Record of Agarest War for Xbox 360 Reviews & Ratings by IGN

Record of Agarest War is being marketed as an erotic strategy RPG, but that is a little misleading. Sure, pretty much every woman you meet in the game brings enormous assets to your party, but what videogame doesn't have big boobs? What Agarest War does is introduce some subtle dating sim aspects to your typical Final Fantasy Tactics-style SRPG. During your quest you will develop relationships with these girls and, at the end of each chapter, "mate" with the one that likes you the most. Your offspring will go on to star in the next chapter (or generation) of the game, which is a pretty interesting storytelling trick. But the mating ritual is merely implied, so don't go into it expecting a peep show. Scandalous this is not, but Record of Agarest War is a fun, old-fashioned strategy game.



The story tells a pretty typical tale of an ancient evil reawakening and a band of heroes that must put it back to rest. It's split into five generations, with each chapter starring a new hero who is followed around by a new harem of potential mates. You begin playing as a soldier named Leonheart, and every hero you control thereafter is one of his descendents. What I really like about the progression is that you retain all of your items, experience, and abilities from the last generation. You'll even get to watch some of your party members grow up along the way. This is an enormous game that crawls along at a snail's pace. The rate at which features are introduced appears at first to be ridiculously slow – until you realize you're only one fifth of your way through the game and you have several more chapters in which to practice capturing monsters or forging weapons.



What's disappointing about this mating ritual (or "Soul Breed" system, as the game calls it) is that you don't get to select the girl you like the best. Along your journey you'll encounter cut scenes where you can chat with the ladies and in typical dating sim fashion your responses will lower or raise their affection for you. It can be difficult to tell how your response choices will affect them, so courting them is somewhat out of your hands -- only to find out that, at chapter's end, whichever girl has the most affection is the one you get. The strength of your bond affects the power of your offspring.



Battles play out on very traditional grid-based maps with each character patiently waiting for their turn to act. If you've played similar games like Final Fantasy Tactics, Disgaea, or Advance Wars, Agarest War will feel very familiar to you. It does have a couple unique features I like, but also makes a few mentionable mistakes. First, certain squares on the battlefield grid will align a character with a teammate. By strategically positioning units on these squares they can receive a boost of Ability Points (which must be spent in order to do anything on the battlefield) and join up with other characters for powerful team-up attacks. The system provides for some interesting tactical scenarios, because someone who is all by themselves on an isolated corner of a map can deliver the killing blow to a monster on the opposite corner if the hero is standing on one of those special squares.



I like the Ability Point system because it carries over to your next turn. So if you can't do anything with a character at the moment, when their turn comes around again they'll have extra points to work with. There is also a Break Attack system that unlocks unique, powerful abilities for each of your characters after enough time has passed in a battle. This keeps fights from dragging on too long, because many of your Break Attacks can decimate an enemy in one hit.



But there are a few strange design choices that keep Agarest War from sitting right beside its excellent peers I mentioned before. All of the maps are completely flat, so there aren't any terrain benefits or tactical advantages. The maps are also reused over and over, so you're always staring at the same scenery. Bizarrely, you can't rotate the camera except for during the "move" phase of a battle. For the most part I didn't have much trouble seeing everything that was going on (the maps are all flat, after all) but I still like to be able to get a good look at the battlefield.



The flow of the game sends you grinding through a series of battles in order to make it to the next story event. I found the skirmishes to be engaging enough to keep me going for my reward of conversation with well-endowed women.



The hand drawn anime art presented in cut scenes is very well done and I really like the character designs. In-game sprites are cute and super-deformed, but Agarest War isn't exactly taxing the Xbox 360. A nice touch I appreciate: when you equip new weapons you can see the changes in battles.



I should note that this is a very Japanese game I think will be best enjoyed by fans of the culture. The voice work is all in Japanese with English subtitles and there isn't even an option for an English-language voice track.

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