I've played almost every Square Enix game there is, and when I saw the across the board bad reviews for Last Remnant, I was a bit worried. But I bought it anyway, and I don't regret it. Just for some background, here's my preference for Final Fantasy games, so you can compare with your own tastes and see if TLR might be for you. I thought FF3 (6 US) was the best hands down, FF2 (4 US) and 7 were tied for second, 10 and 1 (for the sake of nostalgia if nothing else) were tied for 3rd. 12 is next, 9 was not terrible, but it was definitely forgettable. And 8 was a steaming pile of garbage.
With that out of the way, there's one thing you have to accept before you get into this game. If you don't just accept it going in you won't appreciate the game, and if you do you will. And that is the fact that the hallmark of this game is the battle system. That was their #1 priority. Story came second, even graphics came second. Don't get me wrong, I think the graphics are fantastic personally and the story is fine. But the battle system is very impressive and there are a lot of intricacies to it, and it really shows that they were willing to sacrifice other areas of the game for a stellar battle system.
The levelling system has been redesigned as well, although it's up to your taste whether you'll like it. You don't actually "level" your character, instead your skills go up as you use them. For example use a lot of combat skills and they'll become more powerful, use a lot of magic and you'll get new spells. Do a lot of physical attacks and your strength / attack power will go up, get hit a lot and your HP will go up. Etc. Again, some people will like this and some won't, I personally get a sense of satisfaction about hearing that ding every time I raise a level, and keeping track of how much more exp I need to get there, but I can live with this system, it's not that bad once you get used to it. One interesting aspect of it is that it really requires your characters to specialize, since you want to get access to the more powerful techniques you have to keep using that same type of technique over and over, and using some other type of technique will delay you getting the stronger ones from the original category.
The slowdown and stuttering that everyone talks about is indeed an issue, but one that I hardly notice. It's completely forgivable as far as I'm concerned and it doesn't interfere with my enjoyment of the game at all, period. And that's with the disc in the drive, if you install it to the hard drive it may be even less of an issue.
The main complaints I have about this game are as follows:
Exploration has been eliminated. I like the fact that I can go anywhere I want, whenever I want in an RPG. This game doesn't have that. The second you accept a quest, you are teleported to the dungeon / place where the quest takes place instantly. This is just weird, is it really that hard for me to walk there? A side effect of this is that you usually only have one quest active at once.
Travel is instantaneous. Again I like walking, or taking a boat or something. Opening a map and just clicking something and bam I'm there takes away from the nostalgia feel, makes me lose sense of how big and expansive the world is. You can still travel to any previously visited place at any time, even if for example a bunch of people join your party and yell "We must get to Elysion with haste, Rush let's go now!" You can still take your entire party and travel around to lots of previously visted places. In fact doing this you might find a few secrets :P But nevertheless, it also makes the game feel more linear that no matter how far away something is, you can get there instantly.
That's pretty much it. If you're an RPG fan, if you can accept this game for what it is, I think you'll find it to be of good quality.
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This game has a Mature Adult rating, and it's not because of the content, but because of the gameplay. The gameplay is too challenging and detailed for teens. I have played the game twice, creating every weapon, achieving Warlock, Lordly Commander classes on more than one character, all the arcana and weapon arts. The game requires deep thinking to analyze how to create effective unions (battle teams). People think the game is random, or just luck, but it is NOT. Every action is completely controllable, but you have to know what you are doing. Too many recent RPGs have been stuck on a formula where you have a single hero who fights aggressively, and with overleveling the game is overpowered. That is NOT the case here.
BR Battle Rank and Arts are separate. Battle Rank is NOT like traditional leveling. Fighting too easy monsters or too many mobs in a mistaken attempt to "level up" will leave your characters with a high battle rank, but without sufficient skills. Players need to focus on challenging monsters and avoid easy ones until late game when anything goes and you are no longer skill building. The game has job classes determined both by weapon type and also by the type of commands you choose. If you want a combat character, choose combat commands, and don't use the mystic arts for that character. In other words, you must plan what you are doing. Anybody who hopes to barrel their way through the story will not make it.
