Game:

Time and Eternity (2012)

Duration: 2:05:42

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Oooph... where do I begin with this game? "Time and Eternity" is one of the prettiest games I've ever had the misfortune of assessing with a critical lens. Developed by Imageepoch and published by Bandai Namco Games (and NIS America outside of Japan) between 2012-2013, it is, ironically, not the first RPG on the system to dabble with the "two souls, one body" concept... that would go to our other video, "Last Rebellion", which was also released by NIS America. You know what else they have in common? They are both critically panned, borderline infamous games and regularly fall in the "Worst RPGs on PS3" category that's not your low-budget Kemco title or indie effort. However, what's different between this and Last Rebellion is... a lot actually, the biggest of which is that its development team was considerably more skilled and it had a few long-time veterans working on some of the game's key elements.

The story is a simple one on the surface (and almost in its entirety): A wedding is taking place in the small kingdom of Kamza. Princess Toki is to be wed to a gallant knight, Zack, but a little detail was left out until just before the wedding... Toki spoke with a fortune teller months prior who predicted that someone would be killed at the wedding, but didn't pay it heed. Well guess what? A group of assassins disrupt the wedding day and Zack "sorta" loses his life protecting Toki at the alter... but Toki has other secrets she hasn't told Zack. For one, she has an alter-ego, Towa, who resides within her who is a combat specialist and two, they collectively have unique magical abilities passed down in their family to control various aspects of time! In a bid to save Zack's life and figure out who is plotting to kill them, they travel back in time multiple times to figure out who the culprit is... but Zack's soul goes along for the ride as well and resides in Toki's pet dragon, Drake. Antics ensue.

The game sounds interesting enough on the surface and given its theme, it didn't seem like the most likely candidate to get localized, so kudos to NISA for bringing it over, even if it doesn't live up to its full potential. The game is essentially a Action / JRPG hybrid that has notes of classic RPGs like "Dragon Quest" (yes, the very first one, or most one-on-one RPGs), "Thousand Arms" (VERY MINOR comical dating aspects), "Grandia II" (a closer interplay of two characters sharing the same body) "Black Rock Shooter" (another game made by the same developer with its Action-Combat and large emphasis on optional quests) and merges it all with almost every single ecchi harem anime trope ever conceived. Shōji Masuda of "Tengai Makyo" and "Linda Cube" fame wrote the story for T&E, the legendary Yuzo Koshiro and Takeshi Yanagawa worked on the music, Shinichi Suzuki worked as the programming director, Hiroyuki Kanemaru was the lead event planner and the main illustrations are by Vofan (Dai Yuanhong, who is best known for his work on the "Monogatari" series and "Boukyaku Tantei" series). This is just a small bit of a rather large cast which doesn't include the dub team (who are rather prolific), and the game's hand-drawn look allegedly took more than 3 years to put together.

The game, at face value, is devoid of any major bugs or oversights that would plague your typical "bad" game, but what exactly makes it so heinous that it would be a Japanese runner-up for "Worst Kusoge of 2012"? It essentially boils down to extremely limited locales (mainly types), extremely limited enemies (variety, fighting style and extremely frequent pallete swapping), a very cringey group of protagonists (Toki, Towa nor Zack are especially likeable, even if they get into some funny antics), extremely repetitive combat and quests (even in the context of games from decades prior), and lacking in general spirit or adventure (generous hand-holding and very linear with everything of value pointed out on the map from treasures to quests... while this was intended to ease frustrations, it could have an opposite effect for some). Other annoyances include the inability to switch between Toki or Towa without leveling or specific items (which is important... while they don't fight too differently, the have many nuances on the script which is somewhat interesting), the high price of many items (even though you'll find enough gear if you look), sluggish combat and the player MUST play the game twice to get the true ending (which I seldom do in far superior games, much less one like this).

The pros? Nothing reaches unplayable status, it's pretty overall and it has a great soundtrack. As someone who has played RPGs since near-antiquity, the game's very rigid, slow, clunky and basic approach isn't something new, but it's hard to recommend it to others when there are so many better games to play and this one's main hook is its visuals, which are still hit and miss. This video shows 2hrs of assorted footage to form a decision... exercise caution and decide.