Not quite a review (yet), but still worth reading!

[MSG Commander]

Okay, so I haven't actually finished the game, but...

From where I'm at, I can tell you that this is probably Exe Create's best game EVER!!!!! :woohoo: :woohoo: :woohoo: :woohoo: :woohoo:

Seriously, if you like Kemco games at all - you have got to play this one!

(And it turns out, it's not actually a sequel to Journey to Kreisia - at least I don't think so - but it does use some of the same elements: the Overlord, the Hero, the Hero's Sword. Sadly though, there are no other races, but that's okay.)

There is one part of the game I honestly don't like AT ALL - and that's the fact that skills are attached to weapons, so you always have to choose between a stronger weapon or a skill that you really like. Also it's really annoying trying to dismantle weapons to get effects, and then having to Save and reload your game when you add the effect, to try for a decent %.

But even so... This game has one of the most amazing story lines I have seen since Unlucky Hero (which was Exe Create, but no Kemco...)

The protagonist is amazing! He is the perfect classic "fool." Everyone around him thinks he's a no-good noble, only interested in wine and women, but in reality he's actually the only one aside from the king who knows what's going on and how to solve the "crisis."

It is pretty much "one dude and three girls," like so many recent titles, but it's not all-the-time all over the place 3 girls fighting for his attention. Each girl actually has her own personality and a good sense of her own worth - and seems interested in Rain but not desperate for his attention.

The sub quests are, well, sub quests. Some of the rewards are useful, but none of them are absolutely necessary (so far as I've seen).

The difficulty is HARD - even on Easy - unless you take advantage of the bonus dungeon, and spend a good 3 or 4 hours total grinding for gold and EXP. (That's 3 or 4 hours COMBINED, not 3 or 4 hours for each dungeon.)

The dungeons (bonus as well as in-game) aren't hard to navigate - and there's a mini map - and the random encounters are pretty frequent, but not so bad that you need to worry about turning them off (which you can only do with the encounter ring from the online shop, anyway.)

The dialogue in this game is literally THE BEST I have ever seen. (Even better than Machine Knight!)

Also the bonus dungeon - it's basically a copy of the bonus dungeon from Revenant Dogma, but they've made a few changes which I actually think make it a bit more interesting. The biggest one is there are now 3 bonus bosses in this area - one after you clear the easy dungeon, one after normal, and one after hard.

As for the game itself - I'm 17 hours in, and just reached (story) Quest No. 57 - and the whole game just got turned upside down. (Just when I thought maybe I was close to the end, there's still more to do.)

Bottom Line: Out of the 15-20 Kemco games I've played now - this is fast becoming my all-time favorite Exe Create game. You have GOT to play this one, once you get hooked you won't be able to put it down!