[Multiplatform] Trusty Bell, aka Eternal Sonata

Name: Eternal Sonata (トラスティベル/Trusty Bell)
Console: Xbox 360/PS3
Genre: RPG
Japanese release: 06/14/07
American release: September 2007

Trailer 1: (also available to download via japanese xbox live marketplace/130 MB):

YouTube Video

Trailer 2: (also available to download via japanese xbox live marketplace/125 mb):

YouTube Video

Characters:

Chopin

Sex: Male

Age: 39

Japanese Voice: Mitsuaki Madono 真殿光昭

"I can basically use all kinds of magic. I am dreaming up this world, after all."

His full name is Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin. Born in Poland in 1810, he is known as the "poet of the piano". Of weak constitution, he nevertheless has a deeply sensitive and subtle personality. In particular, the loss of his 14-year-old sister Emilia to tuberculosis left a deep scar on his heart. Chopin can see traces of her in Polka, also 14 and destined to die. While knowing that the world in which he meets Allegretto and Polka is just a dream he is having on his death bed, gradually he becomes more and more confused by how real the world feels. He begins to question where his true feelings lie. All the words he speaks come out as poetry.

Allegretto

Sex: Male

Age: 16

Weapon: Sword

Japanese Voice: Hiro Shimono　下野紘

"It doesn't make sense! In this world the people with shining hearts are the ones who suffer! ...That's supposed to be okay?!?"

A boy who works as a bread thief in the port city of Ritardando to provide food for poor children. Though he knows what he is doing is wrong, his strong sense of justice refuses to let him abandon the children. He uses rough language and occasionally even hits his young friend Beat, but in reality he is deeply emotional, and thinks of his young friend as a little brother. With the contradiction of a world where the gap between rich and poor lying especially hard on his mind, Allegretto sets off on journey. He is captivated by Polka, who makes light of her own tragic fate while living each day with earnest, and resolves to save her.

Polka

Sex: Female

Age: 14

Weapon: Umbrella

Japanese Voice: Aya Hirano　平野綾

"I want to use this limited life of mine to give everyone happiness."

A girl who lives with her mother in the village of Tenuto, on top of a hill overlooking the port of Ritardando. She makes her living by selling Floral Sealing Medicine, extracted from Tenuto's unique flowers. However, due to the circulation of cheap government-recognized Ore Sealing Medicine, lately she has been unable to sell any medicine at all. In a world where magic is a side-effect seen in those cursed by a fatal and incurable disease, death is always close to a magic-user such as she. Added to such a cruel fate are rumors flying about that the disease is transmitted simply through contact, leading Polka to be shunned by humanity and causing her to lose all trust in others. However, after meeting Chopin, she decides to use what little remains of her life to help others.

Beat

Sex: Male

Age: 8

Weapon: Clarinet Gun

Japanese Voice: Yumiko Kobayashi　小林由美子

"Why is bread this expensive? If it were a little cheaper, we could just buy it..."

Works as a bread thief with Allegretto in the port city of Ritardando. Beat calls Allegretto "Niichan" (big brother) and adores him like an older brother. A camera that is the only surviving memento of his father is his treasure. Beat is short for his age and is bothered by his height. Sporting a bright and cheerful personality, he is able to talk to anyone and everyone freely. Though he does not usually think very hard, in many cases his sincere words come surprisingly close to the real truth.

Credits to Wikipedia

There is also a demo available for the japanese xbox live marketplace. It takes you through a forest, through the (main?) town, where Polka lives, and into another forest where you fight a boss before it ends. Surprisingly if you download the demo through a japanese account and play it on an english one, the demo will be in english as well.

After playing through the demo on 1080i, I must say I'm very impressed by the graphics. The voice acting is decent (Allegretto sounds a lot like Luke from Tales of the Abyss), but personally I prefer Beat's japanese voice. It's more fitting. Polka sounds fine though. Aside from that there isn't any other voice acting in the demo.

The battle system is a nice touch. Feels a lot like Tales of the Abyss again, with a mix of real time and turn based action. Each character is given a short period of time to perform as many attacks (which raises a combo counter) as possible, and when the time's over it's the next characters turn. After the time is over for all allied cahrcters, the enemies are given an equally short time period to perform an attack.

The combos and attacks are beautifully detailed, as are the enemies. A lot of things seem to fit into place. Pressing triangle brings up an inventory menu where you can heal your own characters with items, and so forth, like usual RPGs. My only complaint is that there should be an option to set square to a specific item for using in battle.

Most amazing jew boots

Sorry I wasn't aware this thread already existed.

Originally Posted by Gechmir

It doesn't seem to really have any nifty, brand-spanking new gameplay mechanics. Seems to reek of past gameplay. Plus the character-types are bugging me immediately. Reminds me too much of Grandia 3, which is a bad thing.

