Hoshigami: Ruining Blue Earth
- August 07, 2001 15:51 PM PST
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Atlus?s latest tactical tile?based RPG wants to scramble your brain with even more stats, tons of customization options, and a nifty new combo system. Don?t let the Blue Earth down.
Unite a divided kingdom. Recruit, train, and command an army of wizards, clerics, and warriors. Heal the rift between humanity and the elemental spirits. That?s just a sample of the trifling matters you?ll have to deal with in Hoshigami, a new tile-based tactical RPG coming to the PSX this fall.
Elemental Spirit Chess
Though it may just look like Tactics Ogre Plus on the surface, dig deeper and you?ll find that Atlus is looking to up the game of ?RPG chess? to grandmaster level. Rather than limiting each unit to the standard ?Move/Attack/End? pattern, characters are allowed multiple moves and attacks per round, in any order, depending on how many Action points they?ve spent.
Customization options abound. Each of the units in your fantasy army can equip a number of elemental Coins; each Coin can then be configured with a number of traits to affect your stats, spells and abilities. Plus, a nifty new brain-hurting ?Session? system lets you position your characters to bounce enemies around the screen in intricate combo attacks, forcing you to think long and hard about whose turn is coming up and where the best place to stand really is.
Confirm? Is That OK? Are You Sure? How Sure Are You?
If there was one notable annoyance in the preview build, it was that the level of complexity made each turn a button-pushing nightmare. As daunting as the pages of stat screens can be, it was almost equally impossible to keep track of how many times the question, ?Confirm OK?? came up as one character walked from one rock to another. But such things are of no concern to the true role-playing tactician?especially when Hoshigami looks primed to be the Deep Blue of RPG chess circuit.
