Sands of Destruction
Aug. 20th, 2013 10:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chuckroIn a land ruled by Ferals, the humans who don't "know their place" form an anarchist group called the World Annihilation Front. Naja, the half-breed son of the former king; and Rajiv, the full-feral son of the current king, swear to stop them from destroying the world. Meanwhile, a boy named Kyrie, who lives with his uncle Agni in a backwater village, is framed as being a member of the World Annihilation Front and called before the Ferals' Salvation Committee. A mysterious voice tells him to run, so he runs. When he's caught, it tells him to awaken, so he turns the surrounding area and everyone in it into sand.
The first person who catches up with him is World Annihilation Front agent Morte (aka "Lady Death" or "the Crimson Plague"), a death-fetishist who really, really wants to end the world. "As destroyers of worlds go, I think you worry a bit too much." When Kyrie doesn't want to jump on the "end the world" bandwagon, she decides to take him on a world tour to convince him how much it sucks. This quickly gets him and several others (a teddy bear mercenary named Taupy, the famous Agan "the Green...and Red", a mysterious woman who may be a dragon, and the ferals from the introduction) caught up in the machinations of both the unseen World Annihilation Front leaders and the various Beastlords who all seem to be playing a complex web of politics.
The main character's name, incidentally, is actually pronounced as "Key-ree-ay", like the Greek for "Lord" used in prayers that usually refers to Jesus. (I first read it as "Kie-ree", like a mistranslation of "Kylie".) Given his status as some sort of chosen "Destruct" (who comes not to bring peace, but a sword), this seems fitting. The Crystal Dragon Jesus is strong with this one.
The characters love to quip and the dialogue is actually witty. Lampshading the fact that Kyrie constantly requires infodumps, "Is there anything you HAVE heard of?" They even make this a game mechanic, as characters learn specific "Quips" during the story that they randomly spout off in battles to give you bonuses.
The voice acting is okay; not terrible but not fantastic. I'd say the same for the music--it gets the job done. I played a decent chunk of the game with the sound off, and I don't think I missed much. (And I think the delivery of some lines was funnier in my head than the voice actors managed. The writing is really good.)
The pacing is also pretty good, in that you can play for half an hour and actually accomplish something, which is important in a portable game and really just generally nice. (It also lets you save anytime you aren't in battle or a cutscene.) Much as I love some console rpgs, there's often the problem of having an hour between save points, and/or needing two hours to actually accomplish anything. The plotline and dungeon designs are a bit formulaic, with a bunch of fetch quests here and there, battles with elemental-themed megabosses, and a series of sidequests just before the final dungeon; but I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing.
Character generally have two attacks: A weak, fast attack they can use for multiple strikes, and a strong attack they can use once but may have an additional effect. As they level up and you spend skill points, these attacks can be chained together with advanced versions to form combos. (Once you hit level 20, you can raise skills to level 7 and get the "Fortify Ability" bonus. If you use that for your Flurry attacks and chain them together, you can snap the game in half.) Allocating skill points to your attacks isn't explained well in the game, but it's moderately intuitive, and if you screw yourself over, there are items available in the endgame that let you completely reallocate.
There's also an obtuse "morale" system that isn't explained in-game and determines how many attacks you get each turn. (Short form: Characters who are equipped with "red heart" accessories and spend more time in your active party end up with high morale and three BP. "Broken heart" accessories and a lot of time in the back row leads to low morale and only one BP.) The game's FFX-style order of battle indicator becomes less useful as the game goes on, because enemies have so many skills that let them jump the queue, and there seem to be "delay" effects that don't get announced.
Even if you use the chain attacks, there is strategy to the battles, and things like buff spells really matter. Another particularly powerful ability is Taupy's "Trump Card" spell, which gives attack, defense and speed buffs to the entire party. It is insanely useful for boss battles in the last quarter of the game.
My complaints: The dungeon puzzles generally devolve into "go here and flip this switch" excuses to run back and forth, though some of them are more clever than others. The encounter rate can be a bit high for chunks of that, but the fact that the game has a useful minimap for virtually all of the dungeons takes some of the sting out of it. The other is the stupid "rare item" system at stores--some items only show up occasionally in the weapon and armor stores, with no indication that they're there until you see them. But you can refresh the list just by going in and out of one menu, so why even bother having it?
There's a blacksmith system that lets you imbue weapons with vendortrash to give them bonuses and occasionally upgrade them into better weapons. It's expensive (so, time-consuming) and not really necessary, and the best weapons (found via sidequest) are still better than the very best things you can make at the smithery, but I suppose it could be an extra bit of customization if you're into that sort of thing.
It's a relatively easy game (in that I could fight everything but not stop to grind, and be fine for both cash and experience) until you hit the bosses of the Sky Gaol, who will destroy you if you aren't level 20 and using chain attacks. After that, the difficulty stays pretty even and not too bad (as long as you have plenty of status-prevention accessories for boss battles and know how to use buffs).
I'd describe it as "What Lunar: Dragon Song wanted to be" in a lot of respects--the battle systems and visual design are similar, but this is a vastly better game, as there are combat options that actually matter, much less repetitive grinding and pointless fetch-questing, and well-written, witty dialogue. It's also similar to Black Sigil, only more polished, in that it's a retro-rpg that attempts to be creative with the battle system, and it works in some ways but can be broken and frustrating in others. But while the encounter rate can be a bit high in places, this never has automatic/arbitrary status effects on your characters, has far fewer glitches, and has a function map system.
(I learned after I finished that a lot of the team that created this overlapped from Xenogears, but they were instructed to tone down the original pitch and make it more kid-friendly. Which makes sense with some of the system and theme choices, and honestly, is an argument that Executive Meddling isn't always bad, because I think this worked a lot better than a grim and serious game would have.)
