Hello all! I'm rather new to the Escapist but I'm trying to get involved in the community and a quick review seems as good a way as any. I recently saw The Last Remnant sitting for $15 on the used shelf at my local electronics store and thought "what the hell, I'll give it a shot".
What I got was an incredibly addicting, time consuming, deeply flawed mixed bag of quality from the ever popular Square Enix. The following is a summation of my feelings on this unique gaming experience.
Here's a basic overview of the game. It is a blend between a traditional JRPG and an RTS game. This probably calls to mind games like Ubisoft's Lost Magic or the bonus campaigns from Warcraft but it is a completely unique experience. Instead of controlling individual units you control groups of units called unions and they share communal health and AP (the MP of the game). When a union's health hits zero, all the units in the union die. However, when you tell a union to attack an enemy, each individual unit attacks differently. Flank attacks and rear assaults are taken into account, as well as a morale bar at the top showing the momentum of the battle. Higher morale = your troops fighting more effectively, lower morale = less effectiveness. This bar is changed by things like critical hits and termination of unions. Its an intricate and involving battle system that is one of a kind. The overworld of the game is reminescent of Final Fantasy XIII only no where near as pretty. You can see all the monsters wandering about before you engage them in battle, which is done by "drawing them in" with the right trigger. Pulling right trigger creates a circle around your character that engages all enemies inside the circle. If a monster touches you before you engage them, they have an advantage. That's a basic, basic overview of how this game functions, now lets dig into the meat of the matter.
I'll start with the good side of The Last Remnant. You can have alot of fun with this game. The battle system is incredibly engaging, and the level up system is intuitive and works great. Some of the monster designs are downright amazing and the boss fights can border on the incredibly epic. There's also a nice host of side quests for those who don't like just following the pre-ordained course. Not only are they a fun distraction, but they provide mounds of back story and there are even completely self contained side stories, much like with the Cerberus missions from Mass Effect 1. Completing these missions can also unlock new mercenaries to add to your party. Aside from the side quests are the guild tasks. These are missions that are constantly going, and a reward can be collected at any time after completion. Think of them almost like in game achievements with rewards. For example, one of them is get a battle chain of 100, which means kill 100 monsters without returning to the world map or being ambushed. These can add nice little extras to your quest. Now onto the highlight of this game, the battle system. The battle system is unique and intuitive. If one of your unions is engaging an enemy union, another one of your unions can come in from the side with a flank attack for extra damage. This adds an element of strategy that is not normally found in a turn based RPG. Its impossible to explain the intricacies of the system in writing but suffice it to say that the system is engaging and works very well with a few exceptions that will be discussed later. The next item is a major plus for me. The music of this game is amazing. The themes range from dark and imposing during boss battles to downright beautiful in some of the environments. Quality instrumentals and the occasional vocal part are a nice touch to this game. Sadly however, that is the end of the good qualities.
Now onto the bad aspects of The Last Remnant. This review is based on the Xbox 360 version of the game not the PC edition. I say this because the Xbox 360 edition has some major, major technical problems. From sound hiccups, to all out freezes this game has issues in the core aspects of its playability. I have heard that the PC version does not have these problems and so may be a better choice if you have a comp that can run it. But back to the 360 version. The lagging is so bad as to make this game unplayable unless you install it to your hard drive. And this is not a small game. It takes up around 12 gigs to install, which is to say you should probably have a seperate hard drive set aside just for this game. Once the game is installed, the lagging is minimized greatly, but still pops up with annoying persistence. On a brighter side however, all sound irregularities are gone. The lagging still can really bite you in the ass at the worst times though. During battle there are moments referred to as "Critical Triggers" which we know as quick time events. This can be made difficult if the game decides to lag at that exact moment. But even aside from the technical problems this game has a host of other issues. The characters for one. There isn't a single character in this game that I would say I really like. the closest thing would be the kind of mentor figure of Pagus, who is just a side character. the main character Rush is downright annoying a lot of the time, and most of the side characters aren't very likeable. David Nassau, who is your main ally, is far too somber and he also borders on the annoying sometimes. The dialogue and voice acting in this game are painful to listen to much of the time, and the mouths on screen don't sync up with the audio in the slightest. The story is nothing special either. It has been done before and done better many times. This is a problem but as a device to drive the game forward the story is passable. Probably my biggest concern with this game aside from the tech problems however is the difficulty curve. Its incredibly schizophrenic, wavering up and down waaaaay too much, and the bosses at the end of each disc are just obnoxiously difficult to beat. This game also chains boss fights which is annoying in and of itslef. You can beat one incredibly difficult boss, just to get pounded into the ground by another before you get a chance to save. Speaking of saving, this game allows you to save anywhere, which is nice except that the game takes advantage of this. You can be in a place with incredibly low level monsters, go through a door, and get annhilated by a dragon in a few seconds, sending you all the way back to the last time you saved. This can be incredibly annoying. Also, there can be some problems with not being able to directly control your units. While combat is great, healing can be bad. Since you can't individually control your healing units, they may heal the wrong unit in the heat of battle. This can be a very annoying situation. In short there are some major problems with this game.
That's about all I can say in a brief review. While this game does have some major problems, I still had quite alot of fun with it and the battle system is truly great. There is however, alot to put up with and if you don't install the game to your system you can forget about any amount of enjoyment. If on the other hand you are looking for a unique, challenging experiece and you are willing to overlook some problems and invest a little time in a game, I'd give this one a try especially if you can find it cheap. That's all I have to say on that. Please post feedback on how I can improve my reviews because criticism is what makes the world go round. Thanks for reading!
