Rating of
3/5
Too Many Sour Notes
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 02/20/11
"Eternal Sonata," the latest RPG from the well-reputed developer, Tri-Crescendo, was on my radar from the moment it was announced for Xbox 360. I tried to avoid as many spoilers as I could while waiting for the inevitable PlayStation 3 release. Unfortunately, my anticipation was in vain, as this game does not live up to Tri-Crescendo's reputation, and is a rare misstep by them. Let's look at the good and the bad.
Presentation
The presentation of "Eternal Sonata" is its high point. The graphics are absolutely stunning. The character designs are heavily influenced by anime, yet don't look like generic anime. They have a certain character that makes them easily identifiable as unique to this game. These characters inhabit a beautiful, stylized world where everything's design is inspired by music and music paraphernalia. Fenceposts look like violin necks, characters have clothing decorated with quarter rests and double sharps, everyone and everything is named after a musical term. It is rather clever. This interesting world is modeled in full 3D with incredibly smooth polygons and high-quality textures. I never noticed a single jaggy or pixilated surface. The only flaw in this graphical beauty is the somewhat awkward character animation. Most characters hold their arms at a stiff 45-degree angle from their bodies, which looks unnatural. When not standing around like scarecrows, the characters don't seem to know what to do with their hands. There are frequent animations where hands should come into contact with another part of the body (e.g., face), yet are held at least a foot away. I presume this 'problem' is actually a trick used by the developers to prevent polygon clipping. The result, however, is rather awkward acting in many of the cutscenes… and, wow, are there ever a lot of cutscenes! Between each event where the player is able to control an on-screen character, there is usually a 10-30 minute cutscene. Thankfully, all of these scenes are skippable, if the characters die and the player needs to reload from the last save. The final animation flaw is also most noticeable in the cutscenes: lipsynch. This is a minor issue, however, as the game was originally dubbed in Japanese. It is unwarranted to expect the developers to include a redundant second set of animations for the English dub, but I still think the dubbers could have done a bit better job of matching the 'flap.'
The sound, like the visuals, is impressive. I was never a particular fan of Chopin, as I found most of his music to be rather forgettable compared to Bach, Beethoven, and Mozart. This game doesn't change my opinion of Chopin's music, but I was nonetheless impressed by Motoi Sakuraba's ability to create a soundtrack that was as beautiful and forgettable as Chopin's own work. The voicework for the English dub is well-done (I did not listen to the Japanese voicework for a comparison, however). There is only one truly annoying voice (that of Salsa, the mock southern belle).
Story
The story of "Eternal Sonata" starts out promising, but soon degenerates into a bit of a muddle, with the game's final moments leaving the player scratching their head, wondering what just happened. In the early portion of the game, cutscenes flash between scenes of the real Chopin as he lay dying and scenes in the game world. There are two women and a doctor with the real Chopin as he lies in a coma. It is never explained who these women are, and the real world cutscenes disappear for a significant portion of the game. The lion's share of the story and cutscenes take place in a dreamworld conjured up in the comatose Chopin's mind, hence the fact that the game world is musically themed (though this begs the question of how Chopin would know of such terms as “Fusion,” “Salsa,” and “Jazz”). In this world, the dream Chopin seems to be aware that he is dreaming, yet possesses none of the abilities he expects to have, such as using magic and predicting the future/people's thoughts. He soon meets up with the heroine, Polka, and a couple of street urchins, Allegretto and Beat. This ragtag group sets out to confront the ruler of the country of Forte, Count Waltz, about the high taxes he has placed on everything except the questionable medicine known as Mineral Powder.
Like many RPGs, the ragtag group of heroes eventually ends up meeting a rebel faction, traveling to a neighboring country, fighting pirates, and meeting a prophet. Most of these events are linked, via cutscenes featuring original Chopin music in the background, to actual events in the life of the real Chopin. I really liked this feature of the game, as it gave a typical RPG storyline a bit of edutainment value. They made me look forward to their appearance at the end of each chapter. Also like many RPGs, the characters spend a significant amount of time combating their personal issues. Most of "Eternal Sonata's" weirdness comes from the inner conflicts of Chopin and Polka.
Where the story really loses points with me, though, is in the linearity. I like my RPGs to be somewhat linear. I like a strong plot that moves from Point A to Point B. However, I also like the freedom to backtrack and revisit previous areas. "Eternal Sonata" prevents all but the smallest amount of backtracking (though I have read on the GameFAQs message board that it is possible to backtrack at will once reaching a certain point in the game during an Encore, that is to say, New Game+). Usually, the player is herded where they are supposed to go by the on-screen character stopping and saying, “I'm going the wrong way!” if the player tries to go in a direction other than towards the next story-point and cutscene. Occasionally, it is possible to revisit previous areas during brief windows, but it is incredibly impractical or even impossible to visit far away or disconnected areas because there is no town warp system in place.
