Riviera: The Promised Land

"A very unique gaming experience."

Riviera: The Promised Land is a relatively unknown game by Sting that was brought over to the US by Atlus for the Game boy Advance in 2004 and again for the PSP in 2006. This review is for the Game boy version.

Story: 7/10

The back-story of Riviera is roughly based on Norse mythology, as the battle of Ragnarok has already occurred between Asgard, land of the gods, and Utgard, land of the demons. Finding themselves overwhelmed, the gods made the “Grim Angels” who turned the tide of battle and sealed the demons with the power of their diviners (weapons). You take on the role of Ein, a wingless angel who is sent to Riviera with his friend Ledah by the orders of the seven magi who now control Asgard in place of the gods who left their power with Riviera. Your job is to investigate the rumors circulating in Riviera that the demons have returned.

As far as plot lines go, Riviera's is fairly standard. I found it just interesting enough to keep me playing, but it isn't anything spectacular. The story advances nicely as you complete chapters in the game, with some plot twists along the way that any junior high school student could see coming. Still, it's a decent story that turns into a memorable ending, but you've more than likely already seen similar stories told much better.

Gameplay: 7/10

The gameplay in Riviera is rather unique. You are required to explore different environments as you fight your way to your goal. There are two different modes to exploring the area that you are in, Move mode and Quest mode. Move mode is pretty self explanatory, as all it does is move you from screen to screen, while Quest mode is used to investigate different objects in those screens to obtain weapons and key items.

Battle is preformed a bit differently as well. When you get into a fight, you are first required to pick who in your party you want to fight, up to 3 different people (You will gain 4 female allies as you play through the game, as Ein seems to have a thing with the ladies). After choosing who will fight, you can choose which position you want them in, either 1 up front with 2 in the back (magic formation) or 2 in the front and 1 in the back (attack formation). Once this is accomplished, you have to choose 4 different items to take into battle with you. Now, each character has different skills with different items, so choosing the right combination of items for battle is essential to winning. Also, most weapons and items only have so many uses before they break, so you will have to take that into account as well.

As you battle, you can earn status increases for your characters at the end of the fight by using a certain weapon so many times. This is essential to powering up your characters for future chapters. You can also use training fights to battle monsters without using your equipment uses left. As you fight, you have an overcharge gauge that will gradually fill up that you can use to unleash stronger attacks based upon your skill with any particular weapon. After battle, you are graded on how well you did, and given points that you can use to explore your location more. That's basically all there is to the gameplay in Riviera. By the 2nd or 3rd chapter you will have everything down, and by the 5th or 6th chapter, you'll be thinking that the whole game is quite repetitive.

Overall, I found the gameplay to be unique and fun, but I also found the method of powering up your characters to be a little too tedious at times.

Graphics: 9/10

The graphics in Riviera are beautiful. The environments that you explore look fantastic, as do all of the character sprites and drawings. There are also quite a few “cut scenes” which consist of drawings taking up your whole screen which are quite nice. Every overcharge attack also has it's own special graphics that look fairly good as well. All in all, the graphics in Riviera are great, nothing too flashy, but a lot of detail obviously went into this game.

Music/Sound effects/Voice Acting: 8/10

The Music in Riviera is pretty good, especially considering it's on the Game boy Advance. There are a few catchy tunes that you may get stuck in your head. The sound effects are fairly standard; nothing surprised me there (not that it should). The voice acting is rather good as well. It's most noticeable when one of your characters is about to use an overdrive move, and you'll probably find yourself straining to hear exactly what they're saying. It should also be noted that there is A LOT of dialogue in Riviera. I don't think there's a single screen where someone doesn't say something. Thankfully, there's virtually no slowdown at all due to the audio and dialog, even with there being so much of it.

Re-playability/Extra's: 6/10

There are 5 different ending you can obtain in Riviera, depending on how strong or weak your relationship with each of the girls is. These ending aren't really game-effecting though, as I believe they only affect what Ein does after the final battle. There is also an optional chapter you can complete after the game, but it is rather short and fairly easy. I imagine it would take awhile to see everything this game has to offer, but you'd have to absolutely love it to unlock everything and I'm sure the average gamer won't have the patience to play through the same scenario's that many times.

Overall: 7/10

Overall Riviera: The Promised Land is a rather fun, unique game. Its high points are the great simplistic graphics and unique gameplay, while its low points are how repetitive it can become and the trouble of leveling up all of your characters. I'm sure the PSP version is superior to the Game boy Advance version, so if you're interested in picking it up, I'd look for the PSP version. It's rather hard to find a copy of Riviera on the Game boy Advance anyways. Have fun and keep playing!

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 10/29/07

Game Release: Riviera: The Promised Land (US, 06/28/05)