Infinite Undiscovery is a Japanese RPG released by Square Enix as an attempt at making a new franchise on the X-Box 360 with an action oriented combat system, deep party and item creation systems, and an epic story with grand scale. Infinite Undiscovery has a lot to live up to. Given the history of Square Enix with RPGs, I went into this game expecting a lot.
Story
The story in Infinite Undiscovery is slightly less convoluted than its name. You play as Capell, a young flautist locked up, mistaken as being the leader of a revolutionary band of freedom fighters attempting to cut the chains around the world that imprison the moon. You see, the corrupt Order of Chains ensnared the moon in massive chains to suck it dry of its magical power. Wherever a chain is attached to the planet, monsters and terrible beasts spring up, causing a lot of problems for the citizens of the world.
Rescued from your prison by Aya, a young revolutionary, Capell ends up joining the freedom fighters, meeting up with his look-alike, and leader of the bunch, Sigmund. The band sets off, cutting chains and rescuing the citizens, trying to save the world. All the while fighting the evil Order of the Chains.
Infinite Undiscovery's story is mostly character driven, which is something I am generally a fan of. However, in this case, it's a real problem. The characters are boring and shallow. There isn't an interesting one in the bunch. And there are a bunch. Infinite Undiscovery has 18 party members, a staggering amount for an RPG of its type. It's very hard to keep track of them all, and their one sided personalities made me very uninterested in their back stories. For example, you have Eugene, the smart guy, Edward, the hot-headed swordsman, and Balbagan, the stubborn axe wielding meathead. The stereotypes go on. Oddly, one of the redeeming factors in the characters is the twin children Rico and Rucha. Infinite Undiscovery is the first RPG I've played with child characters that are not only interesting and entertaining, but not completely obnoxious. The game makes attempts at providing emotional motivation for the characters' quest, but in the end, they just weren't interesting enough for me to care.
Capell himself is a boring, cowardly Joe Everyman. He has very little depth, and its something very obvious that the story isn't his story. Infinite Undiscovery is about Sigmund and his quest to cut the chains, and Capell gets swept up in it all. Attempts are made throughout the story at making Capell more interesting, and he eventually does change, but it comes off being boring and cliche rather than compelling storytelling I've come to expect from RPGs.
In the end, Infinite Undiscovery's story tries very hard to be fresh, but relies too heavily on old cliches. There are far too many characters, each of which plays a particular stereotyped, one sided role. There are twists and turns in the story here and there, but if I told you I didn't see those coming hours away, I'd be lying. While it had some interesting moments, and a love story that, while seeming forced, was fleshed out enough to keep my interest. But these things were not nearly enough to redeem its faults.
Story: 5/10
Surprisingly not annoying
Gameplay
Gameplay
Being an RPG, the most important gameplay element in Infinite Undiscovery is its combat system. Infinite Undiscovery uses a real-time, action based combat system. You control Capell and the AI takes over for the other characters in your party of four. You can set various behaviors like "Combo" or "Save MP" to give yourself a degree of control, but for the most part the AI just does whatever the hell it wants.
When controlling Capell, you have a regular attack and a strong attack, and you can combine them into combos or special attacks. Unfortunately, this doesn't work like other Action RPGs (Kingdom Hearts is a perfect example), and comes off being slow and repetitive. I spent 90% of my time in battles hitting A, A, A, B over and over and over. There is not a way to close the gap between Capell and the enemy either, so if you are just out of reach or are aimed slightly off, don't expect to land any hits, which can become annoying fast.
The other 10% of combat was spent healing. Healing during combat is the single most annoying factor of Infinite Undiscovery. A staple of RPG combat, you have absolutely no control over healing. Capell himself can't use magic, so you have to stack your party with characters with healing spells. The AI very seldom heals, opting for you to hit the Y button to have Capell call out "Can you heal them?" Sometimes the AI will heal them, sometimes they won't. And don't even think about using healing items during combat, because using the menu is asking for a game over screen.
The menu in Infinite Undiscovery is absolutely terrible. Its biggest fault is that it doesn't pause the game. No matter where you are, open the menu and your party pops a squat where they stand while you navigate the menu. Meanwhile, you can see monsters wandering about. Your only hope is finding what you need quickly before you get attacked. There are TONS of options, so it's hard to figure out where to go for what you want quickly. Opening the menu during combat has the same effect, although the AI keeps fighting. You, however, can't control Capell at all. I can't count how many times I've gone to get a healing potion from the menu and ended up needing two because of the amount of hits I'd taken in the time it took me to find the potion. And if all three of your party members die, you might as well throw the controller out the window, cause there is no way you are getting to the "Miraculous Medicine" in time to bring one of them back to life before you die yourself.
Combat in action
Outside of combat, Infinite Undiscovery is standard affair for RPGs. Run around town talking to everybody, rummaging through strangers house's for treasure, and exploring environments filled with enemies between cities. There is a deep item creation system, but it's so deep its overwhelming. All 18 characters can make different items, and they randomly learn to make different things as they go. The character also has to be in your party in order to use their creation options, so it becomes a pain switching characters in and out. You can also "link" with party members in towns, meaning they follow you around and talk to characters for you. This adds a lot of different dialogue and sometimes a side quest or two (only resulting in backstory for the characters), but linking becomes a pain in the ass because you have to find the character in the city, link up with them, and then go talk to everyone you already talked to alone to make sure you get every option. Repeat 17 more times, and you can imagine how fun that is.
There is also a part later on in the game where "Lunar Rain" comes down on your party in certain areas of the environment. The longer you are in this rain, the more powerful your characters become. However, after too long, they turn into monsters and become aggressive to your party. The only way to combat this change is an item that is rare to find in stores, and when used, barely removes the effects of the rain. Your only hope is to rush through the rain avoiding fighting enemies until you get to a point where there is no rain, before your party goes mad and kills each other, and you. It's incredibly obnoxious.
All in all, the gameplay of Infinite Undiscovery is terrible. It's just not fun to play. I kept at it because I wanted to see where the story was going, suffering through the fight system. But in the end, I succumbed to the inability to heal, and got fed up. This kind of fight system in an action RPG is totally inexcusable in a post Kingdom Hearts world.
Gameplay: 4/10
Presentation
The graphics in Infinite Undiscovery aren't too bad by today's standards. The characters are fairly detailed, and the animation is believable. The environments, while diverse, tend to be a bit bland. A cool detail is you can see the chains on the horizon, and the moon later in the game.
The art style is also very bland. All the characters have the look of 'generic RPG hero' with nothing that really sets them apart from any other RPG. There was never anything that wowed me or had me thinking that I was playing a unique and fresh RPG.
The sound effects were pretty generic as well. Your typical battle cries and monster noises, RPG beeps and bells, and magic effects were all present. The voice acting was all over the place. Capell and Aya, the two main characters were, at times, very good, other times laughably bad. Most other characters were phoned in, with static, unemotive performances.
Presentation: 6/10
There are TONS of characters
Summary
Infinite Undiscovery's complicated name lives up to itself. A character driven story with uninteresting characters, an absolutely terrible fight system, and run of the mill presentation don't make Infinite Undiscovery stand out in any crowds. The story was so bland that I couldn't suffer through the gameplay to see how it concluded. And I didn't care. I've come to expect an emotional experience from RPGs over the years, and Infinite Undiscovery just didn't deliver.
Final Score: 5/10
(Average of Story, Gameplay, and Presentation)
I will not be buying this game now, haha. Thanks Matt! You just saved me a bunch of time and money :)
ReplyDeleteThats what im here for! You can borrow it from me if you'd like.
ReplyDelete