by
What’s better than a dating sim? FIVE DATING SIMS.
Have you ever seen this episode of Futurama? Agarest is kind of like that. Mix in a bit of Fire Emblem setting, sprite-based isometricism and all the young maidens throwing themselves at your feet that you could want and you’ve got Agarest: Generations of War. Plotwise, there’s this guy named Leonhardt who deserts from his army in order to protect an elf-chick. Turns out, Leonhardt sucks and he gets his butt kicked by the Dark Knight (their name, not mine). On the brink of death, some goddess pops up and is all like “Pledge your and every single one of your descendants souls to me if you want to live,” and Leonhardt’s all like “… mmmmk!”
Wait, hang on; Green Heart?! Green Heart is that you?
Oh, well, okay then. That clears things up. That actually clears a lot of things up.
Anyway, Leonhardt comes back to life, teams up with THIS GUY…
… and then they go on and have happy adventures. And that’s just the first generation. There are FIVE. The selling point of the game is that within each of the generations, you choose who the male protagonist falls in love with, which then affects the plots of all the other generations that follow after it. It’s kind of a fun idea if a bit harem-anime-ish. Except I guess I can’t even say that since you’re not technically the same person when you choose your hero’s next partner. Or something. I don’t know. “Relationships.”
Oh, right–and it is an RPG so there’s that. Don’t be fooled, it’s not as good as it looks or at least the parts I played didn’t seem to hint at future tactics or strategy. In spite of being grid-based, action-point based, ability use-based and action/movement phase based, it didn’t seem to have any strategy other than “click the murder the other guy” action. The grid is too small to be tactical, doesn’t include topography like the Final Fantasy Tactics games, and overall just feels like a vehicle to grind out some numbers to make you feel like you’re fighting something. That has always been a weakness with Compile Heart–their combat systems have been okay but never great.
In the end, five generations of dating simulations equates to the second level of Tier. Agarest probably isn’t the best game out there, but it would meet the needs of an RPG fix if you had one with the added benefit of a somewhat novel relationship/story changing mechanic. Just make sure that you can put up with some of the oddly translated lines (equating to the whole, “You and I are enemies now” thing) and not take the game too seriously. I mean, can you really with screenshots like this? Just imagine that he’s saying it really quickly and angrily like the old Godzilla movies or something.