Gameplay
Tragically, "Eternal Sonata's" biggest flaws are present in its most important aspect. The battle system is an interesting hybrid of turn-based and real-time. Each time a character's or monster's turn comes around, they have a specific amount of time in which to move and attack. This battle system evolves as the player progresses through the game, becoming more and more difficult to work with. For example, at the beginning of the game, the time meter (initially 5 seconds, but drops to 4 later) only drops when a character is actually moving or attacking. The player can simply hold still to strategize. Before long, however, the battle system evolves so that the player can only strategize at the beginning of the turn, for as soon as the character moves, the time meter drops continually. Later, the time at the beginning of the turn to strategize is reduced to lower and lower amounts before disappearing altogether. The final evolution of the battle system causes the buttons on the controller to randomly reassign their functions mid-battle. The trade-off for less time and more cumbersome input is the ability to equip more expendable items for the battle and to use counter attacks and chains of special attacks. These are not particularly good trades, though, as the limitation on items in the first place is idiotic (it's shared by the party, not per character), and the counter attacks and chains are impractical.
Next, the camera angles in battle are completely obtuse. There are only three choices, cycled by pressing L2. The first is a super-close shot of the active character, making it impossible to see the battlefield. The second is a slightly further away, but still too close, shot of the active character. The third is zoomed all the way out so the player can see the entire battlefield, but the characters and many enemies are so small, it's hard to see them. I occasionally wasted character turns trying to spot a small black enemy against a black backdrop. I also frequently found the view of my characters completely blocked by large monsters/bosses, making it unnecessarily difficult to keep track of my team's location.
The biggest blemish on the battle system, and a feature that almost made me put down the controller in disgust, is the Guard system. Whenever a character is being attacked from the front, the player has the opportunity to make timed button presses (not unlike the universally reviled Quick Time Events) to reduce (not negate) the amount of damage received by the attack. However, unlike the other RPG series that uses timed button presses for evasive moves, Paper/Mario RPG, "Eternal Sonata's" timed button presses are mandatory to avoid death and pop-up multiple times per enemy attack. In the Paper/Mario RPG series, evasion is just a bonus. Enemies deal sane amounts of damage and evading their attacks is just a way to avoid using a few healing items. In "Eternal Sonata," fumbling a Guard against even normal enemies will result in a character taking an obscene amount of damage. Being surrounded by enemies, which results in some of their attacks being un-Guardable because they are coming from the back or flank, is a death sentence. Bosses likewise necessitate Guarding, as most of them can kill a character in a single round if that character fails to Guard. Counter attacks come into play as the battle system evolves, but they are extremely limited. The chance to counter only occurs if an enemy is attacking a character from DIRECTLY in front. If an enemy is even slightly off in angle, pressing the Counter button instead of the Guard button will result in the target character getting mangled. If a character dies, the only way to revive them is to use one of the party's limited items, as there are no characters who learn revival magic. Add to this complete lack of revival magic the fact that few characters learn potent healing magic, and we have a game that dishes-out damage faster than the party can recover it. Sure, this makes the game challenging, but in the wrong way. It is not the strategy-based challenge that RPG fans typically seek, it is a 'twitch' challenge that results in frequent, cheap deaths.
The only aspect of the battle system that is completely without flaws is the Light/Dark system. Depending on whether a character or monster is standing in the light areas of the battlefield or the shadowy areas of the battlefield, they will be able to use different abilities. All characters have light special moves and dark special moves, which are assigned on the status screen between battles. Characters start with the ability to 'equip' one of each type of move, but as the battle system continues its horrific mutation, characters end up with the ability to equip two of each type of move and switch between them by holding R2. Characters can also equip accessories that place them in perpetual light or perpetual dark. This equipment is useful for creating a designated healer, as most healing abilities only work in the light. Some monsters change form depending on whether they are in light or darkness, frequently with one form being significantly stronger than the other. It takes some strategy to lure or push enemies into the correct area to make them morph into their weaker form.
Overall
I really wanted to like "Eternal Sonata." I respect Tri-Crescendo as a developer, but they really didn't live up to their reputation with this game. While the game is beautiful for the eyes and ears, the mind does not get to participate in this enjoyment. The somewhat muddled story along with the half-good, half-abominable battle system ensures a frustrating experience, mainly because it is plain to see how great "Eternal Sonata" could have been.
Presentation: 4.5/5
Story: 3.5/5
Gameplay: 2/5
Overall (not an average): 3/5