I have helped many gamers on gamefaqs with this game, and I suggest using the FAQs there and the forum for questions, as the strategy guide is horrible and lacks crucial information. I also highly recommend using the lastremnant wikia on the internet.
The best players I have seen with this game are ADULT players with 10-20 years of RPG game experience, aged 20 and older. This game was a Game of the Year for me in 2008 and I never tire of watching other players on ustream playing this game. I repeat, it's not for the kiddies. But if you are an adult RPG player who has also some experience with strategy RPGs, you will do great with this and love it. Impatient teens and other reviewers on this site who couldn't figure out the game clearly do not have what it takes to play this, a vast RPG experience, high intelligence, and a love for detailed strategy.
There is no way to play the same game twice with the sheer number of characters that you can hire for your teams. The bosses and download content are very difficult battles, but once you learn what you are doing, you will find this satisfying. I hope that my comments here will recommend the game to other adults looking for a game with adult characters, not just kiddie characters, and also to people with the patience to learn the system in the game. It is NOT random and takes time to analyze.
This game is meant for HDTVs and will be difficult to see on an older analog TV. You will be disappointed in the graphics and menus unless you have an HDTV which will make the game look so amazing you will have your breath taken away. There are massive dragons to fight that are incredible to watch, and many areas in the world to explore. Have fun fellow adults, this one is for us!
Best Deals for The Last Remnant -Xbox 360
Okay... first of all, I read reviews before purchasing this game. BUT, I'm a huge RPG buff, so the positive I had read/seen about it outweighed the negative.
I've only had the game for about a week and a half, but I've played it quite a bit. YES, it does have some technical issues. It graphically lags a bit when super fancy-schmancy effects are processed. So they used the Unreal engine and hadn't perfected said use... big deal. AS LONG AS YOU INSTALL IT ONTO YOUR HARD DRIVE, none of the load screens or technical issues really become that big of a deal.
All that aside, the voice acting is pretty freakin awesome if you ask me. The rest of it plays much like any of the more recent Final Fantasy series, but it feels a little different. Most notable are the combat system (A combination of old-school turn-based and a tactics-type system, with a hint of nutmeg), the item customization system (It's pretty ridiculous... in a good way), and the treasure digging system! Heck yes, it's almost like a little mini-game-type nugget that you pick up early on and take with you throughout areas that you explore.
The only problem I've had so far was that my party seemed SO INCREDIBLY WEAK early on (once you reach a point at which Rush ventures off on his own for a bit). It was taking me forever to fight anything or get through areas, and I had to take enemies on in as few numbers as possible. It was later that I realized how to put additional party members into a union. It's MUCH better after that, haha. But that's what I get for not reading the manual.
Honestly, so far, My only complaint (other than that, ideally, there shouldn't be any problems, really, with graphical lag) is that in the morale system, you get a severe detriment to morale if an enemy engages you before you can initiate combat yourself, BUT, there's ABSOLUTELY no way for you to gain any advantage on an enemy. It's either starting at 50/50, or 75-25 in the enemy's favor. Unless, of course, I just haven't gotten that far yet... But, even so, it should be accessible already. It's fairly difficult to sneak up on an enemy...
If ya like RPGs, and you especially like them with an extra dose of strategy, then go ahead and snag this one ^_^
Honest reviews on The Last Remnant -Xbox 360
Oy! I read the reviews and decided to buy this game. I put in 25 hours and got probably a quarter of the way through and got bored. The story seemed good and the graphics are great, but the battle system and growth system don't engage you. I like rpgs for growing my characters. This game takes that away from you. Growing Mr. Diggs, the side character, was more fun. Here are my problems, which made the game slow and boring:
1) Battles no control. Concept of unions is cool in order to get a bunch of characters into a fight. It gets old when you can only really select four general commands, which are random. Usually, you end up with the same commands over and over again, which makes it difficult to work up experience in other areas, such as healing, which rarely comes up
2) Experience you don't really gain experience, you gain HP separately, AP separately, strength separately, etc. After a while, you have no idea who is growing what.
