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In the cinema world it often happens that some movies are called of "sure success" even if they haven't still be released for cinemas. It's about those jobs that are full of actors of first grade, or a successful director, who has been creator of some other cinema masterpieces, or a production group that has asserted itself in other occasions in the relative fields. Those collaborations, I mean, that are synonym of success just reading the name composing them. Said that, this can be valid too in other fields, like the videogaming one, in the case of Lost Odyssey, classic oriental RPG made by the Japanes software house Mistwalker (that already made its debut on 360 the past year with Blue Dragon) founded by Ironobu Sakaguchi, creatore of the Final Fantasy series. The master, in fact, in his last fatigue, Lost Odyssey, could count on the collaboration of some among the greatest Japanese artists in their relative fields. The composer Nobuo Uematsu, (already author in the past of as beautiful as touching soundtracks), the mangaka Takehiko Inoue, (drawer of Vagabond and of the more pleased Slam Dunk, who got the job of the realization of the character design) and the writer Kiyoshi Shigematsu (very famous Japanese writer, who, in this case, took the job to write some particular stories, several in the game and we'll talk later about). With a dream team of this importance, it was quite foreseeable to expect something unique, passionating and with that poetry touch that only great artists can give to their own works, altough the particularity of a genre that you'll like or hate since the beginning. This is Lost Odyssey, a work that leaves the lighthearted and mischievous atmospheres of the previous work of Mistwalker (Blue Dragon), to make the player go deep into an adventure with some more serious tones and contents, who will get several different emotions, calling him to think about the meaning of the "life" word and of its several facets. But we'll analyze more in the details the many features of this game, and we'll try to best explain why Lost Odyssey can be considered a real colossal.
PLOT
Thirty years before the events told in the game, the discover of a new power called "magic energy", suddenly and inexplicably born inside every human being, started the Industrial Magic Revolution. Such a resource soon found application in many fields, moreover in the industrial one, where it deeply changed (for good) people's lifestyle. Unfortunately, magic energy also changed the nature of the war, being used, by some countries, even for the improvement of their own nukes, in such a way to increase the war power of the fighting armies. And it's right here that the game begins. In the introduction movie we're launched on the battlefield, located on the Wohl plateau, where Uhra and Khent's armies are busy in a furious battle. When it looks that Uhra's soldiers are going to let it go because of the powerful magic machines used by their enemy, here Lt. Kaim Argonar spreading his way by his sword. At this point the game gives us the chance to challenge ourselves in our first fight, useful to take confidence with the mechanics. Easily defeated your enemies, an unexpected thing happens. Out of the sky, inexplicably become of stone, a firing meteor comes, destroying the whole battlefield and killing everyone but Lt. Argonar, who almost immediately gets up without any scracthes. We've soon explained that he can't get killed because he's an immortal one who goes from one battlefield to another one from 1000 years now. So, our first mission, given to us by Uhra, will be to better understand the tragedy, so we'll be sent to investigate on the Grand Staff, a mysterious magic tower not finished yet, wanted and projected by the magician Gongora, to find out if the explosion was caused by some kind of magic energy lack. Kaim, we don't know why, doesn't remember anything of his past except the fact of having been a mercenary, but going on the adventure, we'll wake his own memories up, just by dreaming or looking at some characters who, taken by their daily life, make us remember of some alrealy lived situations. These memories will materialize under the form of some particular stories, written, as previously said, by the writer Kiyoshi Shigematsu, capable of giving the player some very strong emotions. Besides, Kaim won't be the only immortal one in the game. Now I'm going to stop telling the plot, which, I ensure you, is one of the strong features of the game, thanking its depth and the repeated sensational developments.
GAME-PLAY
As previously said, Lost Odyssey is a Japanese RPG that submits some classic gaming modes, used in some interesting and new ideas. So, we can find all thos characteristics that distinguish a game like this, I mean random meeting, turns in challanges, magics, characters' levelling, experience points, exploration of the world by flying ships, etc. One of the aspects that most used new ideas is the challenging part, that we're going to analyze. So to begin, during battles we can count on a team composed of five elements, lined up in the first or second row, according to their characteristics. The first row will be made of people with knives and who have got high strenght, while the second one will be the one of the magician of the group, which are capable to attack from the long distance. Not only, warriors in the first line will also have the delicate job to soften the damages who the ones in the second line got. In fact, up in the right (up in the left for the enemies) a special bar will appear, telling us the level of this particular wall (given by the sum of the PSs of the soldiers in the upper line). This way, the more damages we'll get, the lower the wall will be, increasing the efficacy of the.... |
