Lunar 2: Eternal Blue Complete

omoi · Site Admin Joined: 04 Nov 2006 Posts: 154 Location: GA

This game for the PlayStation is actually a remake of an earlier version of Lunar 2: Eternal Blue for the Super Nintendo (did I get that right?).

A fun and engaging story to be sure. You are greeted with soothing music at the title screen which leads you to choose between a new game or a continue.

Through the game, you meet Hiro, the hero of the game (pun intended? I wonder...). As you go from adventure to adventure, you level up characters, uncover an interesting plot, and meet other characters that join your party. Each one of them is whimsical and amusing in their own particular way.

Oh yeah, I'm supposed to sum up the game plot. Okay. An evil being, long sealed away, is on the verge of revival and Lucia of the Blue Star (one of the main characters) comes to this world to destroy him. Meanwhile, Hiro, an adventurous guy finds a stone in a ruin. Seeing a strange light coming from a spire, he ventures over in just enough time to witness Lucia come into this world from the Blue Star. He helps her get out of the tower (more like she blows everything to smithereens while he shows her the way downstairs) and she tells him of her mission to find Pentagulia - the home of Althena. Hiro decides to aid her on her quest and so the game begins.

In short, a fun RPG to walk through.

Now for my review.

You are NOT going to like this game if you are a Final Fantasy (or other Square-Enix game) brat; this game is just not going to cut it for people who are accustomed a plot twist at every turn (or even every other turn). This game is linear. Period. No two ways about that. That doesn't detract from the game as a whole, but you're just going to be annoyed if you have to have an adrenaline rush every other minute.
you are going to run into quite a few cut scenes. The CGI along with the hand-drawn animation is absolutely terrific. You will enjoy it greatly... unless you are sold on the idea that RPGs shouldn't have them. I personally enjoyed them. It's like a game with occasional, game-related cartoon shorts.
The game has a "retro" feels. The game itself isn't terribly 3D; heck, it isn't 3D at all as far as the gameplay goes. It's in the area of FF6 for in-game graphics. I didn't mind it; it was cute and amusing. If you really think that the whole RPG world is a dark and terrible place, then you are in for a shock.
Related to the above item is the fact that the game characters are awfully happy people. Some people think they are too happy and to a point, I can agree. They have a smile or at worst a look of determination about everything. It's rare to see them sad or discouraged no matter what the situation is. In short, it's like being Keichi from Ah! My Goddess!. Examples of things to be sad about include: (1) the destruction of their world as a whole, (2) the fact that if Lucia uses her power to... oh wait, that's a spoiler. Scratch that, (3) people who find out that their entire lives are lived on a lie, (4) losing their love to a demonic plague, etc. Throughout the entirety of their character development (which there is some, but not a whole lot, to be honest), you hardly notice one shed tear.
The voice-overs in the game are okay. Not stellar, not horrible. The fact that the game is such a great game overall makes the voice acting thing really annoying sometimes. I didn't mind it as much, but pickier people might. At least it's not as bad as the Cartoon Network Naruto dub.
The bad guy who is going to destroy the whole world is not the hardest person in the game. That is kind of sad. You would think you get a sense of accomplishment after beating Zophar, but you don't when you... oh wait, that's a spoiler, too. Scratch that.
The references to American pop-culture abound in the game. You may or may not find it funny, for example, when you cast a wind spell and hear "Fly like an eagle..." being sung by one of the characters or "Yeah, baby yeah!" being said while healing someone. This can be an amusing feature of the game, but if you are a "Keep America out of Japanese games" type RPGer, you will be irritated for the whole game.
On a more personal note, the structure of the game plot is very much like FFX and FFX-2. The two main characters meet, fall in love, have to be separated and, through many perils, manage to be reunited at last to love each other forever. I found myself in awe. The only difference is that FFX and X-2 were more in depth and intriguing in the way they went about hashing out the details of the same basic plotline. Points to Lunar 2 for doing it first, but more points to FFX and X-2 for doing it better.

With all of that said, I give this game and it's cuteness a 3.5 out of 5.
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