First Impressions: Record of Agarest War X Rated?

The Record of Agarest War is a tactical RPG made by Aksys Games for the Xbox 360. I have spent three hours in this game so far and I think I will really enjoy the rest of it. That is, if I ever pick it up again as it doesn’t have a draw to keep me engaged.

The graphics are very simple with all animations done as sprites, no cut scenes, and the best art being anime style, 2D portraits that players collect as the story progresses. This is in no way detracting from the game, but compared to other games it is certainly lacking something. The game play is phenomenal and the difficulty level is steadily increasing. So far, the terrain is a simple, even, square grid. Combination attacks can be created by using certain moves as well as with multiple characters which allows for plenty of strategy with moving characters, getting them to attack sooner, and combine damage to kill enemies.

Unfortunately, the map and travel system is rather outdated with the main character’s sprite moving from point to point along a set line and the word “event” over the dots if something related to the main story occurs there. It is really a shame because the expansive world is reduced to a boring looking map and occasional bland backgrounds during “cut scenes.” It is a stretch to call the scenes where the characters interact cut scenes because they’re really just portrait images and dialog boxes while the sprites move around and occasionally do different animations like pull a sword or fall on their ass.

In the end, it feels like the game was intended as a handheld game, but ended up being too large to fit on that media. It also feels that the game was not originally meant to be ported to America. I am certainly not one to complain about ANY Japanese to America ports, but the voice-acting being completely Japanese will be off-putting for some players.

This is definitely a careful buy. If you like tactical RPGs, alla Disgaea, you will enjoy this game provided you can stand the foreign voice acting. I am looking forward to collecting the portraits of the characters as they were really well drawn and learning how to work the tactics to my advantage. But these are just game mechanics. The actual story is a giant cliche and simply not engaging, not to mention boring. Hopefully, the game play continues to entertain as there isn’t anything else making me want to pick up the Record of Agarest War again.

Except maybe the tits. So after hunting for some pictures of this game, I discovered it’s apparently caused a mild scandal. The collectors edition had a mouse pad where you could rest your wrist on one of the female characters tits. Yes, on her cleavage. It also had a different cover of two girls in towels and a print where you could see up her dress. Other screen shots of those 2D portraits had lots of cleavage and suggestive themes.

Pardon me, I’m going to go finish this game now.