Chantelise: A Tale of Two Sisters
By EasyGameStation
Genre: Japanese Action-RPG
From the makers of Recettear: An Item Shop’s Tale, comes this more traditional action-RPG in the vein of, say, Secret of Mana or even, perhaps, a more primitive form of Final Fantasy XII (the behind the back view definitely lends itself to this). It’s definitely Japanese in origin, as the voice-overs and general aesthetic will attest, but thankfully all the dialog, menus and other text is translated sardonically and wonderfully into English. Add that wondrous old-school aesthetic that plants the look of the game firmly into the PlayStation (One) days, and you’ve got a winner in my book.
The story is a rather unique one; Chante and Elise are sisters, as the subtitle implies. They’re about to get a whole lot closer; being warned not to venture out at night under the ‘red moon,’ (a Blood Moon, perhaps! Good thing they weren’t swarmed by monsters! (A reference to one of my previous reviews, for Terraria!) they do so anyway, somehow being ‘called’ outside. Well, suddenly there’s a big flash of light, and Chante is transformed into a little fairy!
This starts their quest; in order to reverse the transformation spell, Chante and Elise (you control Elise) must travel to various locations, battling enemies along the way, and finding NPCs to talk to and receive new tasks. Chante has received two major boons along with her fairy transformation: the ability to use magic, and a sharp tongue! You may well find yourself in trouble thanks to Chante’s penchant to not keep her tiny mouth shut; it’s like she makes up for her newly small body with a larger-than-life presence.
However, the usefulness of her ability to use the magic crystals that regularly drop from defeated enemies can’t be denied. Lock on to an enemy and hit a button and boom, they disappear in an elemental flash, or your defenses are otherwise buffed up. Combinations of two of the same (at least at first) elemental crystals result in a much more powerful effect.
Leveling is done, much like the aforementioned Terraria, through acquisition of equipment (rings, armor pieces, other trinkets). Before you choose to enter a region in Story Mode, you can choose a Time Trial mode on each area within that region that you’ve unlocked, to try for the best times and best item collection rate.
A charming RPG done in the classic style; it’s awesome to see something like this in these modern times with their obsession with photo-realistic graphics and incredible sound. You who’ve read this space before know my issues with this era’s apparent apathy of its roots; it’s refreshing, then, to see a tribute, as I see it, of those old times; as I said, it wouldn’t be out of place on a PlayStation (One), and I wouldn’t have it any other way. Five out of five, gladly!