Pros: An incredible game.
Cons: This game isn't for everyone.
The bottom line: Vagrant Story is deep and rich in every way possible. In story, in style, in character, and in gameplay. Many bash its complexity, few embrace the challenge.
This game is perhaps one of the most perplexing I've ever played in my entire life, and I finally conquered it after FOUR YEARS, beating out the original Resident Evil at about a year and a quarter (thanks god***n Doom Books). To tell of how awesome and totally underrated this game is is to delve into the deepest pits of video-gaming hell and out the other side thoroughly satisfied, craving for more, and a sense that I had actually accomplished something, not to mention the immediate desire to see a sequel....

Way back in 2000 I borrowed this game from one of my friends when it first came out. My friend is a Squaresoft fanatic and bought it instantly. Of course, when he actually PLAYED the game he went off about how hard and stupid it was. Most people that rented or played it did, including me, at the time when I first played it. I thought the game overall was very cool, and boasted an air about it that no other game could hope to match. Coolness before Dante ever came to kick demonized @ss.

However the game engine left me scratching my head until I dug into my scalp. Shortly afterwards I gave up, and returned the game to my friend.

Fast-forward to about late 2003, and I'm bored. I'm now living with my friends, including the one that let me borrow Vagrant Story, which he still has. One of our gaming friends had also played it, had gotten to the end, and then gave up, saying the last boss was simply too hard to beat. Of course, long before all of this, however, several years before, by pure luck, the gods of irony smiling upon me, I happened to find a copy of the Vagrant Story game guide used, however in pristine condition at a Gamestop. I bought the guide as a joke to give to my friend that owned the game. He didn't think it was very funny.

Anyway, I had this guide now, and I had nothing better to do, so I decided to try once more to take on this Rosetta Stone of gaming. It would take roughly three or four months of on and off, frantic, trial-and-error playing to finally solve this game and conquer it. And in the end I am glad for it, because I can join the probably ONE percent of the gaming population that can beat this game. Of course, I had a guide so that does kinda go against that, but of course it doesn't matter if you can't do what it tells you, ah hell, let's just get on with it....

GAME OF THE GODS
My friend called this game a giant battle system, and he couldn't be closer to the truth. This sums up VS rather nicely, but of course there is more to it than that. But I digress. Vagrant Story has a rather prestigious history, one that goes beyond the game itself. Many who play it may find the character designs similar to another game, that being of Final Fantasy Tactics, which was done by Akihiko Yoshida. While the characters may have looked rather odd and childish on Tactics, they take on an aura of maturity and style on VS that games only recently have begun to match. The charcters are not only displayed so well in ink, but just as well in the actual game, which is something I think is rather cool. Of course, the really cool thing is that VS inherited the artistic style of Tactics, a very good game, but also its HISTORY. Vagrant Story indeed takes place in the same world of Ivalice, the same world in which Final Fantasy XII will be taking place, and the charcters are also being done by Mr. Yoshida (to say that I am looking forward to THAT would be an understatement). While references are few, there are several references to the Zodiac Brave Story of Tactics.

And so it would be that Vagrant Story would also inherit an engrossing and thought-provoking plot like that of its sibling. The game opens with a CG-done scene of an enticing but blood-chilling woman dancing with a sword balanced on her head, while at the same time seeing scenes of weapons being assembled and the main character duking it out with a dragon. Afterwards if you wait at the main menu, you are treated to a prologue sequence involving a meeting with the VKP who have summoned one of their elite "Riskbreakers", warriors that take on daunting, deadly, and impossible tasks for breakfast, and if they survive it, ask for seconds. Ashley Riot is one of their best, and is briefed on the situation.

Members of a cult called Mullenkamp have invaded and seized Duke Bardorba's mansion and have threatened to kill the Duke's family if imprisoned members of their cult are not released. The Duke himself was not at the residence when this occured, and to complicate matters, it turns out that the Duke and the leader of the Mullenkamp Cult, Sydney Losstarot had actually been in some sort of collusion, and appearantly the cult's actions were a sign of a falling out between the two. And then it turns out that the elite soldiers of the Cardinal's Crimson Blades, headed by Romeo Guildenstern have also arrived without any order and have begun to take matters into their own hands.

