Learned at the same time as chains, defense abilities allow you to key different kinds of defense. For example, you can restore magic points or life with a carefully-timed chain attack. Ashley can ready up to three of these at a time and with the proper timing, chain them until the target keels over. These allow Ashley to perform consecutive hits when attacking enemies, with every additional attack benefitting Ashley in ways other than sheer damage.
For example, if you attack a monster's legs there's a good chance you'll reduce their movement rate by 50 percent.Īfter defeating the first boss, Ashley will gain the use of chain abilities. Detailed hit-percentage and damage stats help you plan your attacks more effectively, but attacking some areas can have other effects. Representing the range of the current weapon, you can target any item within the sphere for an attack. Perhaps a tribute to one of the interesting things to come out of Parasite Eve, tapping the attack button pauses the game and causes a large wireframe sphere to erupt from Ashley's body.
While navigating the labyrinthine corridors under Lea Monde is all done in real time, battling is a decidedly different affair.Įven with all of the other gameplay elements thrown in, combat is central to Vagrant Story. While they start off easy, they eventually become fairly fiendish with the addition of a variety of new and different box-types. While the latter isn't emphasized too heavily, Vagrant Story does have a surprising compunction for box puzzles. Ashley can switch in and out of battle mode, freeing his hands for tasks such as lifting boxes or grabbing edges. You navigate as you would in Metal Gear Solid, guiding the character with the analog pad and rotating the viewpoint with the L and R buttons. Most of the game takes place underneath Lea Monde, where Ashley runs through room after room, slaying monsters and recovering information and keys to aid Sydney's pursuit. An odd blend of action, adventure and RPG gameplay, a lot of Vagrant Story's charm lies in the sheer amount of control the player has in playing what is mostly a linear game. While the Metal Gear feel is there thanks to the perspective, attention to detail, and emphasis on cinematics, one never actually has to skulk through shadows, avoid detection, and the like. Many have described Vagrant Story as "Medieval Gear Solid," a comparison that both is correct and not correct. What are Sydney's intentions, and how does Ashley play into his master plan? As with Final Fantasy Tactics, which was developed by the same team, the lines between good and evil are endlessly blurred and the story is complex and twisted. After a chance encounter with the heartless leader of the Mullenkamp Cult, Sydney Losstarot, Ashley finds himself in a life-or-death game of cat and mouse amidst a deeper plot larger than the two of them. Caught in the middle is Ashley Riot, an agent for the Valendia Knights of Peace's elite Riskbreaker unit. Despite a few interface and complexity issues, Vagrant Story is a rare and nearly perfected game.Ī brutal battle wages between the Knights of the Crimson Blade and the Mullenkamp Cult in the city of Lea Monde. A melange of the action, adventure and RPG genres, Square has truly beaten all odds and produced an engaging, seamless epic unlike any other. Let's just get it out of the way - Vagrant Story is a ground-breaking game.
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