Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon: Another Story

"The best Sailor Moon game ever, and a cool rpg."

Sailor Moon, one of the most successful anime series of all time (probably the most successful after Dragon Ball) have always had very bad games based on it (I don’t know if they are worst than any Dragon Ball game but more or less as bad, and that sure is bad) mainly because of Bandai’s useless programmers that only want to make money from the anime licence (think Akklaim back in 1994).
Anyway, happily for all the anime and rpg fans this is probably one of the best games ever based on an anime, and without doubt the best Sailor Moon game you’ll ever find.
I’m a HUGE anime and manga fan, and while SM is far from being my favorite series (or manga), playing a good game (and even more if it’s is an rpg) based on an anime is always a pleasure.

Plot:
Although the main title says “another story”, the truth is that there is a huge amount of references from the TV series and the manga, and if you don’t know nothing about SM you’ll have a lot of trouble following the plot. Plus, the story itself is extremely confusing, not to mention lots of Japanese names and definitions.

Rating: 8/10: Too confusing, but still good.

Graphics:
For a 24 meg game the graphics could have been a bit better, jut a bit. They are very good but I there are things that could have been improved, the enemies for example, they lack colors, don’t move, and they all look like a bunch of crazy drag queens or something worst (just like in the series anyway); or the sailor’s movements.

Rating: 9/10: Excellent anyway.

Music:
Sometimes good, sometimes annoying, good enough.
All the girls have voices, they are funny, hearing Japanese girls speaking in English has always been fun.

Rating 6/10: Slightly above average music, nice voices.

Gameplay:
The game is divided in five chapters, each one involving certain sailors or all of them, but always related to the main plot.

The battles look a lot like FF, but here you can change the formation as you please and link techniques between you sailors. The magic system is a bit different from the typical rpgs, here you have 12 magic points to waste every time you enter a battle.

One thing that I can’t stop thinking is how incredibly amazing the battle system could’ve been with an action/rpg style, more or less like Star Ocean or exactly like an old Nes game called Radia Senki.
The battle system is pretty neat anyway.

Rating 10/10: Strange but effective, the game never gets repetitive or monotonous, and the controls are perfect.

Difficulty: VERY hard.
The difficulty is very low at the beginning but gets awfully high sometimes in the latest two chapters, too awfully hard. You are definitely going to have a hard time with this game.

Overall:
My first thoughts before an hour playing this game weren’t very good, in fact, I got bored and quit at the beginning of chapter 2. This was a huge mistake, because from chapter 2 till the end everything is great. The story is good, it has a lot of dialogues, very good graphics, good gameplay, and it’s an rpg featuring Sailor Mon, what else can you ask for?
I personally think that there’s something missing in this game, there is something I don’t like and that keeps me from giving it a higher rating, I don’t know exactly what it is, maybe because it gets too hard, or because the weird story... but is very good game, there’s no doubt about that.

””My lack of vocabulary and grammatical errors (if there’s any) are because I’m not from an English speaking country, sorry.””

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 08/30/03