Suikoden

"This proves to be the beginning to the legacy of Suikoden."

Story
The tale of Suikoden is loosely based on the classic Chinese novel, Shui Hu Zhuan (translated into English this means Water Margin). Among the similarities is the concept of the 108 Stars of Destiny-but more of that later. You assume the role of of a silent protagonist that goes by the name of Tir McDohl. To tell the truth, Tir isn't his official name, since you are capable of naming him whatever you wish.

The novelization gave him the name he is so widely known as, Tir McDohl, because the novelization gave him that name, and that's the closest the gaming community has to an official name for the protagonist of Suikoden. Therefore, I'll be referring to him thus so.

Tir McDohl is the only son of the greatest general of the Empire, Teo McDohl. Right off the bat, Teo has to leave for battle, by the command of Emperor Barbarosa. Afterwards, you play the role of errand boy for the Empire before complications arise and you decide to join the resistance faction. Along the way, you receive one of the 27 True Runes, veritable gods of the Suikoverse, known as the Rune of Life and Death, or more commonly, the Soul Eater Rune.

Unfortunately, it would be considered to be a cursed rune, since it devours the souls of people close to you and becomes stronger through this method. To further complicate matters, you are pursued by an evil witch that desires the powers of Tir's cursed rune. In addition, your task is to unite the 108 Stars of Destiny and overthrow the tyrannical Empire, and it's ruler, Barbarosa.

This game has apparent political and war themes and dialogue so if you're into that kind of thing, I'm certain you'll love this game. Unfortunately, this is a rather short game, spanning only 20-25 hours if you are aiming on recruiting every one of the Stars of Destiny. As my last statement implies, some of the Stars are recruited during the canonical storyline while others are received via exploration of the towns of the Empire. While this is completely unnecessary, uniting all 108 Stars also yields the best ending Suikoden has to offer.

Gameplay
This is, in my opinion, the second most deep part of Suikoden (The storyline is a close first). Unlike the other RPGs on the market, Suikoden offers three different types of battle. That's right. Not one, not two, three. I shall elaborate upon the trifecta in order, starting with the most generic form of combat, turn-based battles. When Tir walks about on hostile territory, you might experience something that is the backbone of any retro mainstream RPG, random encounters.

When you engage in battle with some fiendish beast, you have quite a few options available to you. Firstly, is the classic option, 'Attack' which causes you to actually damage your enemy with a weapon, which remains true to the age old philosophy of war, 'Stab it until it stops moving'. Good times.

Secondly, we've got the Rune magic system which is probably one of my favorite arcane systems in a game. You obtain objects called Runes via loot from the remnants of a battle or a random treasure chest, and these Runes grant magical power to their bearers. After going to a Runemaster/Runemistress to have one of these attached to your character, the said character is capable of unleashing magical powers that their Rune endows upon the user. The different kinds of Runes are vast. From offensive to defensive to stat augmentation, your options for magic customization are more than just generous.

Those are just the basics of Suikoden combat, and the type that you utilize the most often. Next would have to be Duels, in which a character of yours (Usually, it's Tir, but sometimes the storyline demands otherwise) engages in a tête-à-tête with an opponent. The foundations of this mode could be compared with rock, paper, and scissors in the sense that you are given three choices every turn. Attack, Defend, and Desperate Attack. In the beginning of each turn, your opponent will have some dialogue that hints upon their next move. It's your task to figure out their next maneuver and counter it with the move that it's vulnerable to, much like how rock destroys scissor. You will continue to co this until one of the duelists' health bars has drained out completely.

Last, but not least, there is the war battles. You are put in command of an entire army that becomes larger in the storyline, but can be augmented by recruiting as much Stars of Destiny as you can. Once again, the game employs the use of a Rock, Paper, Scissors style of gameplay, and once again, you have to anticipate the opponent's attack and counter it. While that makes it sound like a carbon copy of duels, that's actually untrue since there's more interactivity involved-but they're mostly optional, such as sending your ninja to check out the enemy's next plan of attack.

Graphics
Don't get me wrong. I loved the graphics of Suikoden and it's successor, especially since they could have been considered revolutionary in terms of 2D graphics since their characters don't look disproportionate from their extreme shortness. Unfortunately, the jaggles and such that this game contains in abundance can be a real turn off to many, not to mention the choppiness of some of the characters' animations. The detail of the environs of Suikoden is commendable, however.

An easy way to spot Stars of Destiny are that all 108 (plus some major characters) are graced with their own character portrait that appears next to the text box while they're speaking. This adds to their character (and to top that, the majority of the 108 Stars of Destiny already had original designs). To finish it off, I have to admit that Suikoden doesn't utilize much of the PlayStation's graphical capabilities, but the detail of the surroundings of the Empire and the 108 Stars of Destiny proves it was an effort done in earnest.

Summary
So basically, this game has a great story with a few tear-wrenching scenes. There is no disappointment to be had with the gameplay as well. The graphics are nothing special, but the detail the developers put into them are worthy of mention. Although short, this game is the beginning of the legacy of one of my most favorite series. So this is one hell of a game that really makes me wonder why it has fallen under the radar.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 06/12/08

Game Release: Suikoden (US, December 1996)