Shining Soul

Sega?s action/RPG for the GBA finally comes to America courtesy of Atlus?was it worth waiting for?

Even though it was usually overshadowed by the likes of Phantasy Star, the ?Shining? series (Shining Force, Shining the Holy Ark) has always been one of the hidden gems of the Sega role-playing universe, a collection of cartoony-cool fantasy tactics games and first-person dungeon adventures. Shining Soul, however, is the black sheep of the family. It?s an action/RPG, and a pretty boring one at that?a repetitive dungeon attack that feels like an unexciting Diablo.

Shining Soul lets you pick from one of four characters (a warrior, a wizard, an archer, and a lizardy warrior), hacking up enemies to gain experience and items in the usual ways on an ordinary quest. While the four characters are pretty different, which makes for a potentially interesting second playthrough and fun four-player linked multiplayer, it?s the main game (your first solo play-through) that?s the problem. The dungeon layouts are simple?just floors with enemies, an exit somewhere, and random items to pick up. There?s one town with about 10 inhabitants. Adversaries (aside from the occasional boss) come in two basic types: shoots or doesn?t shoot, with different graphics and colors. If variety is the spice of life, this life tastes extremely bland.

Even though there?s not much going on, the control is clunky; your attacks are slow, and collision detection isn?t exactly precise. The saving grace is the ease with which you can switch between weapons types and items on the fly, thanks to a shoulder-button based quick menu system.

Many gamers saw screens of Shining Soul in Japanese form long, long ago and wondered why such a cool-looking game wasn?t coming to America right away. That question has finally been answered.

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