Breath of Fire

"A good RPG, but it's not perfect."

I've been a fan of the BoF series for a little while now. I picked up BoF3 at local game rental place, and I loved it. I now own BoF3 and 4. When I heard it was coming to GBA, I naturall got excited. Ran out and bought it. It's a good RPG, a fun game, but it's definitely not perfect.

Graphics are nice for a GBA game. Bright, vibrant, and good looking. It's really hard to play an RPG when you can't tell the difference between a stack of logs and a vase. The character designs are nice. I like the look of the party members on the world map. Love Ryu's traditionally weird hairstyle. NPC designs are so-so, but they're never really amazing or anything. Just ordinary townfolk wandering around in the background.

Sound is fine, the effects are good enough. The usual array of blips, bloops, and dings. Music is very nice. A good battle theme, town music, world music, little action sequence music. It's got plenty there, more than enough for what is needed.

Gameplay is where this game falls flat. The story is absolutely horrid. I hate it. It's not really much. A Dark Dragon clan rises to power and blows up your village. Someone tells you to save the world. You obey. Wow. Dialogue... well, IT SUCKS. Someone tells you to do something. You do it. You talk to them, and they tell you to do something else. No thank you. No long speeches we love to hear in RPGs. The translation seems to be bad, or maybe it's just the actual game dialogue. The random battle encounters are far too common. Some boss battles are insanely easy, and some are extremely hard. The battle system is good though, and the menus are easy to navigate. That's a plus.

Control is pretty simple. A feature pretty much custom to the BoF series is the ability to perform a special action on the map. Gobi can change into a big fish, Nina into a bird. Bo can shoot arrows and kill game wandering the landscape. Some of these are needed, some are just helpful things. It's a nice addition.

All in all, you'll probably enjoy this game. It's a good RPG experience, with a nice battle system, easy-to-navigate menus, and nice graphics. Even if it's lacking in the story department.

Graphics - 9/10
Gameplay - 4/10
Sound - 8/10
Control - 10/10
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Overall - 7/10

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 01/23/02, Updated 01/23/02