Ninety-Nine Nights

"N3 ... A Good 360 Experience"

Ninety-Nine Nights is a "hack and slash" game with a next-gen feel.
This game is about a war between humans and their enemy (Goblins and Orcs). It is said that if the two pieces of the broken orb are ever put back together, that the one who reconstructed it will rule that age and that all others will fall. There are a total of 7 characters that you can play as, 5 on the side of good, and 2 on the side of evil. Most of the character's stories intertwine, but they are unique enough so that it keeps things interesting.

Gameplay - Above Average
Each chapter of a character's story is broken up into separate missions. At the end each mission you will get a rank, S being the best, A being good, B being worse. You only have to complete each mission to advance with the story, but sometimes you may get special items for completing certain missions with a certain rank.

If you are the character Inphyy, Aspharr, or Myifee (three heroes, with the longest stories) you will be able to control various armies, and often times be able to choose between different battalions at the beginning of the mission, such as infantry, heavy infantry, pikemen, and archers. During the course of the game players will be able to defeat entire armies with only a few button presses, and it is fulfilling every time. Throughout missions there may be particular stronger enemies that take more tactful thinking than just going into the middle of a huge army and mashing buttons. Usually at the end of missions there will be a boss fight. These bosses usually have much more HP and much stronger attacks than normal enemies.

During combat, characters will be able to build up enormous combos, into the thousands if they can chain all of their various combos correctly. After you kill each enemy, a red orb will be obtained by your character. This serves two purposes. The first is to gain experience. The second is to fill a gauge on the screen. When this gauge is filled, a much more powerful attack can be pulled off for a few seconds. During this time every enemy that you kill will make your character obtain a blue orb. When the blue orb gauge is filled, an awesome devastating attack can be performed annihilating almost every enemy in range.

Throughout the game you will find chests that contain items, such as red potions that heal, blue potions that help fill your red orb gauge, support items that increase your stats, and new weapons. Enemies also drop all of these things randomly as well.

There is no saving during missions, only at the end when you beat it and are on the mission select screen can you save. This makes things a bit more challenging, but is not a huge hindrance.

Control - Great
The controls are easy to learn and quite fun. There are two standard attack buttons, a regular attack and a strong attack. Each of these can be combined in different ways to pull off a multitude of different combos with each character. All characters besides Klarrann can jump, and all characters can dash. Also, every character can also guard. The characters movements are extremely fluid and you will never have to fight to pull off the correct commands quickly. The camera is completely under the player's control. The right analog stick controls the character's movement, while the left controls the camera angle, so you will never be fighting it.

Graphics - Great
Graphically, this is one of the best looking games on the market today. Individual strands of hair are discernible. My only complaint with the graphics is that sometimes various things seem to glitch or fade/disappear into other things. The beauty of this game is one of its best aspects. Usually there is no slowdown, even when there are thousands of enemies on the screen, however it does happen from time to time, especially during some character's special attacks.

Sound - Above Average
The character's have appropriate responses to most things in the game, although some of the voice acting can be considered questionable during the CG. The music is very good in my opinion. However, every once in a while, if a mission takes a while, there may be a bit of silence after a musical score is over.

Replay Value - Average
At first glance this game may seem short. However, every character can be leveled up to level 9, which will take a little work, and you can always try and go for an A/S rank for every mission. There is also some cool character profiles and art work that is unlockable. After every mission, points will obtained based on how well you did, and you can use the points to unlock these things.

Overall Score: 8/10
Although the game has it flaws, it has many more strong points, and is a great game to buy; especially at this point in time with a pretty stale 360 selection of games.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 09/06/06