3) Speed I loaded this game on my hard drive and the battle load time is still slow (about 10 seconds). Given that the battles are boring and you do about 50-100 per area, you really start to waste a lot of time for nothing new per battle.
That's my beef with the game. At the end of the day, you spend 95% of the time battling, as one review put it, and the battling/leveling up system isn't interesting. The game tries to engage you by having you hit buttons at the right time, which to me sounds like the developer's solution to making it more interesting after they realized that they'd spent a ton of money on a game that turned out to be boring in its main aspect.
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It's like Square and Microsoft brainstormed every possible way to ruin a strategy game and still have it be sorta fun.
Concept: 9/10
The Last Remnant is turn based strategy game set in a fantasy universe created by the masterminds who created Final Fantasy. You play as a young adult named Rush. Rush's sister has been kidnapped by villains that want to use her innate magical abilities to take over the world.
You can access areas through a World Map. There are towns where you buy weapons and equipment, or even craft your own. There are also dungeons and battlefields where you fight enemy Squads and Bosses.
You advance through the game by fighting turn-based Battles.
You hire Warriors, Mages, and Leaders and form them into several Squads.
The number of Units in a Squad = the number of attacks that Squad gets per round. (Each Unit attacks per turn.)
The Squad's HP is the combination of the Units' HP. As long as the HP is above 0, ALL of the Units in that Squad can keep attacking. If the Squad's HP = 0, all of the Units in the Squad die at the same time.
You can issue commands to the Squads during the battle, like "Charge", "Heal", "Attack with Magic"...
After the Battle, all of your Units are resurrected and improve based upon what they did during the battle.
In a Battle, you cannot retreat, and if you lose, you must return to your last Save.
Sounds Awesome... now here comes an avalanche of flaws that ruin the game.
Technical Art: 1/10
Square licensed an old version of Unreal before it had streaming. As a result, there are Load Screens everywhere! The game also is hindered by the most slowdown that I've seen since Aladdin fought Jafar on the SEGA Genesis. Textures and Bump-Maps constantly pop in and out whenever characters or scenes are rendered. It's incredibly distracting and makes your Xbox 360 feel like a PC with a 9 year old graphics card. However, you can avoid most of these bugs, by installing the game on your 360 Hard Drive and playing it from there.
Gameplay: 2/10
During Battles, when you give orders to your Squads, you only get a few options per turn. These options seem completely random. There are many times when a Squad is at Full Health and you get an option to Heal them. However, when a Squad is low on HP, sometimes the Heal Option doesn't show up, causing you to lose a battle. There are other times when you fight an enemy and you're thinking, "My Poison Gas Attack is perfect for this." But it doesn't show up in your Command List. Whoever thought of taking the Player's Options away in a Turn Based Battle Game was a good idea, is clearly insane. Too often, you are forced to make bad decisions because the options you want just aren't available when you need them most.
Even when you do get the commands that you want, sometimes the characters "REASSESS" and ignore your commands and do something different. If your Squad's Leader gets KO'ed with a spell, it's called a BOTCH and the AI takes control of that Squad.
It feels like the game is doing everything possible to take control away from you in a game where the fun is supposed to come from you commanding your army. As long as the AI is good, this usually isn't too much of a problem...
AI: 3/10
At times Allied Squads join you. You cannot give them commands and they act on their own. Sometimes, they attack enemies for 20 points of damage instead of healing one of your Squads, restoring 2000 HP! The AI is so bad, you'd swear that Leroy Jenkins hacked into your 360 through your live account and he's controlling the Allies.
BOSSES: 2/10
Because of the AI and Gameplay issues, the Bosses feel incredibly cheap. Also, all of their Health Bars show up as ???. You have no idea how many HP they have. When they are close to death, their Health Bar flashes red, but that's the only hint that you get. Bosses attack hard enough to take out an Entire Squad, or Charm them and make them fight on their side. If you have 3 Squads, and the Boss decides to Charm all 3, you lose! There are times when you don't get the commands that you need to win the battle at the times you need them, causing you to die.
