Screenshots :.
Resonance of Fate
PS3
Kash
13-05-2010
"Your crew. Mixed bunch of folks."
"I literally have nothing to say about this screenshot."
"Or this one. Let's start singing 80's power ballads to fill the time!"
"IT'S THE FINAL COUNTDOWN, DA DA DA DAAA"
"SHOT THROUGH THE HEART, AND YOU'RE TO BLAME"
"A SINGER IN A SMOKEY ROOM, A SMELL OF WINE AND CHEAP PERFUME"
When ‘Resonance of Fate’ (known as ‘End of Eternity’ in Japan) was announced, I wasn’t quite sure what to think - you see, developer tri-Ace and I have a chequered history. Their games always promise something special (see Infinite Undiscovery, Star Ocean: The Last Hope) but never quite realize their suggested Awesomeness – usually stumbling in the ever so key areas of storytelling, pacing or gameplay balancing. Resonance of Fate doesn’t necessarily fix these problems, but neither does it falter as readily as their past titles. Read on for a tale of one of the more off-kilter JRPGs to trot along in a while.
Resonance of Fate is set in the distant future where (through no apparent fault of humankind) the world has changed drastically. Toxins flooded the air and water almost completely wiping out the human race, who were unable to adapt to the sudden changes. The few that survived constructed ‘Basel’, a giant air purification system located underground. Within the boundaries of this device, humanity persisted, eventually forming a civilization around the construct. From this base, they built a tower to grow within Basel’s protection. Over time, this civilization gave rise to Cardinals – the political and religious leaders who worship Basel and the machinery that forms the tower – and a class structure that saw the Cardinals and richer folk inhabit the higher tiers of the tower while the poorer elements live closer to the treacherous earth.
Sound interesting? Well, there’s more. Only, you’re not going to hear more than the odd peep about it when you play the game. For better or for worse, Resonance of Fate is extremely light on story, especially when it comes to explaining the rich background that’s set up. What little storytelling you will see focuses on the lives of the three main characters – Vashyron, Zephyr and Leanne – a ragtag group of guns-for-hire eking their way through life mostly by slaying monsters that stand between them and a paycheck. The events of the game are broken down into chapters, each following a particular job. There are cutscenes featuring a larger plot during each chapter, but they end up being far too cryptic for their own good. For the most part, the chapters are disconnected affairs and it isn’t till you approach the end of the game that you begin to get a real sense of the larger story having any effect on Team Vashyron.
The three main characters are fairly well-done and, for the initial hours of the story at least, come across as mysterious and interesting. However, for all of Vashyron’s antics (a particular highlight coming in at Chapter 5), you’re never really given enough, save for the odd cutscene and repetitive battle dialogue, by which to judge their character, and consequently, they end up feeling a bit bland by the end of the experience.
So the strengths of RoF do not lie in its story. That can be forgiven if the gameplay makes up for it. Conveniently enough, the battle system in RoF makes a bloody strong case for itself, being arguably, one of the most complex battle systems I’ve had the pleasure of encountering. Battles in RoF play out in a turn-based/real-time amalgam with almost exclusive use of projectile weapons such as handguns and grenades. When you find yourself in battle area, each character can take turns to walk around and, when stationary, shoot at enemies – not too dissimilar from Valkyria Chronicles or any RPG that uses an Action Point system to regulate your movement/action ratio per turn. The only problem being if you move around and shoot in this manner, any attacks made by enemies will interrupt your movement/action and waste valuable turns. To avoid this, you can during any turn, trigger a ‘Hero Action’ which allows you to run across the map in a straight line and take potshots at your foes while invulnerable and looking unbelievably badass. The only problem here is that you can only trigger a limited number of Hero Actions that can be refilled only by killing opponents or destroying their body parts. That’s Juggling Act number 1.
Now for Juggling Act number 2, the fights in RoF feature two kinds of damage – scratch and direct. It is possible to do large amounts of scratch damage via SMGs with a series of shots, but this isn’t persistent and is healed over time. The only way to make this damage permanent is to inflict direct damage with Handguns, which are otherwise next-to-useless in actually chipping away at a non-scratched foe. However, they are handy for ‘breaking’ their health bars so as to be able to regenerate more Hero Actions over time.
