Lost Odyssey

"Easily worth it, classic style JRPG"

First off, a quick rundown of me. Played many, many jrpg's since the Dragon Warrior days of NES. It's easy to see that a great number of jrpg's after DW used it's same formula, with plenty of tweaks to the battle system. But mainly a "jrpg" means a Japanese style of turn based battle role playing game, where the hero and companions usually learn abilities as they gain EXPerience and level up. The stories usually have the same concept of saving the world, but the way they evolve really sets each one on it's own course. This game was very reminiscent of FFX in that aspect, so you will see quite a few comparisons to the JRPG Giant in this review.

That's why I play this genre of games, for their stories, since it's more like a heavily interactive book/movie at times. That's also where this game gets most of it's 8/10 rating, and where King Kong FF has fell off as of late to me.

Few Pro's and Con's on Lost Odyssey:

Pro's
--fantastic storyline with unforgettable writing
--beautiful graphics
--enjoyable characters
--above average voice acting
--battle system's timing ring and ring effects for regular attacks
--ridiculously good music
--fairly challenging by today's jrpg standards
--large dungeons
--creative enemy design


Con's
--very linear, carbon copy of FFX on how the story plays out
--little to no gameplay at times, cutscenes are nice, too many can be annoying
--majority of disc space used on HD cutscenes and audio, took away from content
--no customizable armor, in fact, lack of customization all together
--horrible, horrible jpop love song

As you can see, the Pro's heavily outweigh the con's and this game is easily a must play for all RPG lovers. There's only been a handful of "really good" jrpg's since the release of the ps2 and xbox IMO. The only newer gen jrpg's that come close are FFX and Shadow Hearts1-2, and neither are as good as LO to this gamer.

Now I'll go slightly more in depth on the major components of an RPG, in order of importance to me.

Story: 10/10

One of the most compelling and brilliant stories ever, no matter the style or release date of the game. It centers around an Immortal, Kaim Argonnar, who has seen a thousand years of mortals come and go. Through the use of "dream sequences", you learn more about the past of Kaim and his companions. The character development because of this is better than what you would normally expect in a JRPG. The VA helps the many, many cutscenes pass along smoothly, and the writing of the text is second to none when you are forced to read (God forbid :) When you catch up to Kaim, it is in a world engulfed in a magic industrial revolution. Countries are advancing technologies to try and have the upper hand in case of war. I dare not ruin such a classic story with spoilers, so you will have to play the game to catch the twists and turns as mortals and immortals collide on different sides of power. I will leave you with this....Friends and loved ones that pass away never really die as long as you remember them.


Battle System: 8/10

Fairly simplistic battle system, very similar to most FF titles. Party consists of 5 man groups and you have front and back rows. Players have equippable weapons, rings, and item/s. There are two fairly unique additions in LO's battle system though. One is the timing ring for normal attacks. Basically there is a dartboard with a darker ring in the middle, and when your selected player attacks, a larger ring starts to circle the dartboard. You have three ratings on how well you time it, bad, good, and perfect. These will determine what effect the ring you have equipped does. You also have a GC meter which stands for guard control I think. Basically boils down to how much damage you can inflict on enemies in the back row, also how much damage allies in the back row receive. Nifty idea but never really played a part in too many storyline battles throughout the game. Timing ring took some monotony out of normal attacks and should have been used more.


GamePlay: 7/10

LO does feature quite a few sidequests and mini-games that the RPG fanbase so dearly loves. A slightly interactive world map was nice to see for a change and something jrpg lovers haven't seen since ...???....I dunno, FF9? Skies of Arcadia? The dungeons are also fairly deep and sometimes confusing which takes me back to the NES-SNES days. The difficulty in general wasn't over the top to me, but remarkably higher than most jrpg's of today. Which is a good thing IMO. These types of games should make you think and revise strategies on beating bosses and certain situations. I also like how in LO the game kind of molds the leveling process for you. You gain exp and get into random encounters until the game says you're at the recommended level, and then it slows down. Way down. 1sp per enemy and very few random encounters is what you become faced with. The gameplay falls off on the 3rd disc IMO, which is why I give this category a 7. You could easily go an hour without really taking control of a character for a battle.

Music: 10/10

We all know the famed FF composer and his accomplishments, well just add this to his greatest hits list. Not only is the quality top notch, but there's a lot of different tracks and they all do the mood justice. The world map has an old FF6 feel to it, as does the music played after a victorious battle. Good battle/boss battle music in general, and this is the most important to me as it will probably be the most played throughout the game. Very possibly the best end boss battle music EVER (yes, even greater than FF7's orchestrated masterpiece)

Graphics: 10/10

This has to be one of the best looking games on the market today. It's also the main reason the game is 4 discs long, because the other content in the game isn't astounding. Sheer beauty. The zoom-in feature and slightly rotate-able camera let you see just how detailed EVERYTHING in the game is. No dead spots really, everything is solid. Cool character and enemy designs, life-like reactions, well dubbed voice-acting, and outstanding spell animations are all a part of Lost Odyssey. I wish they gave you a little more freedom with the camera and some massive magic spells (summons anyone?) but that'd be asking a lot ...I know.


All in all, this game had the story to be the best JRPG ever. It had the graphics and the music as well, but just came short in gameplay and battle system to me. Taking a step right into 2-3 cutscenes in a row was just too much on the 3rd disc. I didn't even feel like I was "playing a game." And the battle system was unique, just not quite different enough to make it more enjoyable than the average JRPG. I like how you can control your ships on the world map, it gave the game a pre PS2 feeling. It'd be so nice to see the free-roaming elements of Oblivion mixed into a turn based JRPG. I don't mean so open ended you're creating the story of course, I just mean more like the older FF's 1-9 on today's consoles.

Bottom line is that this is a JRPG that is surprisingly good on the Xbox 360. That gives this gamer hope that there could be many more like it in the future, and eventually we could play that perfect one.....

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 03/10/08

Game Release: Lost Odyssey (US, 02/12/08)