Overall: I'd call this a hidden gem. In the sea of DS rpgs that I didn't expect a lot out of, this was a very pleasant surprise. It's hardly perfect, formulaic in places and obtuse in others, but I had fun playing 20 hours of it, and that's all I'd ask for.
The first person who catches up with him is World Annihilation Front agent Morte (aka "Lady Death" or "the Crimson Plague"), a death-fetishist who really, really wants to end the world. "As destroyers of worlds go, I think you worry a bit too much." When Kyrie doesn't want to jump on the "end the world" bandwagon, she decides to take him on a world tour to convince him how much it sucks. This quickly gets him and several others (a teddy bear mercenary named Taupy, the famous Agan "the Green...and Red", a mysterious woman who may be a dragon, and the ferals from the introduction) caught up in the machinations of both the unseen World Annihilation Front leaders and the various Beastlords who all seem to be playing a complex web of politics.
The main character's name, incidentally, is actually pronounced as "Key-ree-ay", like the Greek for "Lord" used in prayers that usually refers to Jesus. (I first read it as "Kie-ree", like a mistranslation of "Kylie".) Given his status as some sort of chosen "Destruct" (who comes not to bring peace, but a sword), this seems fitting. The Crystal Dragon Jesus is strong with this one.
The characters love to quip and the dialogue is actually witty. Lampshading the fact that Kyrie constantly requires infodumps, "Is there anything you HAVE heard of?" They even make this a game mechanic, as characters learn specific "Quips" during the story that they randomly spout off in battles to give you bonuses.
The voice acting is okay; not terrible but not fantastic. I'd say the same for the music--it gets the job done. I played a decent chunk of the game with the sound off, and I don't think I missed much. (And I think the delivery of some lines was funnier in my head than the voice actors managed. The writing is really good.)
The pacing is also pretty good, in that you can play for half an hour and actually accomplish something, which is important in a portable game and really just generally nice. (It also lets you save anytime you aren't in battle or a cutscene.) Much as I love some console rpgs, there's often the problem of having an hour between save points, and/or needing two hours to actually accomplish anything. The plotline and dungeon designs are a bit formulaic, with a bunch of fetch quests here and there, battles with elemental-themed megabosses, and a series of sidequests just before the final dungeon; but I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing.
Character generally have two attacks: A weak, fast attack they can use for multiple strikes, and a strong attack they can use once but may have an additional effect. As they level up and you spend skill points, these attacks can be chained together with advanced versions to form combos. (Once you hit level 20, you can raise skills to level 7 and get the "Fortify Ability" bonus. If you use that for your Flurry attacks and chain them together, you can snap the game in half.) Allocating skill points to your attacks isn't explained well in the game, but it's moderately intuitive, and if you screw yourself over, there are items available in the endgame that let you completely reallocate.
There's also an obtuse "morale" system that isn't explained in-game and determines how many attacks you get each turn. (Short form: Characters who are equipped with "red heart" accessories and spend more time in your active party end up with high morale and three BP. "Broken heart" accessories and a lot of time in the back row leads to low morale and only one BP.) The game's FFX-style order of battle indicator becomes less useful as the game goes on, because enemies have so many skills that let them jump the queue, and there seem to be "delay" effects that don't get announced.
Even if you use the chain attacks, there is strategy to the battles, and things like buff spells really matter. Another particularly powerful ability is Taupy's "Trump Card" spell, which gives attack, defense and speed buffs to the entire party. It is insanely useful for boss battles in the last quarter of the game.
My complaints: The dungeon puzzles generally devolve into "go here and flip this switch" excuses to run back and forth, though some of them are more clever than others. The encounter rate can be a bit high for chunks of that, but the fact that the game has a useful minimap for virtually all of the dungeons takes some of the sting out of it. The other is the stupid "rare item" system at stores--some items only show up occasionally in the weapon and armor stores, with no indication that they're there until you see them. But you can refresh the list just by going in and out of one menu, so why even bother having it?
There's a blacksmith system that lets you imbue weapons with vendortrash to give them bonuses and occasionally upgrade them into better weapons. It's expensive (so, time-consuming) and not really necessary, and the best weapons (found via sidequest) are still better than the very best things you can make at the smithery, but I suppose it could be an extra bit of customization if you're into that sort of thing.
It's a relatively easy game (in that I could fight everything but not stop to grind, and be fine for both cash and experience) until you hit the bosses of the Sky Gaol, who will destroy you if you aren't level 20 and using chain attacks. After that, the difficulty stays pretty even and not too bad (as long as you have plenty of status-prevention accessories for boss battles and know how to use buffs).
I'd describe it as "What Lunar: Dragon Song wanted to be" in a lot of respects--the battle systems and visual design are similar, but this is a vastly better game, as there are combat options that actually matter, much less repetitive grinding and pointless fetch-questing, and well-written, witty dialogue. It's also similar to Black Sigil, only more polished, in that it's a retro-rpg that attempts to be creative with the battle system, and it works in some ways but can be broken and frustrating in others. But while the encounter rate can be a bit high in places, this never has automatic/arbitrary status effects on your characters, has far fewer glitches, and has a function map system.
(I learned after I finished that a lot of the team that created this overlapped from Xenogears, but they were instructed to tone down the original pitch and make it more kid-friendly. Which makes sense with some of the system and theme choices, and honestly, is an argument that Executive Meddling isn't always bad, because I think this worked a lot better than a grim and serious game would have.)
Overall: I'd call this a hidden gem. In the sea of DS rpgs that I didn't expect a lot out of, this was a very pleasant surprise. It's hardly perfect, formulaic in places and obtuse in others, but I had fun playing 20 hours of it, and that's all I'd ask for.
