A lot of the people who have played Lost Odyssey have commented that the charming but familiar Blue Dragon seemed like a warm-up for the real experience. From our perspective, this definitely seems the case. But to be fair, it’s hard to compare the two. Apart from a few twists (such as no random battles), Blue Dragon was the JRPG experience, with the emphasis on the grind. The two games share a lot of similarities, but Lost Odyssey delivers a somewhat different experience.
Lost Odyssey is pretty much all about the story in some ways it almost becomes an interactive story, rather than a game. But so long as you can openly accept this, it’s not something that detracts from the game. You start off as Kaim Argonar, a mercenary who ends up being one of only a few survivors from a massive battle that was gate-crashed by a meteor. You soon learn that Kaim, is in fact, an immortal being who has been walking through the world for the last 1000 years. Unfortunately, he’s lost his memory and seems to be having trouble dealing with it. Kaim quickly meets up with another immortal, this time a female, Seth Balmore, a shifty womaniser named Jensen and a powerful sorcerer named Gongora, for whom he supposedly works.
A can of mortein would work better, wouldn't it?
As you’d expect, you slowly learn the secrets behind each of the mysteries through out the course of the game. The game isn’t strictly about your main character, but about the entire group of people that you play as and the NPC’s that you meet along the way. Veteran RPG players may eventually pick apart a few aspects that seem derivative and some of the game’s characters may seem a little too familiar. It’s hard to care about such things though when you’re presented with one of the most cinematic and emotionally charged stories seen for a long time in a video game. The way the game captures the concept of struggling with immortality in a mortal world, the relationship between characters, the depth of individuals, the heart-felt emotion coupled with a excellent cinematography and a great translation and presentation. Rounded off with a mighty conclusion, and Lost Odyssey has the most compelling story since Dragon Quest.
Because the game is so heavily reliant on its story, it rolls into other aspects of the game, and this may be off-putting to some players. In particular, the pacing of the game is definitely on the slow side, particularly as you’re often sitting through cut-scenes. It actually feels like the right pacing for the kind of game that you can easily lose yourself in for numerous hours and not even know it. On the flip side, it is undeniably annoying that you’ll sometimes watch a lengthy cut-scene, then take control only to be taken back into another cut-scene after a few steps. It’s nowhere near as ridiculous as Metal Gear Solid 2 but definitely noticeable. Thankfully, cut-scenes can be paused and skipped if you really want or are repeating an area.
Another aspect of the story that is very well used is the concept of dreams. Kaim’s memories are unlocked in the form of dreams, and many will be found through out the game. While they are purely text scenes accompanied by minor effects, they are carefully and beautifully written to convey a throughly vivid image. They may take a while to get through, but those who are willing to be let into the dreams will find themselves taken on a surreal journey of emotion and feeling. It may not be of literary classic status but it’s certainly some of the best writing that you’re likely to find in a game.
Even though we’ve talked at length about the story in Lost Odyssey, there is an RPG behind it as well, and a highly traditional one at that. Even with its heavy traditional (or archaic?) base, there are a few welcome twists to the formula. Lost Odyssey is a much more difficult game then Blue Dragon, as it brings back the aspect of every battle meaning something. While not old-school hard, you need to be on edge to get through battles and you need to use your head to get through the dungeons.
Provocatively dressed women? Insanely large monstrous enemies? Must be a JRPG.
Lost Odyssey takes out the need for grinding. You can if you want, but you don’t need to. It does so by essentially ‘capping’ your characters level whenever it deems that you should be good enough to take on anything in that particular area, and it helps that you gain levels reasonably quickly. While the random encounters aren’t heavy, the level cap can get annoying if you reach it and get lost in a number of almost useless battles. Secondly, the skills system is extremely well implemented and rewards players for utilising it. Your team will often be made up of immortals and ‘mortals’, where the mortals learn skills as levels progress, but immortals can only learn skills by ‘linking’ to the mortals. There are hundreds of skills and spells to be learned, so many, many combinations are possible. Thirdly, due to the difficulty, you're rewarded you for smartly managing your team and strategies with battle, as well as strategically utilising the reflex-based ring system.
The only aspect stopping some real customisation of characters is that their stats lead to fairly predefined roles. And the grind in JRPGs can never be truly avoided, as you’ll probably need to do a bit towards the end. Outside of battles, the game isn’t always too clear on where exactly you need to go. So you can use that opportunity to ransack townsfolk’s houses for potentially useful items in their pots and chests, while you wait to stumble upon the next plot trigger. Well, experienced players shouldn't an issue and the game’s presentation at least assures you that any landmark is rather obvious. Some NPCs are helpful and exploration can be rather quaint and enjoyable.
Lost Odyssey dearly tries to throw up some variety into situations, such as a few mini-games and even a stealth sequence, but a lot of them come off awfully clumsily, particularly when the presentation is otherwise highly polished. These additions would have fitted much better on the SNES, but when everything looks so nice, the effort needed to be just as visible. Strictly speaking, Lost Odyssey has no overworld, as you get to each town and ‘dungeon’ by waypoints. Later in the game, you have a way of exploring the world much more freely, though getting from town to town is very easy once you’ve at least been there once.
Lost Odyssey spans a whopping four discs. It manages to be enjoyable and compelling when you’re following the story and you can easily spend 40 hours just to see it through. However, to see everything and get some more interesting insights, you’ll need to spend quite a few more. While certainly more endearing across the experience then it’s development predecessor, one aspect that hasn’t been improved much over Blue Dragon is the technical performance. The number of load screens and gaps that you come across break up the pace and detract from the overall experience. If this is something that can’t be remedied by using four discs, then there’s something not right in the development process.
Hmm... We've seen this before...
The story in Lost Odyssey is backed up with excellent presentation. Built on the Unreal III engine, (with almost no pop-up), Lost Odyssey is a very visually satisfying experience. Everything fits together extraordinarily well, to create a luminous environment. Apart from a few minor hiccups along the way, the only real detractor from the graphics are aliasing issues. They won’t be very noticeable on a massive TV, but on everything else, it can be a slight downer. Uematsu hits the mark once again, and the English voicing in the game is some of the best that you’ll hear in a Japan developed RPG. The excellent writing isn’t just confined to the dreams, as the dialogue is excellent as well.
While there is no denying that Lost Odyssey has some inherent flaws from a genre that refuses to reinvent itself, these issues pale next to the compelling story. RPG fans who stick with it will find that the many hours they put in are well worth it once the ending scene is reached. Given the technical and inherent design flaws, the game falls short of masterpiece status and it probably won’t ‘save’ the JRPG genre, but it’s certainly given us an experience that will stick for some time.
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