‘Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes’ Is ‘Suikoden’ In All However Identify

In case you’ve ever performed a Suikoden sport, it’s exhausting to not tear up on the opening sequence of Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes.

It’s significantly exhausting watching this following the passing of sequence creator and the director of this religious successor Yoshitaka Murayama on the age of 55. Character montages, a swelling orchestra, sweeping pictures over huge plains, mountains, and deserts, and battles between mates and foes – it is a snapshot of Murayama, and Suikoden’s, legacy.

It’s not possible to separate Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes from its inspirations; Murayama, who fashioned Rabbit & Bear Studios to create this sport, wrote and directed Suikoden and Suikoden II for the PlayStation (and partially labored on Suikoden III earlier than leaving the challenge mid-way); Junko Kawano was the lead artist on the unique Suikoden and returned to provide IV, Ways, and V; and Osamu Komuta labored as a programmer on IV and directed Ways and Tierkreis. Junichi Murakami, the final founding father of Rabbit & Bear, is talked about within the credit of V, and is understood for steering Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow. All 4 are distinguished names from Konami’s — and Suikoden’s — previous.

Forward of the sport’s launch on twenty third April 2024, 505 Video games provided us the prospect to go hands-on with a Steam beta construct. And whereas the vastly profitable Kickstarter, trailers, and promotional materials have made it clear, lastly getting an opportunity to play this turn-based RPG homage made it abundantly clear: Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes is Suikoden in all however title.

Eiyuden Chronicle, Rising

Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes’ beta is actually the opening part of the sport. Consisting of in regards to the first 5 to eight hours of gameplay, it provides you a very good sense of what to anticipate. Plenty of characters, political tensions, friendships, silliness, and loads of stable turn-based fight.

That makes it fairly totally different to the tame, and temporary, Eiyuden Chronicle: Rising, a prequel that was extra motion RPG and targeted way more on a single group moderately than a whole continent. Hundred Heroes is far bigger in scope, as you’d anticipate. Within the beta, you’ve entry to a number of cities, two full dungeons, a few linear branching paths, and a complete world map. A JRPG world map in 2024? Lovely.

Nowa is the main focus of the opening hours of the sport – a younger boy from a small border village, Nowa is selfless, form, and a self-proclaimed “meddler”. He differs from Suikoden sequence protagonists who’re virtually all the time silent, and his character is infectious. After becoming a member of the Watch, a gaggle of mercenaries, Nowa finds himself cooperating with the empire to analyze some ruins. On the mission, he befriends Seign Kesling, a lieutenant within the military. And the discoveries they make are the main focus of the remainder of the sport.

A JRPG world map in 2024? Lovely.

We’re already in love with the handful of characters we’ve managed to spend a while with. Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes hasn’t sacrificed any old-school JRPG silliness for a extra mature plot; we’re certain one is ready for us past the primary few hours, however we may watch martial arts specialist Lian tease Nowa for hours. Each single particular person, from Seign’s perceived haughtiness to the wolfman Garr’s grumpy “father of the group” angle had us charmed from the get-go.

A Woven Internet

The beta is cut up into two halves – the primary few hours deal with the story and act as a form of tutorial for the sport’s fight mechanics. The second half unleashes you as Noah and the Watch onto the world, to recruit allies to the trigger and get a way of simply what awaits in the primary sport.

If we will gush for a second, it’s an absolute pleasure to have a fully-explorable world map in a turn-based JRPG for the primary time shortly. Wandering the plains of a shrunk-down world as somewhat sprite by no means will get outdated. It’s one of many defining options of any JRPG from our childhoods, and right here, it’s yet one more manner that Hundred Heroes wears its coronary heart, and inspirations, on its sleeve.

The fight might be the primary place you’ll spot these Suikoden threads probably the most. You may have as much as six characters in battle without delay – three within the entrance, three within the again. At first of a combat, you may instruct your characters to make use of regular assaults, use expertise by way of the Rune-Lens menu (equipable gadgets that grant expertise and magic to your characters), or use a novel protection command that may vary from dodging magical shields, and even charging up assaults, relying on the character.

Rune-Lens assaults price SP, which you get better by performing common assaults. Some magic-based expertise reminiscent of therapeutic spells and elemental assaults eat MP and SP, making useful resource administration key to fights. This solely actually turns into a difficulty with high-cost therapeutic spells as MP-healing gadgets had been a bit scarce throughout our time with the sport, however there are greater than sufficient HP-healing gadgets to steadiness issues out.

You may see the flip order of each character and enemy on the prime of the display, so planning out your character’s assaults to forestall your foe from making a transfer is essential. It provides somewhat component of technique to battle, and you may even have an effect on the flip order relying in your actions. It’s easy however extraordinarily efficient, and watching the flip order play out after you’ve made your decisions is satisfying – significantly with among the gorgeous spritework and animations on supply.

