Disgaea 3 Absence of Justice

by NIS America

Product Features

• Story and endings evolve as you play the game
• Geo Blocks introduce a real 3D battle system to a SRPG
• Over 270 customizable characters
• Class world adds 40 battle stages per character or 10800 stages
• Only SRPG with infinite number of randomly generated battle maps

Product Details

• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B001C4C4KW
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 5.2 x 0.8 inches ; 5 ounces
• Media: Video Game
• Release Date: August 26, 2008
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (54 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,023 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)
  • #23 in Video Games > PlayStation 3 > Role-Playing
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Amazon.com

The third American release in the Disgaea series by Japanese game developer and publisher Nippon Ishi, Disgaea 3: Absence of Justice marks the arrival of this acclaimed and beloved strategic RPG franchise into the Next-Gen gaming era. A PlayStation 3 exclusive, Absence of Justice features high-definition graphics, including beautiful high-res 2-D sprite character art and stunning spell effects. And although it is the third in a series of games, its story and gameplay stand on their own, allowing players both new to and experienced with the humor, zany characters, thrilling action, and unmatched excitement of the Disgaea universe to jump right into the battle.

Disgaea goes Next-Gen on PS3

Search for clues and advice in conversations. View larger.

Enjoy 3-D play across geo blocks. View larger.

Level up weapons and gear with 'item world'. View larger.

'Magichange' makes weapons of characters. View larger.

Inflict damage with the 'Stack Attack'. View larger.

The Story of Mao, a Demon Gone Bad
Set in and around the ‘Nether Institute, Evil Academy,’ the demon version of the preppiest of prep schools, Disgaea 3: Absence of Justice follows the puzzling decision of Mao, son of the Overlord of the Netherworld, who after reading a manga comic book decides to forsake his proper demonic upbringing, become a hero and attempt to overthrow his father. But in the backwards world of demon scholastics where good is bad and bad is good, Mao is a top honor student. He knows all about ditching school, being totally unhelpful and quickly resorting to violence, but nothing of the selfless nobility and patience of heroes. Heroes are for delinquents, as the number one delinquent of the Nether Institute, Raspberyl and her friends try to tell him. But Mao’s mind is made up. It's a hero he will be.

Flow of Gameplay: Events ⇒ Base ⇒ Battle ⇒ Repeat
Events: Players advance through the game as events unfold. These events can occur during the story, at your base, or before/after battles. You will be able to witness the fun and interesting interactions through a mixture of sprite animation and exciting character battles.

Base: Mao's school, the Nether Institute, Evil Academy is the base point of the game. Players will be able to prepare for upcoming battles here by purchasing new weapons and items, customizing characters and/or restoring health.

Battle: You will be fighting against enemies in battle scenes with a quarter view, tactical simulations. The goal is to defeat all of the enemies before all of your team members die. Battles utilize a turn-based system, where all of your team members will have their turn to attack before enemies begin theirs.

Character Customization: The Evility System
Character customization is crucial in all role-playing games. Absence of Justice allows for maximum character customization through its "Evility System." There are two different categories of evilities: evility that is already set for each character depending upon the jobs of each and evility that players can customize. Customizable evilities include: evility to acquire the special skills for certain weapons, evility to up character status under certain requirements, evility to up the amount of experience points earned, evility to enable special skills and functions, etc. This variety is powerful and important. You may have only one kind of evility that supports a character's status, but you may have multiple evilities for skills. Use this system to create and customize your characters and ideally group multiple evilities in one to conduct battles more efficiently.

The Disgaea 3 Battle System
Combat in Disgaea 3: Absence of Justice consists of a combination of the franchises familiar standard system of attacks, along with a whole new array of moves debuting with the game. This wide range of possibilities allows players to pick and choose tactics that suit the immediate conflict before them or to quest for overall success in the game, and maximum fun by attemping to master all. Attacks and skills include:

