Gaming Trend

Gaming Trend Review

by Keith Schleicher

The original Disgaea has developed a bit of a hardcore following.  The original game had a limited run and about the only place you could find it was Gamestop or EB Games because of how much of a niche title it was.  After word spread of how good it was and prices of used copies went up, eventually a reprint or two occurred and sold out quickly.  Because of this, Disgaea 2 had a much larger run and had wider distribution.  Now the PSP is quickly becoming a home for portable SRPGs, so it makes perfect sense that Disgaea would transition over to the PSP.

Disgaea: Afternoon of Darkness (AoD) for the PSP follows Prince Laharl who is awakened by Etna.  Prince Laharl’s father, the Overlord of the Netherworld, died two years ago when Prince Laharl is woken up by Etna.  He must be a really heavy sleeper as she tried some heavy firepower to wake him up.  When he finds out the news, Prince Laharl is determined to overtake the fighting in the Netherworld and take his rightful place as Overlord.  No time to mourn the passing of your father when there is evil to be done.

The Disgaea series has never been known to be impressive graphically, and AoD is no exception.  Graphically AoD looks a lot like a late PSone game.  Because of the size of the screen, some of the characters actually look better.  The character sprites are detailed enough that you can tell the differences between characters on the screen.  There isn’t any way to change their look so that you can tell characters of the same class apart.

The terrain looks like something you’d find in many other SRPGs.  You can tell the type of terrain just by looking at it, and there are visual clues as to effects of terrain to the characters on the screen.

The characters that show up on screen are hand drawn and definitely have an anime look to them.  They have enough detail to give them emotion, but not so much that they look realistic.  It gives the game a lot of style and adds to the emotion of the voices.  Pictures like these are used when a team attack occurs before the attack happens, giving it even more of an anime feel.

The voice acting of the characters is top notch.  Prince Laharl sounds very immature and the over-the-top voice acting works well.  Even his cohorts have the right amount of whimsy and scheming behind them that gives the characters the right blend of personality.  A lot of this personality is lost during the battles though.  You’ll hear them scream after a hit, but there isn’t much talking on the battlefield.

The music has a sinister tone, but has a sense of whimsy behind it, just like the voice acting.  You can tell that these characters are evil, but there is a light-hearted feeling behind it.  It’s an entertaining mix that sets the tone for the game without being overpowering.

There isn’t much to the controls.  You move using the D-pad or analog nub, select actions using X, cancel actions using Circle, and rotate the battle field using the L and R fields.  The only difficulty I had with the controls was that sometimes your view would be obstructed from all sides, even after rotating the camera.  This made it difficult to move to the area that you wanted to go to sometimes.  It also can cause you to be ambushed even after rotating the camera 360 degrees.  Also, by hitting Circle you would go back to the beginning of the character’s action, even though you might want to cancel one command.  This means you have to input the commands again which can take some time.

The menu system is laid out well.  Options that are available to you are highlighted and are selectable.  The options you have beyond the first menu selection are laid out logically so you can get to the action you want to quickly.

The Disgaea series has been about strategy while increasing the experience of your characters on the battlefield.  Instead of going into battle lined up in a row, you need to move your characters around the battlefield to engage them.  Position, range, and strength are all important in determining where you move your characters.

Before you go out to the battlefield you need to gather your army that you’ll control into battle.  Etna is with your party from the start and she’ll bring a couple of characters to fight along side, but you are going to need more than that in your battle.  You’ll create your army at the Dark Assembly.

At the Dark Assembly when you create a disciple, you need to have enough Mana.  The cost of a disciple is dependent on the class of the disciple and what level the disciple is.  As you continue through the game, more classes are available to you and higher level disciples can be created.  There are over 100 classes that you can access.  This means that there is plenty of variety for you to choose from and new abilities that will be added throughout the entire game.  Not only that, but once you max out a character you can recreate that character with all skills and abilities intact but with a new class.

The Dark Assembly is used for more than just creating disciples though.  You can petition the Dark Assembly to pass bills which will turn the tide in your favor in the next battle.  These could range from improving movement, improve your counterattack, or gain triple the experience on the next enemy killed.  You still need to have the favor of the Assembly to get these passed.  If it doesn’t pass, you can try to pass it by force by fighting against the members of the Assembly that didn’t vote for the measure, but be careful because they are not easy to fight against.  To gain ranks, more powerful senators on your side, and the ability to pass more bills, you need to pass a promotion exam.  All characters are available for promotion since they can petition the Dark Assembly for disciples.  This makes promoting all of your characters important.  Be careful that you don’t bite more than you can chew though, as the game ends if you fail a promotion exam.