Stars of Future

We acquired to mess around with ten characters, and all of them felt somewhat bit totally different. Nowa is a quick attacker who balances offence and defence completely. Garr, a wolfman, is a principally pure bodily attacker and far slower than Nowa, however his Rune-Lens ability permits him to spice up his assault for 3 turns. Then there’s Mellore who specialises in light-based long-range assaults and may hit the entrance or again row of enemies no matter the place she is.

Some characters will finally get entry to Hero Combos, lethal assaults that mix two or extra characters’ expertise at the price of each their SP bars. Nowa and Seign crew up for a robust group-wide assault, whereas Nowa and the marital artist Lian pair up for a combo with a possible essential hit. These are enjoyable additions and are a nod to Suikoden’s Unite Assaults, however as with its religious predecessor, many of those are extra for his or her trendy animations and added results than their harm.

Hundred Heroes wears its coronary heart, and inspirations, on its sleeve.

Having performed just a few Suikoden video games earlier than, we all know how essential crew composition may be – significantly as your social gathering grows. We didn’t get to mess around a lot right here due to the way in which the beta splits the characters – we had seven within the second half after recruiting some additional characters, so choosing between having two mages or having a mage and a ranger was the one actual selection we needed to make right here.

The methods you recruit these further characters may be fairly diversified. The short-tempered cleric Francesca could be our favorite simply due to how her character can do a fast 180 on the click on of a finger, however her recruitment quest merely requires you to set off a cutscene. In distinction, for Mellore, you could observe her and undergo a dungeon to defeat a boss to get her to hitch the Watch. It’s precisely the sort of aspect questing and exploration that we love right here.

Memory

The cities and dungeons of Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes additionally borrow from the classics in the very best methods. The bottom city, the place you spend nearly all of time within the second half of the beta, is large but it surely’s additionally crammed with folks to speak to, retailers to go to, and many stunning visuals. Truthfully, the mix of pixel artwork and 3D backgrounds works extremely nicely and creates a comfortable, nostalgic, and fashionable look that we love.

Suikoden staple shops reminiscent of Rune-Lens retailers, Appraisers, buying and selling posts, and blacksmiths are current – we acquired moderately excited after we noticed the appraisers store for the primary time, however we had been rapidly upset after we discovered we had nothing to appraise! And the cities fluctuate from small farming hamlets to bustling cobbled streets.

The dungeons are equally easy and evocative of the golden period of JRPGs – branching paths with easy puzzles, hidden treasure chests, and random encounters (with an affordable random encounter fee, in addition). One dungeon sees you pushing minecarts round, whereas one other had us memorising brief passwords. None of those might be designed to interrupt your mind; they’re enjoyable and breezy.

Days Previous

There’s rather a lot we love about Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes thus far, however just a few issues are lacking for us. Whereas the fight right here is partaking, Suikoden video games are recognized for his or her snappy menu-based fight, and whereas Eiyuden Chronicle actually makes an attempt to observe that custom, a minimum of within the beta, issues are a bit slower than we’d like. Going by way of six characters’ assault choices feels somewhat sluggish. Auto-battle is a minimum of an choice – and it’s extremely customisable, that means you may set character priorities and actions – however going by way of one spherical takes an extended than anticipated.

From what we’ve seen thus far, nevertheless, it is a legacy Murayama-san, and the crew at Rabbit & Bear may be pleased with.

That is maybe most noticeable with bosses, which add gimmicks to fluctuate up the fights a bit extra. For the primary boss, you could take note of which column the boss goes to assault and conceal behind rocks. For an non-compulsory boss, it’s essential to select whether or not to summon a magical hammer from a left or proper e book to hit the boss because it emerges from the bottom. The latter of those gimmicks got here fully all the way down to luck, and there have been no indicators as to the place the boss would pop up. So whereas we applaud the range, it didn’t all the time work.

There are additionally just a few different parts that, whereas not commonplace in RPGs again within the ‘90s, actually really feel a bit missed right here. So far as we will inform, you may solely save your sport at save factors or in Inns, that means there’s no saving on the world map. Rune-Lenses can solely be outfitted in Rune-Lens shops. And you’ve got restricted, if shared, stock house. It’s extra beneficiant than it was within the unique Suikoden, and we think about you’ll have the ability to develop it afterward in Hundred Heroes, however we ran out of house a few times throughout our seven hours with the sport.

Nonetheless, these seven hours we spent with Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes’ beta solely provided us a slice of what the complete sport has to supply us. We’re promised base constructing, minigames, and over 100 characters to recruit, starting from social gathering members to shopkeepers and extra. And with the carrot dangling some extra critical plot moments from the top of the beta, we’re desirous to see what the remainder of the sport has in retailer for us — and the way it performs on Swap.

From what we’ve seen thus far, nevertheless, it is a legacy Murayama-san, and the crew at Rabbit & Bear may be pleased with.

Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes launches on the Swap eShop on twenty third April 2024. Will you be recruiting these 100 subsequent month? Tell us within the feedback.