The Last Remnant

"The Last Remnant is an immensely addictive and satisfying RPG experience"

The Last Remnant is another Non-FF JRPG from SE and one that has been heavily criticised by many reviewers. The game has been in development for a while and part created by the team responsible for Final Fantasy XII.

Gameplay - 9/10

This is easily the strongest aspect (along with the music) of the game. The game delivers a turn-based system where you can control a number of units and unions in battle, 1-5 unions of about 18 units. Rather than explaining in more detail how the battle system works I'll just generalize aspects of the gameplay and talk about them.

Now in most RPG's you are able to control 3-5 characters and choose any commands for them in battle, in this game you can only choose commands for unions but you're able to see what actions your units will do. A lot of people will complain about options not coming up but generally if you have the necessary items and AP (art points) then options will come up. Being able to control what each individual unit does would be a negative for me. It would take a very long time and simplifying groups of attacks is very beneficial to the flow of the battle system.

The character control is also limited in that you can only accessorise the main character Rush, but you do have somewhat a small influence on how characters can evolve during the game by giving them items or telling them what type of arts to learn (mystic and combat). This is another good point because there are far too many characters to micro-manage and for me personally micro-managing is a tiresome thing. Leaders and soldiers will upgrade their stats/skills and weapons automatically as your progress through the game and battle a lot with enemies.

The outline of the levelling up system is basically done through you fighting enemies and becoming stronger. There are no levels, you upgrade arts/weapons and skills but you don't level up. There is a Battle rank in this game that displays the rank in which you have achieved through the game, the more you fight the higher level it will be. It shows the rank at how powerful your enemies will be and how much you have progressed through the game and it CAN be an incline to how strong you are but not always. You can be at the same strength in BR 30 as you can at BR60…it depends on how you go about training, in general you do not need to worry about this at all. IF you can't beat an enemy then grind up your skills and stats by fighting.

You may think your BR maybe too high but this is nonsense. Eventually you will overpower your enemies because you have the skills to, even though enemies scale to BR the difference is insignificant. For example a Dragon at BR30 is no different than the same one at B50, he'll have more HP and his attacks will do more damage but in general those attacks the enemy does are the same, whereas you have the ability to upgrade your skills the enemy does not. This applies to every enemy in the game right till the end. That's the basis of the levelling up system and it works incredibly well in my opinion.

Now I just want to briefly talk about formations and arts. Formations are basically the way you union is set up, there are may formations in the game and each has it's own attribute such as high Magic Defence/attack and high normal attack and speed etc.. It's important to experiment with these and see which one suits your union the most. In general throughout the beginning of the game you can get away with default Formation. Formations also affect characters arts and abilities. Arts are the main form of attacking in the game, there are 5 different types in the game with more types within those…i.e. combat consists of one handed and two handed and mystic consists of remedies and Hexes. I won't go into detail but each arts has different attributes and can affect the battle in many ways. There are several different arts to learn in this game and they become very useful. Learning and improving arts is essential to overcoming the many great challenges this game offers.

I'm also very impressed with how the Map Navigation system works, you can access any area of the map (providing you have unlocked it) and simply select to go there, you don't have to backtrack through areas again and again to get to certain areas especially cities. There is only one point you do this and that's right at the end but it's nothing major. Overall this helps hasten the game up, and if you want to do quests and extra things you can do so with ease. In fact you can even press select to exit out of towns so you don't even have to move around a lot in this game, for me that's a positive. It pretty much eliminates physical elements of backtracking. On top of that you are able to save anywhere at anytime (except battles) in this game which further gives you more freedom and time to do things without having to worry about messing things up. This was a huge factor for me in continuing playing this game.

Overall the gameplay is very well developed but there are some issues, especially with the upgrading system. The game doesn't clarify how classes change and/or how to grow into one. Classes can affect what arts characters learn and how they upgrade their skills. Other problems include the Trigger system that you will need to use in battle; this is probably a pointless aspect of the game as it's not really necessary. But since they implemented it could have been harder to pull off. It maybe also is more useful if this was randomized and more difficult to trigger i.e. combination of buttons or randomizing buttons. The Button you need to press is dependent on the weapon so for Spears it's Y for Swords it's A etc. so you know which button you have to press. The frame rate also makes the button mashing easier. In terms of difficulty this game is one of the harder RPG's out there, you are required to spend more time upgrading your skills and using strategies to beat harder enemies. It's not an easy game by any means but it's not so hard you'll pull your hair out, It just requires patience and thinking.