Ashley is instructed to rendevous with their intelligence agent, Callo Merlose outside the manor and discover the true nature of the situation and get to the bottom of the events unfolding there. Upon finding Merlose, and no sooner than they try to devise a strategy for infiltration, the manor lights ablaze as the Blades make the first move against Mullenkamp. Ashley realizes this is his best opportunity to enter unseen, and at Merlose's objections and plea to wait for reinforcements, Riot merely says, "Reinforcements? I AM the reinforcements." Talk about bad@##.

Upon entering the manor, Ashley makes his way towards Losstarot, and after several startling events, discovers that he must make his way to the ancient and abandoned city of Lea Monde, where Losstarot and the remnants of Mullenkamp have fled, appearantly to where their hideout is. After determining his infiltration route, Ashley tells Merlose to report to HQ if he hasn't returned by the next evening.

And then you are on your own....

GRAPHICS
As previously said, this game is rather pretty, maybe one of the most pretty 3D games to ever be seen on the PSX. The charcters are well modeled, and even better detailed. The enviroment is also equally detailed, and sports an ancient gothic-feel that would be on par with the Cathederals and tombs of Rome and Renissance Europe. Also, there are a lot of cool particle effects and not to mention some REALLY neat lighting and shadow effects for the time. The one truly cool thing about the game's graphics is that if you are playing this on the PS2 and you set the PSX Driver to render the textures to "Smooth", then all of VS's graphics, character models, EVERYTHING, will be made totally smooth, almost completely pixel-free. This doesn't sound so cool at first, you really have to compare to understand how much of a difference there is, but it's there.

SOUND
The game boasts a rather robust soundtrack, playing almost nothing but silence with ambient background noises in some places, and then going over to a tense, syntho/techno beat in others. The sound effects are very well done, with the sounds of metal clashing, and armor moving and footsteps and other various sound effects. Overall, well done.

BATTLE SYSTEM
Alas, the moment we have been waiting for. Everything else stacks up, and the only thing that can ruin it now, the most IMPORTANT thing, in fact, is the how this game plays. Many people were turned off by this confusing and perplexing battle system, so much so that it killed the game from reaching mainstream status, but of course that made it ripe for Cult status, which is in some right where it will be better appreciated by those who have taken the time to understand the game for what it truly is.

The control scheme is well set, but not configurable, although if you've played Tactics you'll already have an idea of what it will play like. This game plays like an action RPG, but it is executed incredibly well, offering enough Action and Character-Development to complement each other nicely, the only thing is that the nature of developing your character is a very daunting task and perhaps one of the major reasons this game turned off so many people.

This game ain't Final Fantasy, there are no towns, just one big, well-detailed, enormous city to explore and interact with, full of tunnels, treasure chests, traps, terrifying and powerful monsters, and nothing to save you except your wits. There are no shops; nobody is gonna sell you potions, give you armor or weapons (save you kill them for it), and by the way, you don't earn experience or gains levels to strengthen your character. How do you get stronger then? We'll get to that in a minute.

Your character is capable of interacting with his surroundings to an astounding degree, especially if you consider that this is a Sqaresoft game. The closest you can compare VS to is Parasite Eve, only with a much better battle system, more interaction with the environment, and open-ended combat. Ashley is capable of walking, running, and jumping, and able to grab onto ledges and pull himself up, and pushing around crates and cubes in a totally 360-degree environment. You have two modes of combat, that being normal, when you're just going around minding your own business, and then you run into a pile of bones that stands up and pulls a sword on you. At that point you press the "O" button and go to battle mode, unsheathing the weapon you have equipped at that time. The enemy runs at you, and soon he comes into range, you hit O again and a grid-like sphere emerges from Ashley, extending to a preset range determined by the kind of weapon you are using. The enemy is in range, and you now have the option to select various body parts to attack.