• Team Attack - Use up to four adjoining team members to help you attack adjoining enemies. Although this may seem random, it is actually closely connected with the team members you have selected in class and their special skills.
• Combos - Combos happen when multiple team members attack the same enemy during a single turn. They can occur even when team members are not on adjoining squares and their effectiveness increases with the number of occurring combos.
• Lift and Throw - Humanoid characters have the ability to lift and throw enemies or teammates. The distance of a throw depends on the thrower and lifted team members are safe from attack, making this a key defensive tactic.
• Stack Attack - If you keep using the lift command, you will be able to create a tower of characters. Select the attack command while in that state and all stacked characters will begin to attack. The larger the stack the higher the damage to your enemies.
• Double Throw - If one of your characters stacked in a tower selects the "throw" command you can choose to throw any of the stacked characters. This is a useful skill when you want to reach a floor that is too high to reach on your own.
• Throw and Receive - Useful in moving long distances, when you throw a character towards a monster teammate he/she will knock the thrown character further away in the direction faced.
• Geo Effect - The combination of geo panels and geo blocks is called the 'Geo Effect.' The special effect of a block on top of a panel will affect all panels of the same color. You gain the power of those effects by landing on the right block.
• Uniting Skills - If you meet certain requirements during a combo, two skills will unite into one, increasing damage and depending on the skills will increase the effectiveness of your combo.
• Magichange - Magichange allows humanoid characters and monster characters to to fight as one. In doing this the monster will turn into a special weapon for the human to wield and in the process increase the power of both.

Will Mao be able to become a hero and defeat the Overlord? Or will Raspberyl and the demon delinquents convince him to return to his honor role ways? It all depends on you, and so the troublesome, devilish story begins.

Product Description

The Famed Disgaea series goes next gen on PS3! With high-definition graphics, including beautiful high-res 2D sprite art and stunning spell effects, one of the most highly-acclaimed and beloved strategy RPG series is making the jump to the next generation of gaming with Disgaea 3 Absence of Justice for PLAYSTATION 3. Re-enter the world of Disgaea and experience all of the humor, zany characters, thrilling action, and unmatched excitement in this all-new over 100 hour adventure!

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

22 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great Addition to the Series (4.5 Stars), September 7, 2008

By 

S. Rhodes - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)   

= Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Disgaea 3 Absence of Justice (Video Game)

Pros:

+A lot of good gameplay
+An overall charming story
+Lots of things to do off the beaten path
+A Huge emphasis on strategy
+Well done anime inspired art

Cons:

-Still a few problems with the camera
-By now the graphics need an improvement to better bring the story to life. The anime inspired art is really nice, but how about an anime scene or two to really convey a character's feelings or actions? Beyond that, the battlefield and character sprites look exactly like they did in the first two games. A graphical update would've been really nice.

In 2003, Disgaea came out and breathe some new life into the Tactical Strategy RPG. It quickly became a cult classic. Disgaea 2 came around and stayed true to the first by changing very little. In that sense, Disgaea 3 can be summed up as being a continuation of the things that worked in the first two games. If you enjoyed the first two Disgaea games, then you'll like Disgaea 3.

Disgaea 3 focuses on Mao as he tries to overthrow is Overlord of a father for destroying his game console. It's a joke of a story but it's meant to be such. In all honesty it isn't much of a bad story at all once it gets going. The story is told through still shots of the characters facing one another as the dialog pops up on screen. There's voice acting, although some of it is quite forgettable. But there's also a good sense of humor, mainly because the story doens't take itself so seriously. Disgaea 3 knows what it is and doesn't try to be anything more. It makes the overall experience of it fun and satisfying. But as the story progresses it actually becomes about so much more than a mere broken Slaystation Portable.

The story is charming overall, but the presentation of it isn't so much. Certainly character portraits carrying the story out isn't so bad, but by now Disgaea should be willing to take its production values to new levels with the Playstation 3. An anime cutscene or something to help bring some of the more dramatic moments to life would've been really nice.

Battling in Disgaea 3 is no different than it was in the previous two games. You move characters around the battlefield executing attacks. Disgaea has always had a huge emphasis on strategy mainly because of the Geo Panels. Depending on the placement of Geo Panels and the placement of Geo Blocks, characters can be granted certain bonuses ranging from an attack boost to even some that aren't going to help you at all such a hindrance to your defense. Disgaea 3 also brings back the bonus gauge where after a battle you can get certain bonuses depending on how much damage you've done or how many panels you've destroyed. Even by the third installment, the Geo Panels system manages to be unique. The Geo Panels also help to make a difference in your strategy. You'll find your level doesn't mean much if the enemy you're facing has a huge boost by the Geo Panel he's standing on.

Disgaea 3 also keeps the level cap incredibly high. You can go all the way up to level 9999. It might seem like the game puts more emphasis on level and brute force, but chances are you'll find there's still a lot of strategy involved in the game, and that's mainly because there's so much outside of the story to do, and the Geo Panels provide a neat puzzle element to the game.

The biggest problem, however, is that it doesn't look any different from the first two games. You're basically getting a Playstation 2 game on a Playstation 3 console. Tactical Strategy RPGs have never been the best looking games, but Disgaea 3, despite being on the Playstation 3, looks almost exactly the same as the first two games. There isn't a real noticeable improvement in the game's artistic or graphical design. The anime inspired character portraits are very nice and detailed, but the overall look of the game isn't much. It also still suffers from the camera angles. While you can rotate the camera you'll find that there's not much else you can do with it. Pillars and other environmental objects will still be in the way.

