Eternal Sonata

Eternal Sonata ... The Review on May 28, 2008

Eternal Sonata is a beautiful game, that's for sure. It's an RPG with a fun twist on the turn based battle system. During a battle, you have a timer that counts down during your turn. As a result, there is a bit more of an action feel than a traditional turn based game. You can attack multiple times during your turn and build up your energy prior to using your special attacks, which makes them do more damage. Certainly adds a fun hack and slash element to the game.

The adventure is fun. There are some areas that present a puzzle feel as you have to think in order to solve a particular part of the game (more or less making decisions about which way to go as some areas find you having to turn switches on and off or travel through a variety of rooms or climbing up and down vines. Good stuff).

I have one gripe about the game. In battles, you earn a meager pittance of gold for each victory. However, one of your character (Beat) can take photos of enemies and sell them. The amount of gold you can receive for selling your pictures is huge. This seems to cause an imbalance and make the gold you earn for fighting seem inconsequential. Kind of strange if you ask me. It's great for collecting a lot of gold, but I think it damages the integrity of the economic system.

So, I'm only about 20% through the game and have already put in 15 hours. I seem to take my time, but my guess is that the average player will be involved for at least 30 hours. I certainly recommend the game and plan to play it through until the end. At that point, you'll see it available for trade!