should use all faeries and make sure all of your barrack reach max level (lv.20) . For addition note: if you has set into like this, don't ever come back to faeries village. I don't want accept any complain if there are any faeries on your was village died!. Okay next is how to do this in the actual battle, "Just use it on last combo! with the same type of attack." so it can be triple damage (1 base damage plus 2 bonus combo damage) for each faery. I can't count how many total damage but I think it's really effective.

Bug

I don't know this is bug or not, but this work well in BoF4 on playstation. With this you can earn high exp in each monster (max. 256000 exp, I think). You only need equip skill burn and frost (but I think Scias already has frost) to charracter with low magic power. 1st Step Find a monster in the Ruin where all the dragon meet with Ryu (After Deis came out from the Ershin and reside in girls body), the monster shape just like armor equiped with dual gun (I forgot it's name). 2nd Step cast burn or combo this burn with sever if there are more than 1 of those monster (but I think this monster will died if your magic power are high enough) , after being hit by fire elemental magic this monster will change shape! This is where it'll starting works. Take a look on monster detailed , experienced gained from this monster will increase twice each times it's tranformed into other shape. Then to change their shape into original state just hit them with water elemental magic. 3rd Step If their HP low, use Nina Healing technique on them! you should do this cycle until reach it's maximum experienced you can gained (around 256000) then kill it! This should very helping so much on levelling up a character or all party charracter. If you want to concentrate on 1 charracter just use monopolize skill! Monopolized can be gained from Marlock.

Ar Tonelico Melody of Elemia Review

Console : Playstation 2

Genre : RPG

Ar Tonelico is first RPG that I have played on Playstation 2, Ar Tonelico it's self is a name of tower. This tower surrounded by ground / components that flying at the air. In Ar Tonelico's world people live in those surrounded area from low to upper position. This story is about a boy from upper area that crash down in lower area, that no matter what he must to going back to upper area ASAP. Later, In his journey later he went and meets many friend then team up with them in battle. Altough it's graphic just simple 2D but has many costumization feature (dive systems,magic, item creation,etc) also there multiple endings in this games. Character in this game also drawed like japanese manga/anime styles and also don't forget sound quality that supported this games. Altough I have finished played this game sometimes I still play the bonus songs that unlocked from finishing the game.