Glory of Heracles, the new RPG released last week for the Nintendo DS, feels incredibly familiar. And that’s just fine.
The game takes place in an anime-infused version of ancient Greece. Your amnesiac hero may or may not be Heracles, son of Zeus. But he is, like many of the companions he’ll come to meet along his adventure, immortal. So too, apparently, are the rules of the traditional Japanese role-playing game.
Glory of Heracles is the first game in the series to come to the U.S., but the series began in 1987 in Japan. This latest version feels much like an 80’s RPG: Enemies pop up out of nowhere, thrusting the player into the storied “random battles” of yore. Players pick their characters’ attacks one move at a time, then watch the fight play out with a rousing battle anthem in the background. And the game’s first dungeon is the requisite abandoned mine just outside of town.
And yet this familiarity, somehow, doesn’t breed contempt. It helps that the game throws you tons of combat options right off the bat. Characters start out with nearly a dozen magic and attack options – giving role-playing veterans the immediate ability to start crafting game-breaking battle strategies. Because half the fun of playing role-playing games comes in finding ways to exploit the mechanisms of combat.
Glory of Heracles’ first nod to this kind of play comes when characters bring down the hammer. Kills that go above and beyond, carving off way more hit points than necessary, grant an “overkill” bonus of extra magic points. A smart tactician can keep characters’ MP brimming by orchestrating each kill so that magic users get the final blow.
What’s striking about Glory of Heracles is the way it seems to cater to two audiences. The game’s by-the-numbers plot, buoyed by strong writing, is ideal for the role-playing newbie. Yet its mechanics feel refined enough to occupy the avid role-player who has already played and replayed Final Fantasy IV and Chrono Trigger.
The game does, of course, introduce a few nods to contemporary gaming. All the menu-oriented busywork can be handled via the stylus and touchscreen. Certain magic attacks can be boosted by completing optional touch screen minigames. Unfortunately, the game utilizes the sort of ugly 3-D scenery that Square Enix insists on shoehorning into most of its Final Fantasy remakes.
Still, the ugly melding of lovely sprites and clunky 3-D models just makes Glory of Heracles feel that much more like the games it’s trying to emulate. It pays fine tribute to its forebears. You’d expect nothing less from the scion of legends.
Images courtesy Nintendo
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- Square Enix Kills Near Complete Chrono Trigger Fan Project …