Category:

Let's Play

Duration: 48:44

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I play weird stuff... this game is definitely not my jam, and I can play pretty much any game available, but what I need people to understand is that this IS a pretty good game with quite a bit of history, almost a half dozen drama cds, and even some parallels to another significant series, even in spite of my hang-ups. I've had it amongst my imports for ages and have always struggled to get invested for a few reasons, but I'll get into that later.

Originally based on the theme of the anime (known as "Kenran Butousai: The Mars Daybreak, also seen as "Butou Sai"), the game adaptation was pioneered by Alfa System (known for Fighting Street, Linda Cube, Project: Horned Owl, Castle of Shikigami, Tales of the World, Phantasy Star Portable, etc.) who promoted the game as the spiritual successor and evolution of their previous PS1 hit, "Gunparade March", upgrading the game's unique "OVERS System" (Omnipotent Vicarious Enlist a Recruit Silent... from ver 0.89 to 1.00)...which is basically gibberish for "dynamic real-time drama simulation". It was also aided by Sony's internal division, Prokion (Legend of Legaia fame) and was taken over by Bandai Namco later into its development (known as BEC or Bandai Entertainment Company at the time) and published by SCEI.

Described as "every character acting based on "memory" "thought" and "intent" through sophisticated A.I. ", the game essentially gives you limited customization to craft a character and become a recurring character in a three year mission to help unify a terraformed version of Mars through constant character interactions, proper utilization of limited resources, round-the-clock vigilance of crucial empirical data between you and your alliances / enemies, and strategic underwater warfare akin to Battleship in a fever dream. The game takes place hundreds of years in the future where the planet of Mars can sustain life but is almost completely covered by water, so colonies live in underwater "city-boats".

Your character is the newest addition to the crew who is a talented RB Pilot, humanoid war machines known as "Round Bucklers" who help fight off intruders. Your base of operations is the legendary "ship of the dawn" with state of the art systems and a sophisticated artificial intelligence system known as "MAKI", who interacts with the crew along with A.I.-controlled "BALLS" (who share a collective consciousness with Maki, similarly to the synchronization of the Tachikoma in "Ghost in the Shell"). You spend 90% of your time training and building relations with crew members, but you can sometimes take advantage of huge "Martian Cities" (marine vessels) to dock with you where you can spend credits to buy goods.

While the game is mostly relaxed and fairly lenient, when trouble strikes, it strikes in a big way; all the characters have different chemistry with each other and different factors can reduce the ship's population due to riots, terrorism, external forces (weather) depression (cabin fever), etc. Battles can also have high stakes: do poorly and your ship can get damaged and characters can even die for good! Conversely, you can meet a few new characters by defeating enemies in non-lethal ways and add them to your crew along with their spoils. You can tell how characters are doing through expressions and icons, as well as announcements through MAKI. The graphics are pretty good with weird lighting and shading, but the sound is disappointing... most of the (few) tracks are fairly low quality and repetitive, and they're a far cry from Gunparade's far superior soundtrack, not to mention no VO. Still, those looking for a deep sim will come to appreciate the game even with its quirks.

On that note, constantly chasing down characters gets old quick (though the game does tell you where anybody might be at during any time) and being stopped constantly by somebody who wants to talk to you gets old even faster. While the system itself is more sophisticated than GPM with lots of data tracking, GPM was more accessible. The ship seems large at first, but you realize just how small it is along with its facilities after a short time period as you wait for characters to go through the elevator hall for the billionth time. I found myself falling asleep most of the time, but this is just me personally. The game did establish the building blocks for Gunparade's return in "Gunparade Orchestra" after all and it is lovingly crafted... it's just not for me. This is a video showing a general overview of what you'll be doing in the game. You can build different parameters by using computers, hitting punching bags, giving massages to characters you're close with, etc. (through a bar that fluctuates at different speeds... that's about the extent of mini-games). The opening song is in English. Enjoy.

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