Confused yet? There’s more, but that’s when it starts to get really detailed and serves no purpose at this juncture. Just know that it’s messy to try and get your head around. And though that shouldn’t normally be a bad thing, the game doesn’t help with trying to figure this out. The tutorial is limited to a set of text boxes that don’t really proffer much information beyond what you have read here or would have gleaned from playing the game for five minutes. And, for better or worse, all the game’s mechanics are available to you from the outset - you are expected to understand how they work in order to progress. The only serves to facilitate an emotional response of frustration; in the early stages of the game you will come across frequent roadblocks to progress that are only blocks because you weren’t aware of the intricacies of Mechanic X. If you stick with the game, these progress halting points become less frequent, but no less annoying and no less exacerbated by the lack of a clear guide to how everything fits together.
But then ... you’ll get to a point (if you haven’t given up already) where it will all just ‘click’. Everything will make sense and in this state of ‘RoF Nirvana’, every little detail and tactical nuance will suddenly permeate into your consciousness. And when this happens, you’re in for an orgiastic feast of JRPG mechanics. Each battle turns into a ballet of gunplay where you’ll find yourself spending and refilling hero actions without the slightest care; where the different types of damage and cued actions won’t matter because you’ll instinctively know how to deal with every situation the game throws at you.
However, this does not last. Much like the rest of the dramatic flow of this review, as wonderful as that sense of enlightenment is, it falters because there’s nothing more beyond that. Once you hit that lofty peak, you will have experienced the best of the fun that the game has to offer. It may last anywhere from a few hours to a dozen or even a score, but you will have seen it all in the first couple of hours. Because all the mechanics are available to you from the start, there’s no real sense of change, barring the generally-disconnected story. Progress without a real sense of challenge, other than enemies with greater health, or better attacks, fails to keep one engaged over the length of the experience.
And that’s the meat of the game. RoF does play host to a set of nice features – you can upgrade your guns with different parts, which though not reflected in battle, add the ability to customize the characters to play to your tactical strengths. Additionally, in a somewhat rare move for a JRPG, you can choose from an array of different clothing options to alter the looks of the three protagonists – if you feel that Vashyron just isn’t manly enough without that pink t-shirt and black leather pants combo.
It’s difficult to figure out exactly how to pose Resonance of Fate in a recommendation. It’s full of wonderful things that are continually denigrated by weaker factors; it has an awesome battle system, but it’s confusing; the world and setting is completely unique, but they’re never really explained or utilized to full potential; Vashyron is totally amazing, but only in chapter 5 (trust me on this). Ultimately, it all comes down to what is most important to you. For me, engaging and intricate JRPG mechanics placed in a world unlike every other cookie-cutter tale out there made me glad to have played it. So if that sounds interesting to you, please give tri-Ace’s best game in a long time the look it deserves.
Resonance of Fate is set in the distant future where (through no apparent fault of humankind) the world has changed drastically. Toxins flooded the air and water almost completely wiping out the human race, who were unable to adapt to the sudden changes. The few that survived constructed ‘Basel’, a giant air purification system located underground. Within the boundaries of this device, humanity persisted, eventually forming a civilization around the construct. From this base, they built a tower to grow within Basel’s protection. Over time, this civilization gave rise to Cardinals – the political and religious leaders who worship Basel and the machinery that forms the tower – and a class structure that saw the Cardinals and richer folk inhabit the higher tiers of the tower while the poorer elements live closer to the treacherous earth.
Sound interesting? Well, there’s more. Only, you’re not going to hear more than the odd peep about it when you play the game. For better or for worse, Resonance of Fate is extremely light on story, especially when it comes to explaining the rich background that’s set up. What little storytelling you will see focuses on the lives of the three main characters – Vashyron, Zephyr and Leanne – a ragtag group of guns-for-hire eking their way through life mostly by slaying monsters that stand between them and a paycheck. The events of the game are broken down into chapters, each following a particular job. There are cutscenes featuring a larger plot during each chapter, but they end up being far too cryptic for their own good. For the most part, the chapters are disconnected affairs and it isn’t till you approach the end of the game that you begin to get a real sense of the larger story having any effect on Team Vashyron.
The three main characters are fairly well-done and, for the initial hours of the story at least, come across as mysterious and interesting. However, for all of Vashyron’s antics (a particular highlight coming in at Chapter 5), you’re never really given enough, save for the odd cutscene and repetitive battle dialogue, by which to judge their character, and consequently, they end up feeling a bit bland by the end of the experience.