Captain Richards
What I got was an incredibly addicting, time consuming, deeply flawed mixed bag of quality from the ever popular Square Enix. The following is a summation of my feelings on this unique gaming experience.
Here's a basic overview of the game. It is a blend between a traditional JRPG and an RTS game. This probably calls to mind games like Ubisoft's Lost Magic or the bonus campaigns from Warcraft but it is a completely unique experience. Instead of controlling individual units you control groups of units called unions and they share communal health and AP (the MP of the game). When a union's health hits zero, all the units in the union die. However, when you tell a union to attack an enemy, each individual unit attacks differently. Flank attacks and rear assaults are taken into account, as well as a morale bar at the top showing the momentum of the battle. Higher morale = your troops fighting more effectively, lower morale = less effectiveness. This bar is changed by things like critical hits and termination of unions. Its an intricate and involving battle system that is one of a kind. The overworld of the game is reminescent of Final Fantasy XIII only no where near as pretty. You can see all the monsters wandering about before you engage them in battle, which is done by "drawing them in" with the right trigger. Pulling right trigger creates a circle around your character that engages all enemies inside the circle. If a monster touches you before you engage them, they have an advantage. That's a basic, basic overview of how this game functions, now lets dig into the meat of the matter.
I'll start with the good side of The Last Remnant. You can have alot of fun with this game. The battle system is incredibly engaging, and the level up system is intuitive and works great. Some of the monster designs are downright amazing and the boss fights can border on the incredibly epic. There's also a nice host of side quests for those who don't like just following the pre-ordained course. Not only are they a fun distraction, but they provide mounds of back story and there are even completely self contained side stories, much like with the Cerberus missions from Mass Effect 1. Completing these missions can also unlock new mercenaries to add to your party. Aside from the side quests are the guild tasks. These are missions that are constantly going, and a reward can be collected at any time after completion. Think of them almost like in game achievements with rewards. For example, one of them is get a battle chain of 100, which means kill 100 monsters without returning to the world map or being ambushed. These can add nice little extras to your quest. Now onto the highlight of this game, the battle system. The battle system is unique and intuitive. If one of your unions is engaging an enemy union, another one of your unions can come in from the side with a flank attack for extra damage. This adds an element of strategy that is not normally found in a turn based RPG. Its impossible to explain the intricacies of the system in writing but suffice it to say that the system is engaging and works very well with a few exceptions that will be discussed later. The next item is a major plus for me. The music of this game is amazing. The themes range from dark and imposing during boss battles to downright beautiful in some of the environments. Quality instrumentals and the occasional vocal part are a nice touch to this game. Sadly however, that is the end of the good qualities.
Now onto the bad aspects of The Last Remnant. This review is based on the Xbox 360 version of the game not the PC edition. I say this because the Xbox 360 edition has some major, major technical problems. From sound hiccups, to all out freezes this game has issues in the core aspects of its playability. I have heard that the PC version does not have these problems and so may be a better choice if you have a comp that can run it. But back to the 360 version. The lagging is so bad as to make this game unplayable unless you install it to your hard drive. And this is not a small game. It takes up around 12 gigs to install, which is to say you should probably have a seperate hard drive set aside just for this game. Once the game is installed, the lagging is minimized greatly, but still pops up with annoying persistence. On a brighter side however, all sound irregularities are gone. The lagging still can really bite you in the ass at the worst times though. During battle there are moments referred to as "Critical Triggers" which we know as quick time events. This can be made difficult if the game decides to lag at that exact moment. But even aside from the technical problems this game has a host of other issues. The characters for one. There isn't a single character in this game that I would say I really like. the closest thing would be the kind of mentor figure of Pagus, who is just a side character. the main character Rush is downright annoying a lot of the time, and most of the side characters aren't very likeable. David Nassau, who is your main ally, is far too somber and he also borders on the annoying sometimes. The dialogue and voice acting in this game are painful to listen to much of the time, and the mouths on screen don't sync up with the audio in the slightest. The story is nothing special either. It has been done before and done better many times. This is a problem but as a device to drive the game forward the story is passable. Probably my biggest concern with this game aside from the tech problems however is the difficulty curve. Its incredibly schizophrenic, wavering up and down waaaaay too much, and the bosses at the end of each disc are just obnoxiously difficult to beat. This game also chains boss fights which is annoying in and of itslef. You can beat one incredibly difficult boss, just to get pounded into the ground by another before you get a chance to save. Speaking of saving, this game allows you to save anywhere, which is nice except that the game takes advantage of this. You can be in a place with incredibly low level monsters, go through a door, and get annhilated by a dragon in a few seconds, sending you all the way back to the last time you saved. This can be incredibly annoying. Also, there can be some problems with not being able to directly control your units. While combat is great, healing can be bad. Since you can't individually control your healing units, they may heal the wrong unit in the heat of battle. This can be a very annoying situation. In short there are some major problems with this game.
That's about all I can say in a brief review. While this game does have some major problems, I still had quite alot of fun with it and the battle system is truly great. There is however, alot to put up with and if you don't install the game to your system you can forget about any amount of enjoyment. If on the other hand you are looking for a unique, challenging experiece and you are willing to overlook some problems and invest a little time in a game, I'd give this one a try especially if you can find it cheap. That's all I have to say on that. Please post feedback on how I can improve my reviews because criticism is what makes the world go round. Thanks for reading!
Captain Richards
