First Look: Hexyz Force

12:20 PM on 03.01.2010   |   Dale North

27 comments

I was already thrilled when Atlus stopped by Destructoid HQ to give us a first look at Persona 3 Portable, but they actually had another PSP RPG in hand to share. Nice!

Hexyz Force is a polished, nice looking PSP role-playing game from the folks at Sting, makers of games like Yggdra Union and Riviera: The Promised Land. Set to release in late May, this game is actually like two games in one, with independent story lines following two different characters through the same narrative arc.

Read on for our preview of Hexyz Force.

Here's the story in a nutshell: Years ago, a war was waged against the god of destruction. Humans and non-humans fought alongside divinities called Hexyz. Thanks to these Hexyz, good won out and peace returned. However, a promised Hour of Judgment comes, and with it the world would have to decide on whether they want creation or destruction. Your game play decisions actually make this decision.

The game follows two separate stories that later merge into one unified storyline. The game starts out following a character named Cecelia, a cleric in training, who finds out that she is supposed to become a divinity. Later it jumps to Levant, a solider of the emperor. Levant does not have a lot of room in his heart for non-humans. Too bad for him, as the emperor tells him that they'll have to partner with non-humans as evil is rising again. Levant ends up in prison, and finds himself forced to work with non-humans. These two story lines are like their own separate games, but they'll meet sometimes and end up together in a grand conclusion. My short time with the game didn't give me much of a taste of where these separate stories are headed, but it felt pretty grand, and closer to something you'd expect from a full-blown console RPG.

At its core, Hexyz Force is a very traditional role-playing game. There's a magic system that's somewhat unique, but there's nothing out of the ordinary like in other recent Sting titles. The rest is standard and power attacks in a turn-based battle system. There's a row placement system to manage damage/protection, and a meter that you'll fill with regular attacks to charge up special ones. I enjoyed the nifty R button toggle that took the battle speed up by several times. Otherwise, this is familiar territory except that you don't really see a nice, full traditional JRPG on the PSP. Now there's this, and it looks like it will fill that gap nicely.

There's some pretty solid fully animated cutscenes in Hexyz Force. I saw a couple that fleshed out the story a bit, and they both looked very nice. Atlus says that there will be over 20 minutes of anime in the final game. The look carries over into game play and battles. With dialogue, nice drawn portraits accompany the text boxes. The few locales I saw seemed large, and looked sharp in full 3D. The battles also have a top-notch presentation, with a clean, polished look and flashy effects. I only saw a few battles from each character, but they all looked to be right up the alley of JRPG fans.

There's 40 or more hours of game play between the two separate story lines that come together in one saga, multiple endings, anime cutscenes and plucky turn-based battles. And here's a nice feature: Hexyz Force is installable to the Memory Stick, giving it almost no load times at all. If you've been craving a solid, traditional RPG for your PSP, this one looks to be your best bet.

Look for a deeper preview in the coming months. Hexyz Force will be released on May 25th for $29.99.