Suikoden III

"A good solid game."

Suikoden III is probably one of the best games I have played in a while. The one thing is that I never played the other Suikodens nor have I any clue to as what the game was like. I really like RPGs, but it seemed like Suikoden was a terrible RPG that walked away from my traditional idea of a good RPG. However, after playing the game, I thought I was playing one of the greatest RPGs ever made.

Suikoden III gives a unique presentation of characters. You are able to use this thing called the Trinity Site System which consist viewpoints of three separate characters. At the beginning, you are able to choose from Hugo, Chris, or Geddoe. They are each individual characters that are from three different aspect of the world. Hugo is from the Grasslands, Chris is from the Zexen Knight, and Geddoe is a mercenary. They each have three chapters that they must go through. This is mandatory for the player to play three chapters from each of the three characters; however, you get to play an optional viewpoint named Thomas who owns Budehuc Castle. You only get to play two chapters of Thomas and he is completely optional to complete. After playing all three chapters from each of the three characters, you get to select the chapters 4 and chapter 5. The main goal of this game is to find the fire bringer who lived before and stopped the war that was happening in Grassland. I won't spoil it for you, but in the end, you have to take on the role of the Fire Bringer. by selecting one of three characters to play this role. Although the story itself won't change, a lot of events such as ending scenes will change.

The main attraction of the Suikoden game that I found unique was the 108 Star of Destiny. This is where you get to recruit people from various parts of the world. Surprisingly, you get a very vast array of characters to choose from. I'm not exactly sure how many characters you get automatically, but there are tons of characters to choose from once you are able to recruit them into the 108 Stars of Destiny. Once you get them on your side either by money, giving items, or helping them in a side quest, they all end up in Budehuc Castle. Now, you get a bunch of cool goodies from recruiting people like them opening up stores in Budehuc Castle and you can buy, store, sell, upgrade, and so on with them. I personally found this aspect to be the best in the game. Also, you get to rename Budehuc Castle to your likings. Again, when playing the main story of the game, you will come to realize what Budehuc Castle is and its master Thomas.

Aside from the main story and characters, the best thing about this game is the fact that you get a very well thought menu system. The main attraction that I like about this game is that you get a very complex system and you can really customize your characters unlike other games. You can choose from many magic spells that you can affix to your characters. However, this is where some problems occur. For example, you cannot restore the use of these things without sleeping at the inn. Also, to use this runes, you must go to a special store that can affix them to a certain part of a characters body. The next best thing is the actual upgrade of weapons and such. You can go to a blacksmith and upgrade your weapons and also you can go to an armor store and buy really powerful armor for your torso, legs, etc. The most important thing about this game is that you can use skill points to upgrade certain aspect for you character physical skills and rune skills. For example, you can upgrade attack power and the power of magic speed or whatever. This is where a lot of confusion comes in. It would probably take the average person around 30 minutes to get use to this new system. However, once you can figure it out, you will really like the system and see its true potential. The very last thing to go over is the actual battles that you will face. It is very unique as there are three modes of battle. You get to do regular battles that are common to every RPG and then you have the duels, and strategy battles. Now, the regular battles are very nice. It is turn based and you can really have fun fighting various monsters. Also, you get tons of experience points and skill points and you will find that leveling up can either be really hard or really easy. You see, you have to accumulate 1, 000 experience points to level up and the amount of experience points you get depends on your current levels. So, you could get literally nothing from fighting or you can level up like 2, 3 times after a single fight. Aside from that, the duels and strategy battles are somewhat fun. The duels play out nicely and there are not so many of them during the games. But when you do have them, it is very fun to do so. However, the one thing I have a problem with is the strategy battle system. It is exhausting as well as annoying to play out. You barely have any control over what happens except placing your characters in certain positions. Lucky for everyone, the battles are somewhat easy but long. The problem with this is that at one point you can have permanent dead characters. This is somewhat tiring as if after 30 minutes of your time, you realize that you have to do it over because you can no longer use a character. Luckily, this is rare and only happens once in a while if you are not careful.

Aside from some minor problems with the game, it is overall a very fun game to play with. You will find that you can play with it for hours at a time and still want to play with it more. The game is really smooth when you talk to someone and narrating the story couldn't have been done better by anything else. Although there isn't any voice in the game, you will not get tired from reading everything. Everyone says something unique and somewhat important to the story. Unlike most games out there, you will have a fun time revealing the story and get deeper into the plot. Also, with the 108 Stars of Destiny, you will find that playing this game is both fun and exciting. However, the only flaw of this is that the game is relatively shorter than you would expect it to be. The average time of completion would be around 40-50 hours. I managed to play it in 52 hours, but I would say that a lot of people were disappointed with this as the game got really good at chapters 4 and 5, but those chapters are somewhat shorter, maybe 15-20 hours total to complete both.

Here's a break down of the Pros and Cons or the game:

Pros
+ Vast amount of characters you get to choose from to enter the 108 Stars of Destiny.
+ Very unique battle system. You can level up really easily.
+ Customizable system. You have a very good menu/inventory system that comes with the game.
+ Very good story line. You get to see from the perspective of three characters and one optional. It is truly a very well thought game.
+ Leveling up can be really easy if you are under leveled later on.
+ Graphics are nice and makes the characters look good.

Cons
- At first the game kind of scares you away with the complex menu/inventory system.
- Sometimes the 108 Stars of Destiny may become confusing as to how to recruit characters.
- The strategy battle system may become annoying as you barely have any control over it.
- Leveling up may become hard if your levels are somewhat high.
- Limited healing/restore items. I don't think I used a single revive spell and I don't believe I even found one.
- There are very few runes you can use.
- The game is somewhat shorter than expected.
- Customization of certain things may be confusing to some because of the vast amount of stores you have to go to.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 04/25/05