Customer Reviews

Hoshigami Remix: Ruining Blue Earth

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4 star:		(2)
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1 star:		(0)

 

 

At its core, Hoshigami is a remarkably deep turn-based strategy game with an interesting story and some beautifully designed characters. So what's the problem?

For one, the pacing is dreadful... the game moves at a snail's pace from start to finish, the battles take forever, leveling is slow, and in many cases I found myself deliberately avoiding side-story missions (which I generally love in SRPGs) simply to avoid another long, pointless fight.

The interface, likewise, is ill-suited to the DS. They tried their best to shoehorn a complex menu system onto a portable touch screen, and should be commended for it, but in the end its just too complicated to bother with.

If you're really thirsty for a turn-based experience and have played everything else to completion, i'd recommend this, if only because playing it to completion is going to take you forever. On the other hand if you're kind of on the fence about the genre, don't make this your first experience.

I have played many strategy/RPG games. I saw this one for the DS and picked it up despite the mixed reviews I have seen for it. It has received a large number of negative reviews, but I thought i could "find the good" in it and learn to love it. I was wrong. If there is one good thing I can say about Hoshigami is that it tries to be innovative and different. The magic system is something you probably have never seen before, unless you played the orignal Hoshigami on the PSone. This doesn't make the magic system a good thing though. How the game lets you customize the magic system is quite interesting ,but the game fails at helping you understand it. I got annoyed with the fact that I simply did not know how to work the magic system. The in game tutorials DO NOT help you with this and neither does the instruction manual.

The magic system was not the only problem. There are no real classes in this game. Anyone can use magic and anyone can use any weapon. You may be thinking well so it let's you customize each charcter the way you want, that's a good thing right? Well it's not exactly what you think. You can't decide what stats you raise all you decide on is what weapon and what magic they use. I hate it, with a passion. You are better off buying Luminous Arc , Final fantasy Tactics Advance and the soon coming Final fantasy tactics advance 2. Also check out Ogre Battle for the GBA. There are just so many better strategy/RPG's out there. This one is a waste of your money.

I played many RPGs including old ones. I think the battle system is pretty good, but enemies actually play the game like the player which makes entire battle very slow when sometimes there are about 20 enemies. I had fun and like the game overall, but the waiting time is long and sometimes I had to level up characters even in easy mode.
I still think it was the best RPG game I played in DS so far, I find the system similar to PC game final tactics series.

I actually played this game on the original PlayStation and enjoyed it a lot, it was one of the first Atlus games I ever played and it's probably because of this game that I will almost always try out a game that Atlus puts out. If you played the original, you will notice that this one is arguably easier than the original. Also they've switched out some of the characters, such as the character you escape from prison with early on was a buff looking dude in the original and is now a tomboyish blonde chick. Still, if you enjoyed the original it's worth picking up.

For those that have never heard of this game, I originally got it because I had just finished FFTactics on the PS and was looking for something similiar, which hoshigami is in that its innovative, however its customization is quite different. For starters instead of having different classes there are multiple dieties who basically acts as each unit/characters "patron saint" of sorts, they also play into the storyline which is very much a remnant of times when a games merit was based on gameplay and depth vice graphics. That said the graphics were cleaned up and look very at home on the DS. Each diety, divided mainly by element, improves stats and weapon usage as well as unlocking skills unique to each one. there are 6 originally and if you master the 3 "light/dark" elements you unlock 2 more dieties, one of light and one of dark. You keep the skills after changing dieties but as each diety is suited to different armors and weapons you may choose to just keep one the entire game, and the characters will not suffer for it if you choose to do so. The storyline is both interesting and flexible as are the characters you can get to join you along the way, in the original if a unit died you lost it forever however in this port they took that away which is one of the things that makes this game far easier. Also your characters can get exp from attacking each other, so if you're having problems leveling, go to a lower level of one of the various "towers of trial" and equip your characters with weak weapons or just their fists and use weak atks on each other. You get 12-20% exp for hitting a unit of equal level, and since you can attack multiple times based on the amount of action you have taken that turn, its very possible to gain a level every other turn by doing this. This was also not an option on the original game, though you could attack other characters like this, the exp gain was not nearly as lucrative and thus it almost wasnt worth it considering that if you just climbed the tower of trial you would get more exp as well as items. The magic system can be overpowered or underpowered depending on how much time you put into each magic coin. You get seals from battles in the towers of trial and can use them to modify the magic coins you use. Honestly if you enjoy gridbased strategy rpgs this game is worth a shot, especially considering you can get a used copy for 5 bucks, the gameplay is fun and no more repetitive than most strategy rpgs and the storyline is pretty epic

I've been playing this game since the release date on the 26th and I absolutely love the gameplay and difficulty. this is the first time I've ever played these type of strategy games for the DS and it defintely won't be the last. If you like games that are a challenge to play and will last you a long time, this is the game to get.