Ring of Red

"A brilliant strategy game, yet all too time consuming"

The reason I scored this game as I did was because I enjoy the game quite a bit, but the battles can take from 2-4 hours (with no in-battle saves, mind you). If you like strategy games, then this one is definately one to have, however if you've got a short attention span, stay away.

Gameplay- The system in battles is probably my favorite yet in a strategy game. There is a battle field that resembles a chess board and then when you attack/are attacked, it changes views to a 3rd person view of your AFW (mech) and your enemy AFW... from this point on you'll have 100 seconds to fire at each other (have to wait for loading times) and use your infantry. You cannot customize the AFW itself, but you can select which 3 groups of infantry will accompany you into battle. Each of the several types of infantry has different strengths and weakness, so you have to customize it to fit your style. Battles are EXTREMELY long as far as battles go (lasting from and hour and a half on up to four hours) and there is saving the game in battle. You don't notice how long you've been sitting there until your rear/joints begin hurting. 7/10

Story- The story develops nicely as your are a half- Japanese, half- German in post WWII Japan. However this is a bit of an alternate universe with the AFW's running around and the 3 segments that Japan has been divided into. The story is pretty good, there is some rough translations (''To use grenades you have to be right in the enemy's backyard!''), but they are few and far between. Definately has some of the better static characters I've ever seen in gameplay, and the story does delve into the characters backgrounds rather nicely. Not that bad, all in all. 8/10

Audio/Video- The graphics in this game definately do not push the ps2's capabilities (mainly because the game is on CD, not DVD), but they aren't bad graphics really. The graphics are probably most comparable to a very late PSX game or your average DC game. The fire effects are pretty nice, as well as the backgrounds when you engage the enemy. The music you really don't notice all that much aside from the intro (which is really neat, a mixture of actual footage from WWII with a couple AFW's nicely placed in the background/foreground). The sound effects are pretty good as well, of infantry rifles firing and such. Your basic Konami sound really (minus decent voice acting)... 8/10

Replayability- I don't know about going through it a second time... these battles are darn long and sometimes you sit down to play them for 2 hours only to end up losing and starting the dang thing over. I can't really tell you how long the game takes, because on the memory card it tells you the games time and date (each mission begins at some time, and depending on when you end the mission results in which day the next battle takes place)... I have not/nor do I have any plans of going back and replaying this. It's a fun game, but you'll only play it through once if you're like me. 4/10

Value- Buy this game... unless you plan on re-renting it a couple times consecutively which might total out to about the same as the game costs. It's a nice game to have, I imagine a couple years from now on a rainy day I'll come back and replay it, but I've no plans on doing so immeadiately. A must have if you're into strategy/giant robots.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 03/22/01, Updated 03/22/01