A Cleric, a Thief and a Mage walk... (cntd.)

He’s helped in his quest by a number of other characters. Sigmund the Liberator himself, the only person who can free the moon from her chains. Aya, a passionate and devoted young revolutionist (think Tifa or Rinoa with more freckles). Edward, yet another of Sigmund’s followers, and Eugene, a close friend and the heir to a powerful merchant family. And where would we be without Michelle, who takes the role of the healer/attractive young woman/ditz (Selphie with less mechanical skills and slightly more flirting, I suspect). I do rather like the addition of Rica and Rucha – a set of mischievous twins. Seems fairly typical fare for a Final Fantasy party – which, of course, this technically isn’t. There are eighteen characters to choose from, although battles will usually be fought in parties of up to four.

Infinite Undiscoveries

Yoshiharu Gotanda, the creative mind behind Tales of Phantasia, has gone on record with the claim that Infinite Undiscovery is the culmination of ten years of work, which can only be fully realised through the Xbox 360. The most intriguing part of the game so far seems to be the battle system.

Your hero, Capell, is not a fighter. He’s a flautist (ten points to anyone who knows that that’s a flute-player). Rather than injuring the enemies with visible crochets, quavers and minims – as most RPG bards do – Tri-Ace has, logically, decided that he’s going to find other ways to win battles. Or rather, you are.

Those of you who have played Final Fantasy X may recall something like this in certain battles – pre-determined ways to use the environment to your advantage, such as splitting into a pincer attack, or attacking a nearby machine until it exploded. Although in that game, the idea was disappointingly underused, Tri-Ace seems to have run with a similar concept. The player will need to use their own intuition to figure out how to use the environment and situation to their advantage, in a variety of ways. So far, these undiscoveries have taken the form of exploding barrels, and knocking a balcony out from under those big mean trolls, but it’s to be presumed that Tri-Ace have much more up their sleeve.

Even without being used to fight, Capell’s flautist skills will develop later in the game. He’ll slowly gain the abilities to distract enemies, dispel magic attacks, reveal illusions and talk to animals. There’s also been mention of characters needing to “make use of scent”, although there’s little data on facet of the game at present.

I may have made it seem that Infinite Undiscovery has taken elements from previous RPGs, which isn’t exactly the case. Although it has a lot in common with many of the games of previous years, Infinite Undiscovery also seems extremely innovative and very promising. Want. Now please.