Disgaea 3 is a good game. Excellent for Disgaea fans. It may play the same way, but that isn't a bad thing at all. What may not settle well with some gamers, however, is that it's a Playstation 3 game that would've been better suited for the Playstation 2.

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Disgaea 3: You're in for a treat., September 6, 2008

By 

H2Os (New York) - See all my reviews

= Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Disgaea 3 Absence of Justice (Video Game)

This is my first Disgaea game in the franchise. I certainly hope it isn't my last. I've put in about 6 hours into the game, enough to give me an idea of how the game will play. I have to say, it's been fun, great fun.

It's like playing a saturday morning cartoon, except it has a lot of content kids won't get. The game starts with Mao, who wants to defeat his father the Overlord, because his father ruined his video game system(sound familiar?) that cost him millions of hours worth of data. And so our quest begins. The voice overs sound like something off of Fox Kids saturday morning shows.

The game offers so many little things to do and manage. I was actually quite intimidated by the options it gave me when I started playing because I was pretty clueless. After some experimenting I'm slowly understanding parts of it. It is an srpg, but it is like no other srpg I've ever played. The levels are usually small and offer some traps, and puzzles as you traverse the area. I have a feeling this game is going to offer me a lot of great hours. There's so much to upgrade and different things to do.

I'm sure by now everyone knows this game has the look of a ps2 game. And honestly it does. But it's been such a good time, it doesn't bother me one bit. I love it. Rent it, buy it..I don't care. just play it

38 of 45 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars My favorite "Disgaea" yet..., September 7, 2008

By 

M. A Jenkins "southerndudeman" (Manhattan, KS) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

= Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Disgaea 3 Absence of Justice (Video Game)

I could not disagree with the three star review more: the current iteration of "Disgaea" is, IMHO, the best strategy game ever made, overtopping both of the original offerings in this series.

Why, though? What makes this offering stand out from its counterparts? It's simple, really: it's precisely the bizarre storyline of the main quest. Lots of people heaped praise on the storyline of the original "Disgaea". I wasn't one of them. I personally thought that, while the story had its moments, in the end, it was pretty blah (particularly considering the cast of wonderful characters appearing). The storyline for the 2nd "Disgaea" was less entertaining than the first (mostly because the cast of characters wasn't interesting in the least, until the post-game madness started). Yet, I loved the first two games, precisely because of what happened AFTER the game. The number of extras in the first game was impressive, and the extras in the 2nd game were absolutely stagerring.

But finally, I really enjoy the storyline. I won't spoil it, but it is incredibly strange, and wholly entertaining. Rather, I'll break my review into the typical pro and cons sections:

PROS:
1) Storyline - It's funny. It's well-written. What more could you ask for.
2) Music - At times, it's positively incredible. The music playing in the background while in the academy (i.e. while not battling) ranks among my favorite video game themes of all time, and the main theme is good as well. The battle themes are less impressive, but this is actually nice, if one attempts to beat the game with skill as opposed to level-grinding (I would rather focus my concentration on the battle at hand).
3) Voice-acting - I enjoy it immensely. It works very well for the story present (although the Japanese voices annoy me).
4) Extras - I'm not talking about in-game extras (of which there are so many, I cannot even begin to describe them). I'm talking about the soundtrack CD accompanying the product. I love music CDs, when they're free.
5) Price - Most Sony PS3 games are sixty bucks, and most PS3 games stink. It's nice to get a fifty dollar offering that is enjoyable.
6) In-game extras - You could easily play this game for 150 hours. There is so much craziness to end the game, it's not even funny.

CONS:

1) Graphics - Yes, I know. It's not really important to the main offering. But come on. Most of the time in the game is spent either in battles, or in the school. There's really not much to illustrate here. Why not go the extra mile and make some interesting NEW character designs? I mean, these are the EXACT SAME monsters we saw in the original "Disgaea".

That's about it. Really.

This game, however, will not appeal to anyone. Action gamers, stay away. There's nothing wrong with that, and the comment isn't meant as an insult. Some people don't like the slow pacing of strategy games, or the level grinding madness that ends each "Disgaea" game. Strategy gamers, come one, come all. Let's face it, we haven't gotten many strong offerings recently (I deplore the DS "FFTA" game, and the Wii's "Fire Emblem" was a pretty frail offering as well). "Disgaea" fans - well, I don't even have to tell you, do I?

Good stuff.