Vagrant Story

"Weren’t Rosencrantz and Guildernstern from Shakespeare’s Hamlet?"

Square, probably the most well-known RPG developer in console gaming, has built its reputation basically on the highly innovative Final Fantasy games. However, one might say that the series is more groundbreaking when it comes to story, plot and setting. In terms of gameplay, it could well be considered conservative. Fortunately, though, the company produces other games as well, that, even almost always failing to achieve the same success of the main series, work as a great space for experimentation, thus giving us fresher, more original gaming systems. Such is the case of Vagrant Story.

In this game, you are Ashley Riot, a new hero with a strange hair and even stranger personality. History has shown us that Square writers have the ability to create intriguing lead roles for their games and this is no exception. First impressions are, once more, deceptive and, through the course of the game, this guy will have his sanity, memory, morals and goal questioned. Contradicting the general rule, the game also manages to offer strong villains, specially in the figure of Sydney. Right from the opening sequence, he makes a big impression and his mysteries are not fully understood until much later in the game. Other supporting characters avoid the traditional cliches and manage to keep the interest high enough. The choice of a small cast was wise, allowing for more space for each one, resulting in deeper characters than your average RPG would offer.

The plot in Vagrant Story is definitely a strong point, even if it’s too mysterious and confusing in the beginning, something that could turn a good number of players off. The story is quite intricate and many of the characters’ intentions aren’t clear until you’ve made your way into the game quite a bit. The mystery around the characters, including the hero, is the driving force of this game’s plot. In some situations, the dialogues get a little bit muddled, in a way that recalls Final Fantasy Tactics, where you’re not exactly sure what the characters are talking about. The game extensively uses wonderful cut-scenes, with characters’ lines being shown in balloons like comics, which is a very interesting mechanism, but also contributes to this general confusion, because sometimes you don’t even know who’s speaking.

In terms of setting, Vagrant Story is quite different from the majority of RPGs. Set in a medieval world, there is no trace to be seen of futuristic elements. As the medieval times were once called the dark ages, the world of Vagrant Story is extremely dark and menacing. It’s populated with nasty creatures – all enemies are frightening – and controlled by even nastier human beings. There’s a good deal of violence and tension in this game, something that is very clear from the opening sequence. The game has a much darker and more serious atmosphere to it than most RPGs.

When looking at Vagrant Story’s gameplay, it’s easy to say it’s an action RPG. Like many games in this sub-genre, it contains a good dose of puzzles, pushing crates, timing challenges and so on. But the most unique aspect of this game is definitely the combat sequence. The hero has the ability to wield a large variety of weapons, each with different physical and elemental properties, which can be used to your advantage. After hitting your enemy, you can start a chain combo by timing the pressing of the buttons right. Each button can be used for a different type of combo link, meaning you can drain the enemy’s MPs, restore your HP, simply deal damage or inflict status changes. There are also timing abilities for defense, where you can reduce damage, avoid status changes and so on. Here enters the first misstep in the gameplay – the risk concept. Everything you do in this game, basically, raises you risk. High risk means you accuracy is down, you get more damage from attacks and other bad things. Even if it is a good idea, the fact that you can only lower your risk with items or with the passing of time and the fact that it increases so fast really gets in the way. It prevents players from trying to do infinite combos – since combos are what raises risk fastest – but the handicaps that it brings are really heavy.

But risk is far from being the worst aspect of the gameplay. In this game, weapons have affinities to different types of enemies and, as I said before, elements. The enemies are divided into six different types: humans, beasts, undead, phantoms, dragons and evil. The affinities can be increased by putting magical gems in your weapons. Also, you can forge new weapons from the ones you have taken from fallen enemies and chests. But, the mystery is that, sometimes you have a strong weapon against some kind of enemy and the right elemental affinity, but it still deals 0 damage! Well, actually not 0, but something between 1 and 10, which doesn’t help much. This can make some battles really long, sometimes lasting for more than half an hour, where you have to keep mashing at the enemy, taking away small amounts of damage, healing yourself and lowering your risk. Even if the affinity system works in most times, sometimes it just doesn’t follow and logical system, which can be really annoying. Apart from that, all battles in this game are exactly the same, meaning bosses aren’t anything more than common enemies with more HP. Some bosses are actually easier to defeat than the regular enemies. The battles also get too repetitive and, towards the end of the game, you can’t stand killing enemies anymore.

In terms of graphics, Vagrant Story is a very interesting game. From the original designs of the characters, everything has a really striking look, always in a very dark tone. The city where the game takes place, Lea Monde, is also very interesting visually. Everything is done in 3D graphics. The enemies look good, but the really good stuff is the main cast. Not one character has a dull design and Sydney probably has the greatest, most menacing design for a Square villain since Sephiroth. The only bad point about the game’s graphics is that the backgrounds really get repetitive after a while. That happens specially because most of the game is set in underground caves and dungeons, so the few open areas are really refreshing and welcome when they come.

In terms of sound, Vagrant Story is also very solid. Music-wise, the game concentrates in atmospheric, ambient tunes, which enforces the tense side of the game. The tunes are extremely well done, but the probability is that players will never remember the songs from the game, because, like in a movie, they’re not there to attract attention, but to create an ambience. The sound effects take an important role in creating this mood and they are really well done. There’s not one place in the game that isn’t matched with a proper ambient sound effect. I normally don’t pay attention to sound effects, but here they have a pretty important role and they perform it wonderfully.

Unfortunately, Vagrant Story ends up being a great concept of a game, with a very involving story, but lacking in the most important aspect, the gameplay. I guess some people will have fun with it, trying to get the best items, forge all kinds of different weapons an armor and so on, but, for the average player, who only wants to have a good bit of fun and intelligent – not senseless - challenge, the gameplay is definitely a weak spot here. Anyway, the game has a good amount of other qualities that more than make up for the trouble of playing this game to the very end.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 07/08/02, Updated 07/09/02