If you are going into battle, your characters need weapons to fight.  There just happens to be an item shop in the town.  The items that you’ll find at first are generally low grade, but you can petition the Dark Assembly for more expensive items in the item shop, which will mean that more powerful weapons will show up there.  As you use weapons in battle, you will gain mastery for each weapon type.  Special skills for that weapon type will become available to that character.  Weapons can also be leveled up in the Item World.  Here you need to defeat residents of the unequipped item that you want to level up.  Each level that you defeat gains an extra level to the weapon.

Of course you need to have a good hospital for your troops, and one is provided at the Netherworld Hospital.  There you can restore your allies Hit Points and Spell Points.  The more points you need to restore, the more money you need to pay the hospital.  There is an advantage to going to the hospital though, as you can get prizes based on the amount of points that get healed.  The more you get healed, the better prizes you get.

As you can see, there is a lot to do even before you enter battle.  It’s important to make sure that you have enough disciples and the right equipment to go into battle, as AoD throws you into the combat quickly.  You’ll find yourself with a challenge right from the beginning.  There are some useful tutorials to help you out at the beginning though to help you with all the subtleties of combat.

While all the options available in AoD are great, it won’t matter if you don’t have a great combat system.  Fortunately AoD has an intriguing system that won’t feel like it came ripped from another strategy RPG and painted with a coat of Disgaea characters.  Positioning is a huge part of AoD, and moving into certain areas that are affected by Geo Symbols.  These areas affected by the Geo Symbols are called Geo Panels.  These areas are indicated by the color of the ground on that area.  You can counter the affect by lifting up the Geo Symbol and throwing it to a different area.  There are even multiple Geo Panel colors on the field, so it might be beneficial to throw the Geo Symbol from one colored area to another.  If you don’t want to deal with the Geo Symbols, you can attack them and destroy them.

The lift mechanic is be used for more than just lifting the Geo Symbols.  You can lift allies over your head and throw them as well.  If you only lift them, the character at the bottom will protect the characters above from damage.  Throwing can send allies to an area they normally wouldn’t be able to reach on one turn.  You can also send allies directly at enemies on the screen.  This can be useful when the allies you have explode on contact.

The group attacks are where the real fun begins.  By lining up your allies to hit one enemy it opens up a whole new range of possibilities.  With combo attacks it is possible to have one character attack multiple enemies on the same turn.  Part of the reason for this is the fact that all attacks are executed at the end of the turn instead of at the end of movement for the character.  This really makes strategy of attacking important, because you don’t want to waste a turn attacking a character that will be dead after one attack.

While all of this might seem to be overwhelming, AoD lets you go as deep into the system as you like.  If you just want to scratch the surface of the Item World and focus on the Dark Assembly, you can.  If you want to try to buy better items, you can.  There are plenty of classes to try out as well.

There is a lot of strategy behind the title, but casual SRPG players might want to think twice before picking up AoD.  The difficulty is on the high side, and the learning curve is up there because AoD throws you right into battle right away without much aide.  A tutorial system is available when first starting the game, but you will find yourself in over your head quite often even at the beginning.

If you aren’t used to this kind of game, then the pace might be a little slow.  Taking turns can take a while, especially with a large number of characters on both sides.  If you aren’t the patient type and want to get each turn quickly, then this SRPG might not be for you.

AoD is essentially a port of the original Disgaea: Hour of Darkness for the PS2.  That means that a lot of the story has been rehashed from the original game.  Owners of the original game will probably want to take a look at it for a trip down memory lane.  It’s a great game to play as a portable.  You might even run into some characters from some other SRPG titles.  With the large number of classes for disciples as well as the Item World and the special abilities, you can replay Disgaea any way you’d like.

Once you are finished with the game, the story elements won’t change.  However, there is a short campaign that changes the story.  What would happen if Etna ended up killing Laharl and took up the crown as Overlord of the Netherworld?  That’s what you find out in the Etna Chronicles.  It’s a nice little edition to the game that is only available on the PSP.

There are some multiplayer capabilities, but they are only available in ad hoc mode only and not infrastructure.  This is disappointing as a game like this would be great for playing over the internet because you wouldn’t need to worry about split second timing.  Even then, the multiplayer games are a bit underwhelming and aren’t as much fun as the main game.

Being able to play Disgaea on the PSP is a great way to play it.  Since it is turn based you can pick up where you left off at any time, and the battles do seem to be broken up into small chunks.  Still, sometime the battles can be long and drawn out.  Still, other than possibly the original Final Fantasy Tactics, Disgaea is the definitive SRPG.  If you haven’t experienced Disgaea: Hour of Darkness, Disgaea: Afternoon of Darkness is an excellent way to play it.  The humor, story, and gameplay are all top notch.

Gaming Trend Score

88

1. Graphics: 85
2. Audio: 90
3. Controls: 84
4. Gameplay: 91
5. Value/Replay: 88
6. OVERALL:88