Luminous Arc

"Even a drop is a flood in a draught"

Ah, Luminous Arc. The first "real" strategy game on DS. You had so much potential, and I'm still a bit torn up on the inside that you came out only as decent as you did. While it ain't bad at all, it just isn't the droid we've been looking for.

Story

Easily the strong suit of the game, the relatively original story centering around a corrupt church and a persecuted race of witches boils to a fever pitch in game. It'll grab your attention, and even with doldrums abound (cutscenes are unskippable, so be prepared to watch it as many times as you play the mission), it still stacks up as a novel plot with the holding power to make you want to keep on playing. Sadly, the script at times can be very, very terrible, laughably so at some points, but most of the dialog is of decent quality.

Graphics

The visuals and effects in battle are very clean and well done, but the general animu style of the characters, and Fire Emblem style of talking face portraits detract from the pretty flashes and such.

Sound

Eww. This is one of the most annoying factors in this game for me. With such a great story, you'd expect the audio to be on par, but an uninspired score and such an incredibly hit and miss voice cast (wait until you meet Nikolai, ugh), you'll simply want to leave the volume turned down most of the time. It gets points for the voice acting for all missions, though, as some characters are cast well.

Gameplay

This is what kind've unmade the game for me. In theory, the idea is sound: grab the best mechanics from some big name games, and pile them together. However, it really doesn't work out very well at all. Elemental panels are almost useless, characters are ridiculously unbalanced (a nonissue for the story, but there is an online mode), and so many x's and y's missing from the equation (simple things like height, direction, and line of sight are totally missing from the game) that it's just hard to get into seriously. You can basically zerg through the game with minimal thinking by just bringing your best characters to the front and wiping out whatever you may see. It's a decent romp, and totally playable, but don't come in expecting a seriously amazing battle system.

Replayability

Honestly, I could have given this a zero and been on my way. Sans the primitive affinity system, there is almost no way to better your characters short of grinding. There is absolutely no depth to this game. However, there is an online game. This is one of the biggest saving graces I've ever seen in a game. Without it, this game would be lifeless and dull, and worth no more than a rent (and Blockbuster doesn't rent DS games anymore, so I'm pretty much declaring it a pass), but with it, it becomes a lot of grinding and some actual strategy that the main game is so desperately lacking (be forewarned, the online game is almost just as much of a "who has the strongest guy" as the single player game, but at least your opponent won't be just throwing his characters at you to be mowed down). It's relatively fun to pick up and play for fifteen to thirty minutes, but in the end, all it does is encourage more grinding in the game for the best weapon/highest level.

Story - 8/10
Graphics - 7/10
Sound - 3/10
Gameplay - 5/10
Replayability - 7/10

OVERALL: 7/10

Final thoughts: Again, not necessarily a bad game, but the story just can't support the mediocre gameplay very well. It's depressing.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 08/24/07