Eternal Sonata: Xbox 360

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The enemy battles in the dungeons are highly repetitive. Every time you engage the same type of enemy in a particular dungeon, the battle will play out exactly the same way. It will get old rather quickly if you're accustomed to a lot of variety in your game. There's definitely plenty of "activity"; however, whether such can be called "gameplay" depends on how you define the latter.

If simply navigating through lots of wrong turns, fighting the same exact battles over and over again constitute gameplay for you, then you will be happy with this game. If you're like me and prefer your gameplay to have a point (meaning it moves the story forward and unfolds the plot in a logical way), then you will be unsatisfied with Eternal Sonata.

Eternal Sonata is made by the same developer (Tri-Crescendo) that made Baten Kaitos: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean and Baten Kaitos Origins. Monolith Soft, the developer of Xenosaga, had a hand in developing the first Baten Kaitos. However, ES is nothing at all like Xenosaga or your typical Playstation RPG. Eternal Sonata plays more like a Nintendo game. Which the two Baten Kaitos are, by the way.

Eternal Sonata is not at all what I would expect from an RPG that was designed for a next-generation video game platform. There are no grand cinematics here. As a matter of fact, you will have to do a lot of reading because just about all of the lines are not "spoken". There's very little spoken dialogue in the game. I almost felt like I was playing on a Gamecube! As I said, Eternal Sonata is more like a typical Nintendo game, which tend to eschew deep plot, character development, epic story, and grand soundtrack in favor of puzzles and repetitive battles.

The story begins at the deathbed of Frederic Chopin. As the hours of his life tick away, he begins to dream. And the game takes place in his "dreamworld". There was a lot of potential here to develop a truly moving and epic story. However, Tri-Crescendo chose to keep the story light and character development became just an afterthought. The dialogue in the game are oftentimes awkward. It's not a problem with the voice-acting though. If you have played any of the Xenosaga and Soul Calibur games, the voices will be instantly recognizable to you. Rather the lines themselves are awkward.

If you only have an XBox 360 and you like JRPGs, then you simply have to give this game a try. It could very well be the best of the genre on this platform. For now, anyways.

Eternal Sonata: Xbox 360

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I would like to doubly highlight that this game has one of the best soundtracks to date. It is absolutely magnificent. Probably the best soundtrack that I've heard this entire generation.

If you like Japanese-style role-playing games, you cannot go wrong with this game. You will love it.

Eternal Sonata: Xbox 360

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The voice acting isn't the best in the world. They've got the right voices for the job, but a lot of the actual voice acting is dry. Luckily, if the English voice overs are annoying you, you have the option to switch the voices to Japanese. The story jumps between Chopin's life and the dream world which the gameplay centers in. Also, throughout the game, you'll get to learn a little about the real Chopin. The game gives you some historical accounts and during these moments will play his beautiful music. This is all great, but sometimes these historical segments come up at inappropriate times. The good news about these historical segments is that they do relate to the overall story. Also, as good as the story is, it's rather slow to start. On the bright side, the cast of characters are really likeable.

The game isn't all that different from your traditional JRPG. There's a field mode and a battle mode. Outside of battle you'll run around on the field gathering treasure and talking to denizens. Battles are contact based which means you can easily avoid battles you don't want to bother with. Battling in Eternal Sonata is quite fun, though.

The battle system is perhaps one of the most inventive battle systems in the genre. Your characters and enemies have what's called an "action" gauge. When a character takes his or her turn in battle they'll have what's called an "action gauge" on the left hand side of the screen which will count down. Within the allotted time, you can pretty much do anything you want. Either attack normally, use items or special attacks. You'll have to plan well, though. It's a simple battle system to grasp, but it's hard to master. This is because the battle system never stays entirely the same throughout the journey. You have what's called party levels, and the higher your party level the more difficult battles will be. For example, at Party level 1 the action gauge decreases only when you move, and stops decreasing when you stop. When you hit party level 2, however, the action gauge never stops. Just when you're positive you've mastered the battle system, it throws another twist at you, via the party level.

The battle system works well because it relies not only on real time, but strategy as well. Special moves are an important part of combat. There's no limit to how often you can use them, but even here there's a twist. Your party has what's called echoes. The more hits you score in battle the more echoes you get. These will increase the power of your special attacks and are shared by the whole party. While it's tempting to end every combo with a special attack, it's even better to save them until you've acquired enough echoes. Just the same, Eternal Sonata will give you quite a challenge, especially in the boss battles. You can also block your enemies attacked by pressing B at the right time. This doesn't mean you can just mash on the B button when the enemy attacks as your character will guard prematurely and take the full extent of the damage. These timed presses take a long time to master.

Another really big aspect of the games battle system is the use of light and dark. Special attacks change based on whether or not you are standing in light or in shade. That's not all light and shade have an impact on. Some enemies change form depending on where they are. Some enemies will also throw you for a loop because they can provide their own light. The game is very touchy on this as even standing in the enemies shadow will cause you to use a dark special attack instead of a light one. It's pretty amazing stuff.

If there was anything wrong with the battle system it would be the limit to how many items you can take into battle. You can't just pull up the item menu and go. Instead you can only carry a certain amount of items into battle, and some will take up more space than others. For those looking for a challenge, you'll definitely get it. Especially in the beginning of the game when healing allies via magic is a difficult task. On the other hand, it can be quite annoying, especially when you find items that take up more space than you want them to.

The only other major issue with Eternal Sonata is that there simply isn't much to the game. There's a sidequest where you can collect and play musical pieces, but for the most part, it's quite linear. There's no overworld map either, so there's not much of a chance to really explore anything throughout the game. Another big issue with exploring the environments is that the camera is at a fixed angle and you can't shift or rotate it. In some moments when you're traversing behind scenery, it'd be nice to be able to shift the camera to see what was in front of you.

Those issues aside, the game is absolutely gorgeous looking. It's not the greatest looking game on the system, but it's beautiful and artistic nonetheless. This is one of the most beautiful looking cel-shaded games out there. It also doesn't suffer from terrible load times or framerate issues. The best part about Eternal Sonata is its beautiful music soundtrack, which sounds nothing short of fantastic. It's absolutely remarkable. The fact that they also play some of Chopin's music is also really nice.

Eternal Sonata is easily the best JRPG available on the XBOX360 at the moment. It has a surprisingly deep story and is a burst of creative energy. All minor problems aside, it's an enjoyable game.

Pros:

+Surprisingly deep story
+Very well defined characters
+Some historical background on Chopin's life
+Very inventive battle system
+A good challenge, and the game only keeps getting harder as you go
+Very gorgeous game
+Remarkable soundtrack, some of Chopin's actual music is also used

Cons:

-Limited items for battle is actually a little harsh
-Very linear
-Historical moments sometimes show up at inappropriate times
-Slow story
-Bad voice acting