QUESTS: 4/10
Most of the Quests are of the dungeon crawl variety. You gain access to a dungeon and fight to an objective with an AI companion. Most of them are ok, and some are horrible. One Quest in particular has you running through a barren desert for 12 minutes, touching posts. The only way to Identify them is to touch them and if you touch the wrong one in the wrong order, you have to start over. It's got all of the excitement of your Gym Coach making you run 3 miles in real time.
ART: 5/10
Slowdown aside, the art is very dull. The lighting is very dark throughout the game and colored lighting is pretty non-existent. Everything looks dull and drab, like you're watching the game through a dirty window. The Character Designs are interesting, but lack the Style found in the Final Fantasy series. Another issue arises when your army fights another humanoid army. The characters in the battle look nearly identical, so it is really difficult to tell who is who. When you see a guy swing an axe at an identical guy and a 1000 appears above the injured character, you don't know whether to cheer or panic.
WRITING: 3/10
If you're looking for an epic script, look elsewhere. The dialogue in this game is as epic as 2 third graders talking about their lunchables. The lines are delivered like the actors are in a breakfast cereal commercial where the first 5 ingredients are Sugar.
Rush's Battlecry, "YEAH, Everybody is getting HYPED!" He says stuff like, "Yo Dave, whassup?" "Yeah, No Prob. Whatever..."
Another annoyance is that the team reversed the Critial Hit Dialogue, so when your characters critical hit the enemy, they say what they would have said if they had gotten critically hit. If you do 5000 damage to an enemy, your character is likely to grumble, "Aww shucks."
BROMANCE: 0_o /10
Homophobes beware. The first major NPC that you speak to is an aging bartender at the Tavern. He calls you "Cutey" and hits on you. In all fairness, your character is feminine and he's wearing leather chaps as a fashion statement. Later on, Rush meets Dave, a flamboyant magistrate, and they get along better than any other two characters in the game. In one scene Dave gives Rush a flower and they gaze into each other's eyes. Normally, Rush replies with a nonchalant "whatever" to the other NPC's but if Dave says something, Rush says, "Aww, I can't say no to you." If the enemy surrounds you, they can attack with a "REAR ASSAULT" and Rush says, "They caught us with our pants down!" So, after a while, the game starts to feel like Brokeback Kingdom.
ECONOMY: 1/10
Rush is the only character that you can equip, and it seems like once you buy a decent sword, there's no reason to get another one until Disk 2. The game has a crafting system, where you can make things for Rush, but the parts are so rare, it's not even worth searching for them. Also, 90% of the items that you can create are the same as items that you can buy. Your NPC's equip themselves and manage their own gear. Sometimes, they'll ask you for something in the inventory and you have the right to refuse. But if you refuse, the NPC just becomes less effective.
The Game is Rated M for Blood, Language, Violence and Suggestive Themes (between males)
Overall, the game is at least 50 hours long full of Quests and Side Quests. At times, the game is fun and the cutscenes are pretty good. Your Characters do improve after almost every battle, so it does feel rewarding. It's a semi-decent way to kill time in small doses. But, the lack of control that you have over your army is incredibly frustrating and the homosexual undertones as well as the juvenile dialogue can get on your nerves.
If you're dying for a turn based strategy game for the 360, and don't mind playing it from your hard drive... and all of the stuff I just wrote about doesn't bother you... Buy this game.
Avoid this game if you hate Slowdown, Bromances, Bad Art, Load Screens, Dull Quests, Awful Dialogue, or if you actually want to control your soldiers in a strategy game.
Note: There is also a bug that prevents you from getting 200 Achievement Points when you finish the game.
If the flaws that I mentioned above are just too much, but you still want a strategy game, check out the Fire Emblem series for the Nintendo Systems, the Total War series for the PC, or King's Bounty for the PC.