And this is where it starts to get complicated. And I'll explain why as we go along. There are two numbers that you will see when you highlight a body part. The first is how much damage you are projected to inflict when you land a successful strike, the second is a percentage that determines the chance of the strike actually LANDING. Ashley himself has five areas of his body: Head, Legs, Body, Left Arm, Right Arm. His overall bodily condition is indicated by an icon in the lower left of the screen. As the Riskbreaker can do to his enemies, they too can do to him. He strikes the skeleton's arm, the skeleton retaliates by striking his left arm, which he failed to heal in a previous attack. It gets taken to "Dead" status and his ability to parry with a shield goes down by half. Another hit to this legs kills them (granted this isn't so likely, but only serves as an example), and Ashley's ability to move is also halved.

Of course, Ashley can do the same to his enemies. If he does enough damage to his opponents' legs, he'll cut their movement in half, of course, many enemies have weak points that they defend, and hitting other areas of the body will loosen up their guard and make other areas vulnerable. Don't be fooled by this game's modest appearance, because it belies a monster of combat system that is both unrivaled in its overlapping intricacy and insane depth. But that's not to say it isn't user friendly, the controls are set up to make the game easy to interface with, not to mention a built-in help menu and with all the info you need to learn about the game's mechanics.

Defeating certain enemies will occasionally net you healing items or/and weapons and armor. But the bulk of what you find is stashed away in treasure chests that you find lying around Lea Monde--some in plain site, others well hidden in twisting passages, protected by nasty enemies. As you progress into the dark tunnels of the delapidated city, you come across Titans, powerful boss monsters that must be overcome to proceed. After defeating the boss, Ashley is awarded points based on his performance and increases his Riskbreaker Rank. He is also granted a spin from the Wheel of Fortune that will grant Ashley a stat increase in a particular area. But don't mistake this for leveling up, cause it's not. The bonuses are rather minute at best, although there are also potions to be had that also give stat boosts, that alone will not allow you survive Vagrant Story.

So how do you overcome adversity and demolish your enemies?

As a Riskbreaker, Ashley is able to disassemble weapons, and in various workshops in Lea Monde, is able to assemble weapons and combine blades, shields, and armor to forge better, stronger equipment and weapons capable of felling any foe. Or course, it's not as easy that. Only certain materials can be handled in certain workshops. So if you try to combine an iron piece in a workshop that only forges wood, leather and bronze, then you won't be able to. Of course, you can assemble weapons in any workshop.


Ugh, I just realized how long this is getting. There's no way I can cover every possible aspect of this game, so I'll summarize:

RISK
This is the game's claim to fame. Think of Risk in same way of Brave and Faith from Tactics. Risk has a direct effect on combat. When Risk is at zero, Ashley is completely calm and in control. His ability to land hits is at its peak, and so is the damage he can deal. As he lands blows he increases his Risk, and as it goes up, his ability to attack efficiently goes down, however, his ability to cast spells goes up, as does his chance to land a critical blow with his weapon.

CHAIN COMBOS
Shortly after the game stars, Riot gains the ability to use Chain Abilities. These are offensive and defensive skills triggered by pressing a preset button during an attack. If successful, you will attack with a skill that may inflict a status effect or do more damage. Of course, you can chain THAT attack, but it has to be with a different button. It can't be the same button twice. The same goes with defense abilites, which is the only way you will be able to defeat certain enemies early on in the game.

MAGIC
Ashley can also learn to use magic. There are four types: Shaman (healing), Sorcerer(support), Enchanter (elemental), Warlock (attack magic), and later on teleportation magic capable of transporting Ashley from save point to save point by using a certain amount of MP. He learns spells through "Grimores", that he uses to learn the spells permanantly, and in the case of some spells, can gain certain Grimores several times to increase the power of some spells.

