Infinite Undiscovery

"A fun, solid Action-RPG"

After reading about this game in a summer issue of Game Informer, I never put too much thought into it. I figured that if it looked good upon release, I'd check it out. However, I was craving an RPG right in time for this game's release, so I picked it up right after release day. And wow, was I in for a treat.


--------------------------
Story- 9/10


The story in Infinite Undiscovery is a little bit mixed when it comes to intrigue and strength. Let me be honest, the beginning of the game is awful, and I was forcing myself to keep playing. During this time, I was thinking "Great, what did I waste my money on?" Now, by awful, I mean it was just pretty uninteresting. However, this streak of boring only goes on for about 2 hours of the game; ending as soon as you finish your first dungeon(2nd if you count the starting area.) It could even be less than 2 hours, I'm not the fastest person when it comes to progressing in these games.


But! As soon as you reach that certain point where you meet the rest of your entourage and you get to experience 2 to 3 full parties of allies fighting alongside of you, the story really picks up, and you'll have a very hard time putting the game down. You quickly discover multiple mysteries in the story surrounding the main character, Capell, and the other hero who could be Capell's identical twin, Sigmund. Many developments occur that you'll never see coming.

The main back-story of the game is that the moon has been chained to the world by the 'Dread Knight,' and the 'Order of Chains.' You discover the purpose for this during the game. The Moon is said to house the great god Veros, who watches over all of humanity. The chains have brought monsters and other abominations like 'Lunar Rain' to the unsuspecting people, and the world is suffering. That's about all I can say without inducing spoilers. The characters are very interesting, all with their own unique background and stories.

A few of the story elements also seem to be 'borrowed' from other RPG's that date back to the SNES era, but they blended the whole thing in nicely.

--------------------------


Graphics- 7/10


Here is one area that I think could have been worked on a little more within the game. There are some scenes where the characters are talking or something and you can really pick up on the nice texture that they put into the game. However, some of the special effects in the game look a little depressingly bad. For example, in the beginning of the game, you must carry an injured person through an open field while a giant dragon is spitting fireballs at you (literally). Right away, I noticed that the fireballs looked like a graphic from the Playstation 1 days, they could almost seriously pass for animated gifs that you can look at on the internet. This is a pretty rare occurance in the game though.

At some points in the game, I caught myself wondering if this game really couldn't be on the PS2 or the Wii. But every time you get a close-up of any scene, or any cutscene, the graphics prove to be decent enough for a more powerful system. I guess most RPG's don't really go for the mega graphics as well, which is why I try not to hold it against them too badly. If you don't house pet peeves similar to mine, then this shouldn't bother you. The character detail and action sequences are very well done.

Also, the voice acting in this game is really good, the talent did a great job of becoming their characters.

--------------------------


Gameplay- 9/10


This seems to be where the Action RPG games really shine. The gameplay is really simple, and can be learned in no longer than half an hour usually. Anyone who has played a Dynasty Warriors game will pick up the melee combat pretty quickly. Basically, A is your normal attack; and B is your Fierce melee attack. Combos can be done by the usual button combinations of AB, AAB, AAAB. One knocks the enemy into the air for aerial combos(also making them defenseless), one knocks them onto the ground, and the other is a multi-hitter. You also learn special attacks that you can map to the A or B buttons, and all you do is hold that button down to do one of the special attacks. I might make it sound more complicated than it really is, it's all nice and easy to learn.

Battles are really simple, you only control Capell, and the AI does the rest of the work. Now, some people might not like this, because computer AI controlled team mates in other games are almost always as useful as a fly without wings. They don't do their job but they're funny to watch. This is not the case with Infinite Undiscovery though. I was pretty shocked during my first few battles when the AI showed that it's actually really smart. If someone in your party is fighting an enemy on their own, you can count on them to get the job done. Your mages will keep everybody healed. And if they're ever too slow for your liking, you can just press the Y button to request immediate healing. Similar to other action RPG's, you can order your teammates to use certain tactics; such as Save MP, Fight Freely, Spread out(attack different enemies if there's more than 1), Focus on Capell's target, and you can even command them to wait in one area when not in battle. It's useful for opening treasure chests that you think might be a trap.

Thankfully, you can take the healing and whatnot into your own hands if things really hit the fan. Pressing the Back button will bring up your menu, and you can toss some healing items at your allies. It's almost mandatory when it comes to MP restoration, because the AI doesn't seem to be programmed to deal with mana potions.

Overall, the battles are really addictive. But there is 1 thing that keeps me from giving it a perfect score, something that is really uncalled for and is aggravating; getting knocked down is the most annoying part of the entire game. Certain enemies like the tall ogres, or some bosses will knock you off of your feet every single time they hit you. And the most annoying part is, it takes a good 4-5 seconds to get back up. It's the WORST when your team mates are getting hit for 2,000 damage and dying from the final boss, and you're waiting for Capell to get back up to help. Now granted, the game gives you a 'parry' move for defense, to deflect some attacks. But it's seriously so hard to time that most people just don't even bother with trying.


--------------------------------------

In Closing-


Overall I believe this game is worth full price, and I'd highly recommend it for those fans of Action RPG's. It has its weaknesses, but the good far outweighs the bad. The ending could be better, but it leaves you with a nice 'accomplished' feeling. The re-playability is pretty high on this game, due to the length.

**That's something I want to address too, a lot of people complain that this game is only 20-30 hours long. Trust me, if that makes an RPG automatically bad, Chrono Trigger and Suikoden would have been ignored and forgotten long ago. This is a really good game that you will probably play through several times before this generation of games is over. Not too long, and not too short.

--------------------------------------


Story- 9/10
Graphics- 7/10
Gameplay- 9/10

Rent or Buy: Buy

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 09/26/08

Game Release: Infinite Undiscovery (US, 09/02/08)