Shining Force Gaiden

"Domingo is back, and he brought an Amigo!"

Strategy games seem to be the perfect kind of game to play in portable systems. The usually long duration of battles (and, subsequently, of the games themselves) match perfectly with boring and endless activities such as traveling or waiting for something. With this in mind (or maybe this is only an invention of mine), Sega made a version of their immensely popular (well, maybe not immensely, but it had its share of fans, at least at the time) strategy RPG series, Shining Force, for their handheld system, the not-so-popular Game Gear.

While the game obviously lost in technical possibilities (since the original Shining Force had been released for the Sega Genesis, which was much more powerful than the Game Gear), it kept the feel of the series basically unchanged. On the bad side, the game was only released in Japan, even if a version of the game in English exists as part of Shining Force CD. For those who want to play the original, however, there’s a translation of the script somewhere on the Internet (taken from Shining Force CD, really), which is a much easier solution than taking Japanese lessons, anyway.

Shining Force Gaiden is a direct sequel of the first Shining force game. Many characters from that game make an appearance here and the game starts in the same place, the kingdom of Guardiana. The story begins twenty years after the end of the first game, when the queen of Guardiana, Anri, receives a visit from the forces of another kingdom called Cypress and she is cursed. Guardiana sends troops to destroy the curse, but their soldiers are lost. Then, a small group of young soldiers join under the command of the mysterious Nick to try and save the lost soldiers and the queen. Thus, the new Shining Force is born.

In the first Shining Force, character development was sparse and only existed for some specific characters. In Shining Force Gaiden, however, it practically doesn't exist for any character. This is mostly due to the extremely dull and obvious dialogue, which only serves the purpose of explaining what is going on in the game. The story this time takes place in Cypress, which is a new place, but the basic Shining Force mythology is basically untouched and all classic races (like centaurs, birdmen etc.) and classes are present in this game, with a few minor additions.

The game also preserves the basic gameplay of the first Shining Force, specially when it comes to battles. The engine is exactly the same, with a group of up to twelve characters having to face the enemies on a kind of board. Character movement and defense are affected by a ‘land effect’, which depends on the kind of ground he is standing on or walking through. When performing an action, like attacking, casting spells or using items, the game changes to a closer view and shows the animation for the action just performed. Experience is won by each successful action taken and characters level up with every one hundred points of experience. Differently from the first game, experience that passes the one hundred mark aren’t lost, making characters level up faster. At level ten, characters may be promoted to a different class, which enables them to use more powerful weapons and grant them better status improvements.

This fidelity in relation to the gameplay used in the first game is probably Shining Force Gaiden’s strongest quality. This happens because the gameplay is incredibly addictive and the battles, although pretty long, sometimes almost exhausting, are all very exciting to play and well designed. Combining that with the fact that this is a handheld game, it becomes a perfect way to pass time. The difficulty level is also well balanced, even if the game tends more to the easy side of things, some battles will provide a little bit more challenge than usual, like the last battle, when only the main character can damage the final boss.

Outside of battles, however, things change a lot. While the four-icon menu still exists (although the icons have been replaced by text), everything else was changed. Pretty much, the only thing that exists other than the battles is the camp, with a shop and the headquarters (where you can check on your characters as well as revive and promote them, as well as save the game). Gone completely are the town exploring, talking to NPCs, finding secret areas and items and so on. While there are secret characters in this game, they must be found during battles. This limitation really takes away from the game, since Shining Force Gaiden loses most of its RPG elements and almost becomes a straight-ahead strategy game, with the leveling up, buying items and characters and story reminding us it is still in fact an RPG.

The graphics, while much poorer than those Genesis predecessor, are quite impressive for an 8-bit generation game, even if it was released in 1992. The first thing to be noticed is that the graphics are really faithful in mood and design to the first Shining Force game. If the graphical quality in the game isn’t quite the same, with weaker animations for characters’ and monsters’ actions, simpler ‘map’ character designs and a lot less variation, specially because there isn’t any exploring to be done in this game, this is mostly due to the system’s limitations and it compares wonderfully to other 8-bit games in terms of graphics. And, basically, the great thing about them is that they are pure Shining Force, proving the series has quite a distinctive visual feel.

The same conclusion can be taken when it comes to sound. The music in this game, even if a bit weaker than the original’s, is perfectly fitting in the series. More than that: it’s instantly recognizable as ‘Shining Force music’, with all of its good and bad points. This music is pure videogame RPG stuff, with the adventurous, epic feel that is expected in these games, with a military twist to it (almost all strategy games are, in essence, war games) and some happy, lighthearted tunes. Like in other games in the series, however, the number of tunes seem to be small for the duration of the game and their diversity limited for all of the situations the characters face. Their quality, however, is still very good and the overall result very pleasing.

Shining Force Gaiden is still a great game, a strong strategy RPG that is much more strategy than RPG, really. While the game isn’t as strong as any of the Genesis main Shining Force titles, it’s still a recommended play for anyone who is interested in the genre, mostly because of the simple, yet immensely enjoyable gameplay (which means, battle system). Because it manages to capture the charming quality and mood of the original game, specially in terms of graphics and music, for fans of the Shining Force series, this first title for the Game Gear is an essential play. And who didn’t like Shining Force, anyway?

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 06/01/03, Updated 06/01/03