INNOVATION INNOVATION INNOVATION

The music's pretty good. Chopin's material is in it, obviously, and a lot of it's fitting. Motoi Sakuraba's Valkyrie Profile 2 themes were impressive as well. Can't complain about it really. Usually if music isn't good, it's the first thing pointed out. Yoshi's Island DS ring any trusty bells?

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Uh.. no.. I don't think you're following.

Pieces of this game's music was composed by Motoi Sakuraba, a japanese composer whose known for Shining Force, Valkyrie Profile, and Star Ocean's music.

He also did the music for Tales of the Abyss, which this game plays and feels akin towards. I could've sworn the english voice actor of Abyss is the same as Allegretto in this game, but his profile hasn't anything linking him to Eternal Sonata (BUT HOLY SHIT HE DID THE VOICE ACTING FOR PIXY IN ACZ, FUCK YEAH), and as far as I know there's been no information on whose exactly doing the english Eternal Sonata voice acting for each character.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Yeah, I was reading about that somewhere as well. Apparently, Eternal Sonata was never exclusive to the 360, and it's also going to be released for the PS3 too. The only difference is that the PS3 version will be released later, and the 360 will get it first.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Oh hey, that's neat.

They've taken a piece of their traditionally styled art (this piece here) and replaced the characters for their cel-shaded versions. I think it's pretty good box art.

I was speaking idiomatically.

Originally Posted by Cetra

So I have mixed feels about this one after playing the demo. I don't like the battle system much as it is just a mind numbing button masher. Basically take the Tales system, remove all of the combos, remove enemies attacking you while attacking and you have the Eternal Sonata system. The light-dark system is interesting, but would have worked out FAR better if the battle system was actually real-time. It could get a bit more complex later in the game, but having to pound that A button as many times as you can in a time limit gets old pretty quick. Oh and the guard system is friggen annoying having to time a 'B' press over and over. I'm hoping some of the later party levels not available in the demo will offer some battle types that are a bit more to my liking.

It's just a demo, the only real enemy you faced was the boss. Which did attack you. The thing with the battle system is that, real time battles feel more suited for this game over turn based or sRPG style. Sure they aren't NEW or anything, but it's practically the same as Abyss, which was a good game.

Quote:

Graphically the game is sharp in texture quality but the environments and models are a bit too simplistic and last gen. I'm honestly not seeing the stunning and jaw dropping visual experience many others are claiming. They aren't bad by any means but nothing fantastic either.

Stop playing it on a 21" CRT.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Originally Posted by Cetra

It's nothing like Abyss. It's a turn based button masher not a real-time combo system found in the Tales games. I mean seriously, most of the game revolves around smashing the A button as fast as you can and the enemies just stand there and take it. There really isn't any strategy involved. To me this game feels like an extremely dumbed down real-time system. I give them credit for trying to mix things up, but in the end the battle system just gets very dull very quickly.

Most RPGs have button mashing though. I mean, if you don't like pressing A, just don't bother with RPGs at all.

Quote:

Okay, but I'm playing it on a 55-inch Bravia but whatever. The environments and models are primitive. The explorable paths are highly restricted and the overall polygon count is really low for a next gen game. Now perhaps this was done on purpose for style but it highly reminds me of the extremely simple modeling found in Tales of the Abyss. It doesn't look bad but it's not very impressive either. The shadowing system is also really basic static shadows too which is a real shame considering how important shadow and light are to this game. A more dynamic and modern shadow system should have been developed.

Uh hello, it's cel shaded. Blue Dragon has even less detail in characters compared to Eternal Sonata. I'm not sure what you're expecting from an RPG, but Tales of the Abyss was restricted in it's exploration paths too. If you want to explore open-end areas forever, go play Oblivion.

I think the game looks really well. There isn't many RPGs on the 360 right now to compare it with, but I'd say that it's more interesting than Blue Dragon. Not saying that Blue Dragon isn't great (it is), but still. You should be thankful it isn't Enchanted Arms.

Oh well, I guess people find nit-picking more fun instead of variety coming out.

FELIPE NO

Originally Posted by Kairi Li

Interview with developer

http://au.gamespot.com/xbox360/rpg/t...=1&sid=6176358



FUCK YES! I was praying that this would be the case, since after seeing Lucky Star and Haruhi Suzumiya, I wanted to hear Aya Hirano's voice as Polka.

God I wish I can play this ASAP, but I can't, not untill I head back to LA... sometime next year...

Awesome news. This month, Persona 3.. next month, Eternal Sonata. Very satisfying. Oh and Polka's by far my favorite character. It's nice that they're doing this.. much like how Blue Dragon is, I guess.

How ya doing, buddy?

I'm pretty sure Eternal Sonata was always a timed exclusive.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Sexninja

I am too sad that this game is region locked.
Can't play on my asian system, also the jap/asian version has no english text or voice.

Asian/jap people are stuck with chinese and jap.

Guess i have to wait for ps3 version.

According to Namco, there's going to be an English "Asian" version released in November. No idea if it has any extra content though.

There's nowhere I can't reach.