So the strengths of RoF do not lie in its story. That can be forgiven if the gameplay makes up for it. Conveniently enough, the battle system in RoF makes a bloody strong case for itself, being arguably, one of the most complex battle systems I’ve had the pleasure of encountering. Battles in RoF play out in a turn-based/real-time amalgam with almost exclusive use of projectile weapons such as handguns and grenades. When you find yourself in battle area, each character can take turns to walk around and, when stationary, shoot at enemies – not too dissimilar from Valkyria Chronicles or any RPG that uses an Action Point system to regulate your movement/action ratio per turn. The only problem being if you move around and shoot in this manner, any attacks made by enemies will interrupt your movement/action and waste valuable turns. To avoid this, you can during any turn, trigger a ‘Hero Action’ which allows you to run across the map in a straight line and take potshots at your foes while invulnerable and looking unbelievably badass. The only problem here is that you can only trigger a limited number of Hero Actions that can be refilled only by killing opponents or destroying their body parts. That’s Juggling Act number 1.
Now for Juggling Act number 2, the fights in RoF feature two kinds of damage – scratch and direct. It is possible to do large amounts of scratch damage via SMGs with a series of shots, but this isn’t persistent and is healed over time. The only way to make this damage permanent is to inflict direct damage with Handguns, which are otherwise next-to-useless in actually chipping away at a non-scratched foe. However, they are handy for ‘breaking’ their health bars so as to be able to regenerate more Hero Actions over time.
Confused yet? There’s more, but that’s when it starts to get really detailed and serves no purpose at this juncture. Just know that it’s messy to try and get your head around. And though that shouldn’t normally be a bad thing, the game doesn’t help with trying to figure this out. The tutorial is limited to a set of text boxes that don’t really proffer much information beyond what you have read here or would have gleaned from playing the game for five minutes. And, for better or worse, all the game’s mechanics are available to you from the outset - you are expected to understand how they work in order to progress. The only serves to facilitate an emotional response of frustration; in the early stages of the game you will come across frequent roadblocks to progress that are only blocks because you weren’t aware of the intricacies of Mechanic X. If you stick with the game, these progress halting points become less frequent, but no less annoying and no less exacerbated by the lack of a clear guide to how everything fits together.
But then ... you’ll get to a point (if you haven’t given up already) where it will all just ‘click’. Everything will make sense and in this state of ‘RoF Nirvana’, every little detail and tactical nuance will suddenly permeate into your consciousness. And when this happens, you’re in for an orgiastic feast of JRPG mechanics. Each battle turns into a ballet of gunplay where you’ll find yourself spending and refilling hero actions without the slightest care; where the different types of damage and cued actions won’t matter because you’ll instinctively know how to deal with every situation the game throws at you.
However, this does not last. Much like the rest of the dramatic flow of this review, as wonderful as that sense of enlightenment is, it falters because there’s nothing more beyond that. Once you hit that lofty peak, you will have experienced the best of the fun that the game has to offer. It may last anywhere from a few hours to a dozen or even a score, but you will have seen it all in the first couple of hours. Because all the mechanics are available to you from the start, there’s no real sense of change, barring the generally-disconnected story. Progress without a real sense of challenge, other than enemies with greater health, or better attacks, fails to keep one engaged over the length of the experience.
And that’s the meat of the game. RoF does play host to a set of nice features – you can upgrade your guns with different parts, which though not reflected in battle, add the ability to customize the characters to play to your tactical strengths. Additionally, in a somewhat rare move for a JRPG, you can choose from an array of different clothing options to alter the looks of the three protagonists – if you feel that Vashyron just isn’t manly enough without that pink t-shirt and black leather pants combo.
It’s difficult to figure out exactly how to pose Resonance of Fate in a recommendation. It’s full of wonderful things that are continually denigrated by weaker factors; it has an awesome battle system, but it’s confusing; the world and setting is completely unique, but they’re never really explained or utilized to full potential; Vashyron is totally amazing, but only in chapter 5 (trust me on this). Ultimately, it all comes down to what is most important to you. For me, engaging and intricate JRPG mechanics placed in a world unlike every other cookie-cutter tale out there made me glad to have played it. So if that sounds interesting to you, please give tri-Ace’s best game in a long time the look it deserves.
8/10
