Being a retrocentric turn-based strategy, one would think that Shining Force would have already been exploited by Sega for DS appearances a hundred times by now, but Shining Force Feather is actually the first time that the series has appeared on the handheld system. It was on show in Sega's considerably large TGS booth, so I hopped in and checked it out.
As you'll know from my last hands-on, I was mostly just using Sega's DS booths as an excuse to take a chair, but it rewarded me with some good preview time. Hit the jump for my first Jimpressions of Shining Force Feather.
As always, I didn't have a clue what was actually happening with this TGS demo, but using journalism I have discovered that you take on the role of Jin in a story that takes place 3000 years after the war between the Shining Force and the Kyomu. I'm sure that means something to somebody out there.
The cutscenes use static anime-style images, but are fully voiced. Of course, they're fully voiced in Japanese right now, so I'm buggered if I know what they were saying. As far as I can work out, some guys are in some place, some other guy shows up, and then everything becomes a turn-based battle.
Feather is a typical turn-based strategy game. Each character has a movement bar which depletes as you direct your characters on the map. Once the bar is depleted, the character can no longer move that turn. Should you be in range, you can opt to attack, and the game switches from an overhead to a side-on viewpoint.
As your character prepares to attack, a bar on the screen will fill with color and you have to press the attack button at the right moment in order to maximize its effect. From what I can ascertain, hitting the button when the color fills the bar to the halfway point does the job. Different attacks are mapped to each of the four face buttons.
Some characters also use magic attacks, which will require no user input to perform. In order to be in range, an enemy has to be within the targeting circle that surrounds the character when the desired attack is selected. All very simple, intuitive stuff.
I probably wasn't playing it too brightly, since enemies seemed to take forever to finish off. In fact, I never even killed anything in my time with the game as their HP was dropping too slowly. Either I was doing it wrong, or this is some hardcore strategy RPG stuff going on.
The game also looks very tasty, with terrific animations during the attack sequences, and some great character design. There is some really impressive sprite-based graphical work going into this game, which is very appealing.
A few minutes of playtime is not enough to fully gauge a strategy RPG, but from what I saw, Shining Force Feather looks like something that fans of the series and the genre in general will really enjoy getting to grips with. It looks nice, it plays solidly and should provide a deep and challenging experience.
Contest:
2:28 PM on 10.13.2008
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Control scheme sounds like fun, however.
Bastards!
I'd like to have a centaur archer, but in that new flashy anime style.
Now I'll just pray for decent English voice acting or, even better, just subtitles.