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Post by Doan the Nado on Nov 23, 2005 9:57:13 GMT -5
Kuromei Chronicle, by smurf90 (updated 12/4/05)The second game in the Chronicle series opens with Skyal Kain hearing a voice just before going to bed, and then we find out that he is locked in a cell inside a hideout. Your first order of business: Escape. After that, discover Skyal's connection to a certain "shadowy figure" who has led the people of his hometown away. Visit his forum for all the details, including a walkthrough. Downloads: .xps .max
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Post by BloodKnight on Jan 5, 2006 21:19:44 GMT -5
I've played this for 4 hours and 7 minutes. I would've tried to play until completion, but an oversight in the game kept me from going any further, and I'm NOT starting over. Here's my feedback.
(scores are from 1-5, with 5 being best).
For my reviews here, I'll give a brief description of the points which are scored: -Artistry(how good the areas look) -Storytime(how good the storyline is and if it's bearable) -The meat(what you'll spend most of the game doing) -Extras(what's not in most games) -Nitpicks(what I didn't like and what could use improvement;the higher the score, the less nitpicks I have about the game)
Artistry(2.3) If you looking for a Paladin in terms of graphic usage here, well, you'll be dissapointed. Kuromei chronicle has some simple exterior and interior design. The world map looks very basic and other areas also look unusually uniform, making you think that maybe, just maybe our world was flat after all. After abour an hour or so, I still haven't seen any mounds, ridges or canyons. The towns do look decent though while being so small, I should take notes from this part of the game and I suggest others do too.
Why did I give this score? Because the areas are simple looking, even by RPG Maker standards.
Storytime(3.8) The story seems good enough at the start, but other than the dialogue you get at the beginning, there's not much else to hang onto until a good deal into the game. Good thing is, while it starts off slow, the game gradually provides more of the storyline at a moderate pace. There are a lot of events to go through, but I think the storyline needs more substance.
Why did I give this score? The story, while nothing to write home about, bares itself to the player well.
The meat(3.5) I would've changed that to a 4, but one of the nitpicks kept it down. As far as gameplay is concerned, you'll explore a fair bit and battle a lot. There are also an abundant amount of save points to record your progress and it's not too easy to get lost in the game. Everything you need to survive is provided for you when appropriate, and while the difficulty sneaks up on you sometime into the game after being so stress relieving, it's balanced for the most part. Puzzles so far, have been near non-existant, but the few that were there provided some worthy detours.
Why did I give this score? Simple and easy to progress through the game.
Extras(1) Not very many, if any. In fact, If I made the same game and put in an option to change the main character's name, that game would have more extras than this.
Why did I give this score? Not very much to distinguish it from other RPG Maker games.
Nitpicks(3) Let's start with the window color. Oh my goodness, whatever the author was on when they colored these, I want THREE TIMES what they used! The windows are a striped blurb of pink and purple. While I was able to read what was on them, the colors did not help, especially in some cases where the transparency would help blend the letters with the screen(this is my experience and I'm pretty bad in the vision department, so others may get varying experiences). However one may react to this, the windows probably won't win any awards for being easy on the eyes.
Next is the battle system. It's basically the DBS(Default Battle System), nearly untouched. Now, I wouldn't have minded this so much if the world map encounter ratio was a bit lower(as you'll get into an average of 2 battles before you reach most areas on the map). Compund that with the fact that running away from battles is almost impossible, and you have an exercise in tedium on the world map. Fighting battles is also pretty easy, 2 hours into the game and I haven't actually had to buy anything(you'll find a lot of items in chests and from enemies), and while leveling up isn't exactly quick, it'll make weak enemies significantly easier(like, death in 1-2 hits easier). I understand being forced to battle if say, upcoming game events were going to be at least slightly challenging, but the game for a while is very easy(be prepared to use the "auto" command...a lot). Why be forced to go through this?
Also, some attacks looked lackluster. While Paladin's attack effects were simple, I would've prefered those over the effects in this one. Someone answer me this... for an attack like "Freeze Blade", which effect would you expect - a chilling sword that chopped through the enemy, or a few simple swipe effects(while being told you created a freeze blade)? I personally would've been happy with just a blue sword, but some attacks in the game didn't look very believable.
Dungeon interiors have a fixed camera. This means, that you have to enter some areas a certain way to make sure you don't spend a great deal of time trying to find your way around because you can't rotate the camera. This is the only nitpick that annoyed me throughout the entire experience.
Why did I give this score? Many nitpicks. Most, if not all of them, could've been fixed.
Worth playing? Yes, to an extent. While there's a lot of game here, the value would've been significantly higher if the quality assurance was kept up. Overall, you should play this if you're looking for a game, but don't get your hopes up.
I bet some are curious as to why I couldn't progress through the game, well it was a simple mistake, but one that could've easily been prevented from a developer's standpoint.
It had to do with the first battle with Kuromei. After playing around in Killa(didn't know what to do after completing the graveyard, so I just gave up on that town), I went to Aiden. At this point, your party splits up and you're alone. I was confident I could take Kuromei, but it seems he had more HP than I could take within 5 turns(I was pretty close to defeating him) and I ended up losing a winning battle.
What happened after, was that your party members stayed gone, but you went the last place saved(via teleport point I assume). This is where things can go wrong and in my case, did. I was still on the continent where enemies could numb you(and do so often), and you know what that means when you have only one party member(for those that don't, instant game over). It was impossible to progress anywhere due to the encounter ratio. After about 6 tries(I was delusional thinking the world map would forgive me), my quest ended.
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