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Yggdra Union: We'll Never Fight Alone (PSP & GBA)
Topic Started: Aug 24 2010, 12:49 AM (1,066 Views)
Mr. Fievel
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Shaken, not stirred.
I've already done a review for the game's predecessor, Riviera: The Promised Land, but this game is quite the strange one. While it is an RPG, it isn't really a conventional one, as there is no real HP stat, or MP, and while there are stats for strength, magic, and luck and the like, it still doesn't feel truly like an RPG. This is by no means a bad thing, as pretty much no game in the series (that currently consists of Riviera: The Promised Land, Yggdra Union: We'll Never Fight Alone, and Knights In The Nightmare) has similar gameplay mechanics, leading each title in the series to feel like completely different games that have absolutely no relation to each other whatsoever. Anyway, time to start the review.

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Gameplay:
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The gameplay is particularly nonstandard for an RPG. There are two basic types of gameplay in this game that constantly keeps you on your toes and in the action. The first, is an overworld of sorts, where you navigate the various maps you go through while defeating any opponent who challenges you or is otherwise in your way. The strange thing, however, is that your party is divided up into teams, where the main characters will command a unit of soldiers who use the same basic weapon as the leader, but are unable to use special skills. Going back to the overworld for a second, or rather, the map, as I will refer to it from now on; every mission in the game either requires you to move from point A to point B, sometimes without encountering any enemies, or protect another character's team from being slaughtered, to survive a certain amount of time, or to defeat a specific enemy or all enemies. In that way, it reminds me of Final Fantasy Tactics (and the strategic skill required at some parts also reminds me of the precise planning I sometimes had to do when playing FFT), the game also has an isometric grid system used to navigate the world and has specific guidelines used for entering battle, which I will now explain.

Before your turn, you must select a card to use. This card does four things: one, it gives you a specific number of moves before you can no longer move your characters, two, it enables you to utilize the special technique specific to that card, which can have a wide variety of effects, three, it determines who can use that ability, and four, it determines the power of your attack. When moving to fight or avoid certain enemies, you must keep in mind the character's gender. Females can attack anyone in a + that has a range of two squares, and males can attack in an x formation with a range of two squares as well, and the same applies to your opponents. In addition, there is the ability to link characters to fight the same foe in succession. For example, if Yggdra (lead female character) is standing next to a female opponent and Milanor (lead male character) is standing right behind her, they will both attack that opponent, though not simultaneously, as it's a one team vs one team sort of situation. Also, if another allied character, let's say Durant (another male character), was standing diagonally from Milanor, Durant would also be involved in the confrontation, though the second extension brought on by Milanor only has a range of one, and only allies who were linked by Yggdra would be able to link other characters. When planning your strategies, you must also keep in mind that the enemies can do the same, so it's best to ensure that few enemy opponents can be linked by whoever you decided to attack.

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Take this screen, for instance. Elena is attacking an S Rider, who is linked to a Valkyrie. In this case, Elena would have to face both opponents in succession, and with every enemy she has to face, the number of units she takes into each successive battle decreases by one. If she had Milanor or Yggdra nearby, however, Milanor would face the Valkyries with a full team while Elena fought the S Riders with a full team. It may take a while to understand, but the game introduces these things at a reasonable pace so you can gradually become acquainted with this mechanic.

Now to explain the battle system. Actual combat is frequently determined based on a simple rock-paper-scissors mechanic in teams of seven regular units and a leader unit, where characters who use swords will be beaten by spear users, who will be beaten by axe wielders, who will be beaten by swordsmen/women. In addition, those three types (from hereon referred to as the triad) will be beaten by magicians, who will be beaten by archers, who will be beaten by the triad. There are also other types of units who are weak against nothing, or strong against all, but those are encountered much later in the game. In addition to the SPS battle system, you also have to remember the power that was displayed on the card. When you defeat your opponent, they don't immediately die, they just lose some of their morale. To completely defeat an opponent, you must completely drain their morale, and the power on the card determines how much morale either you or your opponent loses for being defeated. Also only certain units can use certain abilities, like, if it has an axe on it, only Milanor and other axe-users can make use of the special technique, though everyone else can still make use of the card. In order to use the ability, you must first build up a meter during combat (the abilities can only be used in combat). The meter can either be built up, brought down, or remain stationary depending on what you do in battle.

Aggressive mode brings down the meter quickly, but in exchange powers up your team so long as you are in aggressive mode. Passive mode weakens your characters, but your meter build up quicker, and standard mode keeps meter growth and ally power balanced.

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There are many other factors to take into account in battle, but explaining all of them would take quite a bit of time.
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Story:
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The events in this game are indirectly responsible for the event in its sequel, Riviera, though other than that, they have no relation. The main plot of this game concerns a princess (Yggdra) who has run away from home in order to escape the clutches of an evil overlord who is quickly gaining control over more and more territory and killed her father. She manages to escape into some mountainous region and hides in a nearby house that is set on fire by her pursuers. A thief (Milanor) arrives in time to see his home being burned, and proceeds to defeat the soldiers in the area, with Yggdra escaping from the burning home and enlists Milanor, in exchange fir a castle of his own to replace his recently destroyed home, in her quest to reclaim her throne and save the world from Gulcasa's evil schemes. There's much much more to it than that, but I don't really want to spoil anything.

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Music/Sound:
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The music in this game is without a doubt (in my mind anyway) even more phenomenal than the one from the first game. The music still retains the variety from the first one, with it going from electronic to orchestrated to rock-based, but it manages to sound even more appropriate for the game. The music seems to have some of the same influences as the first one, musically speaking, but it manages to distance itself further and sounds very original and energetic at nearly all times. Considering the constant tragic feel of the story, the game still manages to pull off having lighthearted music almost immediately after having serious or tragic music plays, and it still sounds perfectly natural, though incidences like that don't really occur frequently. Anyway, this game definitely has the best game in the series, though I'm not sure if I'd feel the same way about the GBA version, though I suppose I'll find out when I LP it anyway.

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Graphics/Art:
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For a large portion of the game, most of what you'll see for the characters will be those sprites from the first screen shot that remind me of more detailed versions of Pokemon human character sprites. The backgrounds of the maps are done beautifully however, and appear to be fairly realistic. In battle, significantly more detailed sprites appear and have a wide range of movement, and the backgrounds are again well done, as are the special effects that occur whenever using a special technique. The artist who did the character art has become one of my absolute favorites (as I mentioned in my Riviera review) and I find the art style rather cutesy (somewhat unfittingly, considering the plot).

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Overall/Lifetime:
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The game, while more difficult than its predecessor, still provides a reasonable challenge that puts your strategic thinking skills to the test, especially later in the game, and with multiple endings to the game (one of which makes the events in Riviera impossible), several characters that can be unlocked on a second playthrough, additional difficulty levels, and multiple paths to take, the game has a good amount of replayability. I never once got bored with the game while I played it, though I did get a tad frustrated when the difficulty ramped up, but overall, I'd say that this game is a superb game, and definitely deserves to be played if you own either a GBA or a PSP.

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Gameplay: 4/5
Story/Plot: 5/5
Music/Sound: 5/5
Graphics/Art: 4/5
Overall: 5/5
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