WEAPON TYPES
There are eight types of weapons in Vagrant Story, and several of these weapons are further divided by blade type, such as edged, blunt, or piercing. Weapons are comprised of a blade, and a grip. Some grips are better than others, and some allow for the attachment of gems that can give a significant edge against an enemy in combat. The one thing to keep in mind is the kind of grip in relation to the type of blade. If you have a grip better suited for piercing attached to an edged blade, then the weapon's attack power will suffer. Early on in the game there isn't much you can do about this with the equipment you have access to, but you will be able to remedy it as the game progresses.

MATERIALS/DP/PP
Blades, Shields, and Armor are all made of various materials, some with special properties. Wood, Leather, Bronze, Iron, Hagane (Steel), Silver, and the powerful Damascus that was forged exclusively in Lea Monde. And along with that, weapons and shields have something called Phantom Points. As the mystical energies accrue around Ashley as he attacks his enemies, this energy fills his weapons and shields, increasing their effectivness. When they are at their peak, a weapon will be doubly effective, as will a shield. All equipment has Damage Points that start at maximum and decreases as the weapon/armor/shield takes wear and tear during combat. If the the equipment's DP hits zero it "Breaks" and it's effectivness is halved. DP can be repaired in workshops (at the expense of PP), and both PP and DP can be gained through certain chain abilities.

CLASS AND AFFINITY
This perhaps, more than anything, is why Vagrant Story is so hard to grasp and so difficult to overcome. There are six enemy classes in the game: Human, Beast, Undead, Phantom, Dragon, Evil. There are seven elements: Physical, Fire, Water, Earth, Air, Light, Dark. Now here's the kicker: each of these pertains to your armor, shields, and especially blades, and how you grasp what this means will determine how hard this game will be for you. (Almost) Everytime you land a blow with a weapon against a certain enemy, you gain a point for the class that it falls under. If you are fighting a bat, it will fall under Beast, and usually most enemies have an accompanying element, but that really isn't as important as classes are for the most part (except for elemental enemies). Essentially, as you attack the same kind of enemy with the same weapon, it will build up its Class, as will its effectivness against that particular enemy type, but as one grows stronger, another atrophies, so eventually a blade good against Humans will only be good against Humans. Understanding this will make the game a LOT easier. All that remains is to build up srong equipment with strong classes.


Understanding, patience, and experimentation is the key to conquering this game. Enemies respawn when you travel from one area to another so you will be able to build up classes efficiently, and there are a few other built-in things that you can exploit to make the game a cinch in some areas. Just keep in mind that the elements of this game's battle system are constantly overlapping each other. It's a checks and balance system designed to keep the game from being too easy, but far from difficult if managed properly and with creativity.

If this game has a flaw, it is with one thing. While all of the above sounds really hard to manage, it really isn't, because if you hold L2 during combat, you will bring up a shortcut menu to your spells, items, chain abilities, and more, but the one thing I wished was that they have a shortcut to the equip menu, because switching out a different weapon every few enemies gets kind of old after a while, but eventually you get used to it.

Perhaps the coolest thing about this game to me is the ability to rename your weapons, and luckily you are given a ton of spaces to work with so you can give your weapon a fairly long name if you want. I had a lot fun being creative with naming my weapons as I developed them.

CLOSING
There's some more to this game, but it'd take forever to go over it all. Literally. It's taken long enough as it is, but I wanted to try to give a basic idea of how the game works. If you go in knowing how to tackle this game you might be more inclined to play it, and trust me, it IS worth playing. If it wasn't I wouldn't be writing this right now.

Just one more thing: this game has high replay value, you just have to beat the game first. If you do, you can start over with the ability to access new areas, new enemies, new bosses, and gain powerful weapons. You start with all the magic you learned (use ALL of your Grimores before the final fight) and all of the Weapons, Shields and Armor you had at the final battle are carried over to your next game, and trust me a smile will come to your face when you begin owning enemies that gave you pure hell in your first play through.

This game is deserving of a sequel, and who knows, maybe we'll hear some VS references in FFXII. It's greatness is matched only by its infamy of being a Squaresoft game that actually CHALLENGED it's audience....