- Familiar TerritoryThe turn-based RPG has been languishing for a long time, and fans of the genre will not be disappointed in Lost Odyssey. The game is an X-Box exclusive, but developed by Mistwalker and headed up by Hironobu Sakaguchi, who created the original Final Fantasy games. The result is that Lost Odyssey is extremely familiar - almost to the point of being derivative - of those golden games.
Lost Odyssey follows the 1001th year of Kaim, an immortal who's fighting to regain 1000 years of lost memories. Along the way he meets other immortals in the same situation and mortals who have been caught up in the immortal lives. Early on you discover that there's a mastermind behind the immortals' missing memories, and you pursue that mastermind for answers and revenge.
Lost Odyssey features 4 disks - 4! This isn't just graphics overload, there is a lot of story and content to go through in the game. The visuals are stunning, as to be expected, but you really need a high-def TV to appreciate them. I have a 32 TV, but it's not high-def, and I can barely read the menus or pick out pots and treasure chests in the landscape. All of the character designs are beautiful, apart from Kaim's, who has an annoying strand of hair in front of his face that I would love to take some scissors to. Kaim's 1000 years of history leave the doors wide open for writers, who oblige us with memorable short stories in text-only "dream" sequences. I actually found the English voice acting and script more engaging and suitable for the characters than the Japanese voice acting cast and writing. The orchestral score is top-notch, and very reminiscent of Final Fantasy VII and Radiata Stories (Nobuo Uematsu wrote music for both Lost Odyssey and Final Fantasy VII).
The gameplay features some new ideas. Your active party consists of 5 players arranged in a front and back row. The front row's hit points determine the "Guard Condition" of the party, or how much damage reduction is available for the back row. The enemies also have this advantage, so your tactics must be planned accordingly.
Immortals can learn new skills from mortals and accessories. Mortals only gain new skills based on level. It's very addictive to build skills for your immortals this way. You accumulate new skills quickly, and there's no limit to how many skills you can learn - just how many you can equip. Theoretically, your immortals can learn every skill in the game.
Parts for enhancement rings are scattered across the world. Ring crafting is the sole crafting mechanic in the game. Recipes for enhancement rings are automatically unlocked as you collect the required components. Equipping enhancement rings will give your melee characters the ability to apply status effects, increased damage types, and other effects. The ring system gives your character an additional action to time while attacking - you must hold down the right trigger as an outer ring contracts onto an inner ring, and release the trigger as both rings overlap. The better you are at this, the more effect your equipped ring will have.
Though there are some unique aspects to the gameplay, there are many turn-based RPG conventions that are used in the game, including all of the annoying conventions you hoped were dead and gone forever.
You only have 3 of the maximum 5 characters for most of the first disk, and the pattern-style boss fights are incredibly difficult and unbalanced when compared to the monsters you fight before each boss. I suspect that they specifically designed the game with the assumption that every player would have a game guide, and still want to make the game challenging for those players. The result is that the early boss fights are only conquered through perfect tactics and dumb luck. The game doesn't become enjoyable until you obtain at least 5 characters. No game should ever have a trial period that lasts 1/4 of the game.
There are plenty of in-area annoyances, including gathering, block-moving, guard-capture and maze puzzles - most of these are in areas that include random monster encounters. At one point in the game, there's a funeral, which is completed with three minigames. How tasteless.
The turn-based system and skill system leave much to be desired. You must enter all of your actions at the beginning of the turn, so they may be completely invalidated by enemy actions intermixed with your own, and there's not a lot you can do to plan for this or predict when your turn will complete relative to an enemy's. There is a big discrepancy in mana cost vs. effect for spells - you're usually better off using the lowest-ranked spells for maximum effect, since the higher-ranked spells are so expensive and only slightly more effective. The ring system is also a little ineffectual. As with most classic RPGs, status ailments still have a tiny percentage of being applied to enemies. (But enemies seem to have no problem hitting you with them all the time.)
Annoyances like this are tolerated for our favorite turn-based RPGs because we're rewarded with amazing story and character development. Lost Odyssey's commercials may feature "White Rabbit," but there's not a lot that's surreal or dark about this game. The immortals initially suffer from one-dimensional personalities due to their lack of memories, and it takes quite a while for us to sympathize with them. The dream sequences are hit-or-miss: a lot of them read like drippy, mediocre fan fiction, but some of them are quite moving. The characters are mostly adults, which is refreshing - no more rites of passage or whiny teenagers with identity crises. But many of the characters often fall into the RPG character paradigms - spunky thief girl, strong silent tank man, jerky sidekick type, a naive princess on her first adventure.
Apart from its flaws, Lost Odyssey is an artful, decent game. It takes a long while to get started, but you will be emotionally involved in the story and engaged with the few new gameplay mechanics. But if you're a fan of the genre, chances are you will play this game and be nostalgic for older releases that do the same thing, but better.
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