Suikoden V

"10/10 is not EXAGGERATING!!!"

Suikoden is a series that started on the Playstation as one of its first RPGs for the console 10 years ago. As it began, all of the people who played the game loved it, and as the second game came out, the series became well known. Look on eBay and you'll see the Suikoden 2 goes for more then 100 dollars. This is pretty phenomenal from game that is last generation. The series then went completely haywire with the third game infuriating may fans, but then pulled them right back with the fourth game that strived to bring the series back to its roots while continuing to show the world the Suikoden 4 is a game for the PS2. What all of the Suikoden games share is the option to recruit 108 characters, yes that's right, 108. Now it's the 10th anniversary of Suikoden and Konami have developed the 5th game that would remind RPGamers and all gamers alike what classic RPGs are made of.

Suikoden V (Sui5) takes place about 15 years prior to the original Suikoden, so it's a real treat for those who remember the first two games really well because there would be many Easter eggs and cameo appearances that would make the game experience more enjoyable. For fans of the series, I'm sure you're already playing the game, if not already beaten it so I won't get into any specific details related to the past Suikoden games. Of course the game can be enjoyed by all and not just fans.

Suikoden has always been a game that distinguishes itself among the rest of the games of the same genre. For many RPG fans, there is the story. I can't get into the story of Sui5 because being spoiled, even a little, isn't a good thing, but I can talk about the jist of the plot in a Sui game. The plot of all of the Sui games involved very little love interest and is more focused on friendships, characters, and politics. For a game that allows you to have up to 108 characters, how likeable can these characters get? For me, I've been surprised time and time again by the characters. Though Sui has always spent little time for some of the characters that are optional, those characters aren't underdeveloped at all. All these characters has a history, and the game allows you to easily known and love them in an instant. I'm probably exaggerating this a little bit, but all of the incredibly nice character designs with an exception of a few further makes players love them even more.

Recruiting characters is also a lot of fun. It's like running errands, but these errands has a lot of variety and different ways of going about recruiting. For example for one of the characters, in order to recruit this character, you must beat her in a fishing mini game. Recruit these characters besides being a lot of fun is also a very satisfying achievement. Without exploring all of the areas given to the player, the player would definitely pass up many of the optional characters. In addition to having more characters, these characters also help buff up your headquarters. Recruiting characters will turn your castle into a mall and/or an arcade of minigames, which again makes recruiting characters genuinely satisfying.

The battles in Sui games itself can be called the most original in traditional RPGs only behind Shadow Hearts and Grandia, and like the games mentioned, it's great. Sui5 consists of 3 battle systems like the games from the rest of the series. They consist of traditional, war, and duel battles. Traditional is your standard traditional random battles in RPGs, and while it is turn based it allows you to auto it so the computer would automatically have your characters randomly attack, which speeds up to battle and highly reduces that tiresome feeling many people have with random RPG battles. The war game is a drag and drop game that utilizes the rock paper scissors kind of gameplay, and while duel is similar but different. While Sui5's battles are exciting and fun talking about them for a review would be tedious so I'll move on.

The camera angle this time around is probably the only set back and it's not bad, it's just not as good as Sui4, and could be potentially frustrating for some players. The camera is placed at about 4 o'clock staring at the hero. While exploring towns and dungeons, this camera doesn't move unless the game tells it to, which is a pretty rare occurrence. It could be potentially frustrating because there are various tall buildings that could completely block the hero and yet the camera refuses to do anything about it. Although this sounds bad, the camera in it self does little to hinder this great game.

While the camera angle in town isn't as good, the return of the overworld map is very very VERY welcoming. The PS2 generation of RPGs lacked the overworld which only a few exceptions from games like Wild Arms 3, and Dragon Quest VIII (which was so drastically different it wasn't really a traditionally overworld). Although I love games like Shadow Hearts that features the now standard point and click to the next town, seeing the overworld of Sui5 nearly brought tears of happiness to my eyes. RPGs are just simply more epic with this around, and hey Sui5 is certainly benefiting from this.

The minigames in Sui5 has card games, fishing, horse racing/gambling, and other games. I easily spent hours fishing that also give a genuine satisfactory with every big and rare fish you catch. Idling in the games storyline to play minigames is also a lot of fun.

Talking about graphics, this game gets it done and gets it done right. While it's not as sweating with details like Final Fantasy it's certainly does what is necessary. Every character has their own character animation for the storyline cutscenes also unlike FFX and to me, it certainly gives more personality to these characters, more so than FFX. But of course comparing Sui5 to FFX is wrong because these two games are completely different, but among comparisons, Sui5 have more personality although less polygons.

Voice work for Sui5 is also outstanding with the most notable being Sialeeds. For a game that has 108 characters, each with voice, this game does a phenomenal job of fitting voice with character. The only flaw within the voice work may be in the war games where every character seems to say “Don't let them get away!” But that doesn't mean that that's the only thing they say in the war games. Many of dialogue in the war games are different, but the one fore mentioned just appears more often than most.

What does all this mean?
It isn't an exaggeration to officially declare this game as RPG of the year. Yep! THE YEAR!!! Even with Final Fantasy XII, Xenosaga 3, and so many other exciting RPGs coming out this year, Suikoden 5 did it for me. With about 60+ (my girlfriend played it up to about 100 hours) of gameplay, 40 dollars for this game is well spent. So do yourself a favor and go out and buy this game!!!

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 06/15/06