Agarest: Generations of War
Review
Dating and warfare
by Preston Dozsa
reviewed on PC
Slow Story, Long and Dull Battles
Beyond the romantic elements within the game, Agarest is from top to bottom your classic strategy RPG. You move around the world map via nodes that connect towns and fields together, and you enter battles either through random encounters in dungeons or entering battle nodes that are found on the map. Battles themselves are based around chaining together attacks between allies in order to create special combo attacks that deal more damage or to simply use as many attacks as possible to eliminate an enemy quickly. It’s functional combat that encourages experimentation and repetition in order to hone your skills. More often than not, however, I found myself rushing through battles in order to experience more of what the story has to offer.
Unfortunately, the story happens to move at an extremely slow pace. Whenever I encountered a story node in the first act for example, I received anywhere from one to five minutes of talking before being forced to spend 15 minutes in battles in order to reach the next cut scene. If the story didn’t move like a sloth, I would be far more inclined to enjoy the battles which make up the core of the game.
Another detriment to the battle system is the incredibly lackluster terrain in which you fight on. Every map is on a flat grid with no height or terrain advantages to speak of, meaning everyone fights on the same flat plain no matter what. And while the background may change from say a forest to a mountain every so often, it doesn’t help the fact that it remains remarkably boring. The characters and their sprites themselves are far more detailed, and they remain a constant positive at every point in the game.
For the Patient Player
Agarest: Generations of War has an interesting central concept that never manages to create anything special with the tools it has available. While the dating sim portions of the game do succeed, even if they are overly awkward, the slow pace of the storyline combined with a lack of clear innovation does more harm than good. But, if you want to play an RPG that will last you an extremely long time, and are unconcerned with its pace, then you could do far worse than this.
6.0
fun score
Pros
Dating sim elements are interesting, Long story, Gameplay works well
Cons
Tries too hard to be mature, LONG story, no variety in battlefields