Shouldn’t there be more of these out there?

By “these” I mean Japanese turn based strategy games for the DS. With the system having all but consumed the market in Japan and still burning up the charts over here, you’d think that we’d have seen more of these kinds of games on our shores. I could be wrong, but “Hoshigami: Ruining Blue Earth Remix” is probably the first of its kind to make it to this system in the States. That’s definitely good for the game itself, since it’ll be judged a bit more forgivingly by its target audience. While I can’t say that the game needs every bit of help it’ll get, it’ll certainly tide people over well enough until something better comes along.

JASON GLICK

Read the full review, after the jump!

Now if you’re thinking, “Hey, the name of this game sounds familiar…” that’s probably because you’re remembering when it first came out on the PS1 around a decade ago. If you then start thinking, “Hey, this game LOOKS familiar too…” then that’s because it was one of many turn based strategy games that hit the PS1 in the wake of the success of “Final Fantasy Tactics,” and it borrows a lot from that game. From the look down to how you gain experience and skills, this game takes a lot from the classic Square RPG. As it stands, it’s more of a case of “stealing from the best” rather than “shameless ripoff” as the game does manage to distinguish itself in ways both good and bad from its forerunner.

For example, there aren’t any thinly veiled religious allegories in the story here, just a story of an average kid who finds out that fate has much bigger plans for him. The average kid is Fazz, a young mercenary in the country of Nightweld. His country is in dire straits as it is currently being invaded by the powerful nation of Valaim, who are trying to take control of all the elemental towers of the continent. Why are they doing this? Who’s really pulling their strings? And what does this have to do with the legendary Ixian civilization and the legend of the Hoshigami?

Those questions and more… will moderately involve you throughout the game. More than anything else, the story does a good job of getting you from battle to battle and motivating you sufficiently to defeat the guys on the other side (even if you do find yourself cutting down some good guys in the process). It won’t do much more than that, as the characters are pretty thinly drawn and I was never really compelled to find out what fate awaited them.

Fortunately the game’s most distinctive feature is its combat system. Forgoing the traditional “move then attack” system you’ll find in most of these games, the game uses what it calls the “Ready for Action Points” system “RAP” for short. With RAP, you’re allotted a certain number of points (represented by a meter in the battle screen) each turn for you to do whatever you want. Moving, attacking, using magic and items all consume RAP so you’ve got a great amount of freedom as to how you want to plan your moves each turn. You can also drive your RAP meter into the read for an extra attack, but by doing so your character’s next turn will take much longer to come up.

This system is a refreshing change of pace, for the most part. I liked being able to attack the enemy right next to me three times if I wanted to, and the simple act of moving your characters around becomes much more strategic since you want to place them in a way that draws the enemy in, rather than going up to them and beating the crap out of them (and doing that WILL get you killed, more on this later). The problem is that the system is very much weighted towards characters with ranged attacks like archers, and mages. Because of the range of their attacks, once someone gets within their range, they can just unload on that guy until their RAP meter is maxed out and not worry about moving around too much. While this is true for both your characters and whoever you’re fighting against, you’ll notice that your opposition always has the tactical advantage in terms of position on the map.

Speaking of the opposition, I haven’t heard much about the original “Hoshigami” on the PS1, but what I have heard is that it was very tough. Unfairly tough. Tough enough to make people who mastered “Final Fantasy Tactics” cry. For example, there were no revive spells or items in the game. Once you lost a character in battle, you never got them back. Fortunately for “Remix” the developers decided to ease up on the player just a bit with some adjustable difficulty levels. Those of you looking for a taste of how brutal this game was on the PS1 can check out the normal and hard difficulty levels, but if you want something a bit more forgiving (and to be honest, more fair), easy is for you. Characters who die in battle are only gone for that battle, and Fazz has a resurrection spell to bring character back to life in the course of a fight.

The enemies you’re fighting against do seem to be somewhat brain-dead on the easiest difficulty, but they still put up a formidable fight. Sure they have a tendency to run right up to you and attack, and their archers are prone to firing their arrows into trees, but they will always outnumber you, and their mages usually have the ability to cast more spells than your characters (and don’t forget that they’ll have the high ground as well). So even on the easiest difficulty, “Hoshigami” puts up enough of a fight to satisfy (or frustrate) veteran strategy RPG gamers.

Speaking of magic, casting spells works quite a bit differently in this game than in most other RPGs. Called “confeigms,” they come in coins that allow you to cast a certain spell (elemental attack, status attack, or healing) and you can only carry seventy two of them at a time for some odd reason. While you can buy better ones as the game goes on, what you’ll really want to do is customize them with the seals that you’ll buy and find throughout the course of the game. You see, your characters don’t have any MP, they’re able to cast confeigms based on how much RAP they have and how many Confeigm Points (CP) their coin has. The CP for a coin regenerates over the course of a battle, so on one hand you’re encouraged to use confeigms early on so that you can take full advantage of this.

However the CP cost for any of these spells is usually high enough that customization becomes a necessity if you want to cast a particular spell more than once every seven or eight turns. This is bad news for people who dislike to “grind” in their RPGs, as you will need some powerful confeigms to make it through the game. The good news is that if you do take the time to power them up, then the game becomes much, much easier.Technically the game looks and sounds pretty well. They haven’t really done a whole lot to spruce the game up from the PS1, but the DS is more than up to handling the graphic demands of the game. Sonically, not so much, but it’s still quite pleasant.

As you’d also expect from a game with the word “Remix” in the title, there have also been a few things added to this version of “Hoshigami.” Aside from the aforementioned ability to select the game’s difficulty level you’ve also got some new missions, music, a new character, the ability to trade items with other people and the ability to play the game with the stylus. That last thing isn’t all that spectacular, but it’s nice that they decided to put the DS’ special abilities to use in some way.

With branching story paths, multiple endings, and around fifty hours of gameplay, “Hoshigami: Ruining Blue Earth Remix” has the potential to keep DS owners who’ve been jonesing for this kind of game occupied for quite a while. Though the game does some interesting things with its battle system, the game can still be frustratingly hard even on the easiest difficulty level. Still, it is the only game of its kind on the system right now and it does what it does decently enough. It could’ve been a lot worse, but I think it’ll please fans of this game until something better comes along.

Pros: Flexible and deep battle system, lengthy quest, only one of its kind on the system.

Cons: Challenge level is more frustrating than fun, story and characters kind of “Meh.”

Overall: 7