Welcome back, doods! …Wait; I’m thinking of the wrong liveblog. Any suggestions on how I should refer to the readers of this liveblog? I could go with ‘Zeroes’, but that sounds more like an insult. Maybe I should use the word ‘recorders’, but it sounds like that instrument I played back in elementary…what’s that? I should stop rambling and get on with the playthrough? Okay then!
The opening scrolls past almost too quickly to read, and definitely too quickly to jot down for your viewing pleasure. The gist of it is that the world of Agarest has twelve gods, six representing ‘light’ and six representing ‘dark’, though my experience with games like the Shin Megami Tensei series means that those words aren’t synonymous with ‘good’ and ‘evil’. Getting back to the setting, in order to avoid wiping out everything in some cataclysmic event, the gods decided to have mortals fight their battles for them. And, as one might be able to guess, we play as a force fighting for Light at a time when the Dark forces are stronger than ever…
Cut to some rustic village in the middle of panicking due to invasion from the Dark forces. Thankfully, the armies of Light, including our first three important characters, are here to help evacuate the citizens and fight back against the enemy. Our heroes start to talk about the current situation, and I must say, it’s a tad weird. Akin to other games made by companies like Idea Factory, when dialogue occurs, you usually have an appropriate character portrait behind a corresponding text box. However, the portraits in this game…well, they blink, and they move their lips when talking. Also, their bodies move a little, making it look like they’re breathing. And while unfamiliar, I could get used to this, except for the fact that the portraits are rather…emotionless. Oh, and did I mention that the audio is Japanese only?
Putting that aside for now, let’s actually meet these characters. The brown-haired swordsman, the main protagonist of the first generation, is the rather serious commander Sieghart. His two allies are Friedlinde AKA Linda, a spear-wielding chick that seems anxious about their current situation, and Eugene, a swordsman that tries and fails to lighten the mood with a few humorous quips. Suddenly, some Dark forces breach the defences put up, and it’s time to start our first tutorial!
Our first battle, against two little purple things called ‘gremlins’ and a big green one called an ‘ogre’, teaches us the basics of moving and fighting. While going through this tutorial, I realize it’s quite similar to combat in Blazing Souls: Accelate, another game I really should finish by the end of the year. There are two parts to battle: a Movement phase, where you spend Action Points to move your character at a rate of one point per tile (did I mention this was an SRPG?), and a Combat phase, where you pick an enemy and spend your remaining points on skills to hit ‘em with. Other important things to note are that you deal more damage if you’re facing the enemy’s back, and if you would rather stock up your AP instead of attacking an enemy, you can just pick the ‘Standby’ command, though every character has a limit to how many AP they can have at a time.
The next battle begins with Sieghart suddenly in critical condition for no explained reason (I swear, I passed that first tutorial with flying colours!), and Eugene has a bit less health than before. This battle, against two ogres, teaches us how to use Support skills like Heal in addition to how to use items. By chance, I also accidentally teach myself what the manual calls ‘Arts’. You see, each of these characters has at least two skills; everyone has a couple of General-type skills, but Eugene can use wind, the other two characters can use Power-type, and Linda knows Heal for the purpose of the tutorial. And like Blazing Souls, selecting certain skills in the proper order creates a new attack; in this case, the General skill ‘Double Edge’ and the Power skill ‘Power Attack’ lead to the Art ‘Broken Hit’.
Once that tutorial’s done, it seems that the Dark forces have stopped invading, but Sieghart decides to check the surrounding area in case any villagers had a run-in with the enemy. And lo and behold, in the woods nearby, he finds a white-haired girl being cornered by what he calls a ‘larva’. This guy’s named Varacade, and he looks like a combination of Iori Yagami from King of Fighters and a Darkspawn from Dragon Age. Sieghart tells the girl to run away while he distracts the larva, but considering what Varacade tells her before the ensuing battle, it seems more likely that they’re in cahoots. Also, Sieghart thinks to himself that he’d be lucky to walk away without some injuries, making one think that a Hopeless Boss Fight’s coming up.
In the actual battle, I get to witness my first Overkill. Unfortunately, as predicted, it’s Sieghart whose face is getting slammed into the floor. It appears that Sieghart’s just died, and Varacade gloats a little, but is taken by surprise when the white-haired girl starts yelling in pain and radiating light. After a bright flash that lasts quite a few seconds, we’re given our first save prompt. And to me, this seems like a good spot to end this update.
Next time: The creation of Sieghart 2.0!