Graphics- 7/10

In terms of the technical issues they are severely bad if you don't install and the problem is still apparent even if you install the game. Now this is the MAIN reason why many reviewers have slated this game. While this game does have a barrage of technical problems like slowdowns, loading and pop-ups it doesn't really affect the outcome of the experience to a significant degree. At first you'll be slightly annoyed that the game is running slowly in battle but once you get use to the game you won't really care all that much. This is a Turn based RPG game it's not an action game. In terms of non-battle screen the game runs fairly smoothly, apart from rush's awkward running animation and some other characters, the animations in general are very good. The game does look very nice especially on a HD screen. The art design is terrific and once they've loaded the textures look really detailed too. This is definitely one of the best-looking RPG's this gen, without a doubt. Other hitches include Repetitive map designs especially for dungeons.

Sound – 9/10

Before going onto the music I firstly wanted to say that the voice work in this game isn't brilliant but it's actually not bad by ENG voice acting standards, it's really not! Well some voices can be incredibly cheesy but it's bearable nonetheless. Sound effects are great especially in battle and in dungeons and towns; it really improves the atmosphere of some places. Just turn down the BGM sound and leave effects on and you'll notice this.

The Music in this game is also fantastic, there are a few issues like repetitive tracks but overall the score is terrifically composed. Each town has it's own theme and Battle music changes depending on how many turns you've completed to increase the tension. Boss music especially the last boss is also very epic. Overall for a JRPG the music will not disappoint you. It's certainly one of the most impressive aspects of the game.

Story & Length – 8/10

The story plot is straightforward and isn't hard to understand but the characters are easily likable and that adds more to the story as you progress. There isn't a whole lot of character development here apart from a few characters. More background story for some leaders would have been nice but in general it's simple to understand and you know what's going on. You can concentrate on the gameplay while not worrying too much about the main storyline because you will always know what's going on.

In terms of the length of the game well…it can be pretty overwhelming. The actual story is about 40-50 hours but if you are trying to get mot of the achievements or just the two “200G” ones then you will be spending up to 80-90+ on the game if not more. This game is VERY time consuming, in fact I would say it's more time consuming than any JRPG I've ever played. There is a ton of things to do in this game in terms of quests/monster hunting/component finding but it's not just that many games have side quests and extra things to do but it's just in this game they take a long time to do. You can rush this game and try and complete it but you will be sucked into doing extra stuff. Especially since the rewards are great. Also this ties into the Map navigation system, it's incredibly easy to access any area in a quick time so this makes quest hunting less tedious AND most quests you are transported to the area and back from it. You may think it's nothing to track back and do things but I assure you it makes the game and the side quest aspect far more player friendly. A negative aspect of this would be that unless you get help from other sources you will miss important info regarding miss-able quests, which is annoying. Luckily I manage to research these before actually progressing much through the game.

Overall 8/10

I've spent more time on this game than any other Xbox 360 game combined (minus multiplayer). Which is saying a lot. Sometimes you'll get bored of games or lose interest after a while, it's happened to me many times over the last few years, especially now since I'm passed 20 and don't have the time to spend on games as I use to. This game has taken me by surprise in that I've spent an incredible amount of time and effort trying to get the best out of it and I've never done it through any force or me wanting to get my moneys worth. I've greatly enjoyed this game and I wanted to review it once I had played it extensively. This review isn't written in detail but I just wanted to write something about my experience. I have spent 2-3 months on this game and about 150+ hours and while I'll be glad my experience is over since I can now spend time on other things I will miss playing this game. I hope to play another RPG like it some time in the future.

It's not a perfect game and it's probably not an excellent one either, but the Last Remnant is an immensely addictive and satisfying RPG experience that I would recommend to anyone with some form of patience. If you aren't looking a long game-play driven RPG or want a more epic story driven RPG then look elsewhere.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 02/25/09

Game Release: The Last Remnant (EU, 11/20/08)