Eternal Sonata - Quick Review

After finishing up one of my favorite games on the Xbox 360, Mass Effect, I still had an RPG itch to scratch. So, basically at this point, I had three choices: Blue Dragon, Lost Odyssey, and Eternal Sonata. I decided on Eternal Sonata due to its creative sounding story and its bright, cartoon-like artwork, which was sure to be a good contrast after the dark, brooding atmosphere of Mass Effect.

While Eternal Sonata does have a light-hearted nature about it, it also tells one hell of a confusing tale. Basically, the storyline takes place in the dream-world of Frederic Chopin in his final hours as he lays dying. The dream world introduces a large cast of characters who become caught between two nations on the brink of war, all the while waxing philosophic on the nature of reality and what it means to truly exist. Also, there are several historical interludes on Chopin and his life that break up the story.

Visually and sonically, everything is beautiful. The music is excellent, featuring original compositions as wells as showcasing the work of Chopin. The battle system is a lot of fun as well, featuring a more action oriented turn-based style that allows characters to move around the battlefield and attacks are based on button-mashing rather than a single button press.

Unfortunately, these positive points cannot save the game in my mind. The story was absolutely terrible in my opinion with no satisying conclusion. Cut scenes in the game could last as long as 30 minutes, with very little action or substance. Initially, I was captured by the story, but about mid-way I realized the story was going nowhere and that I did not care a single lick about any of the characters in the game. I'm certain there are underlying meanings to the story in this game, but it does not seem worth the effort to wade through the stodgy dialogue to glean what meaning may be there. Also, the game is extremely linear and short (about 20 hours), which would not have been a problem if the story had been worth the effort. A second play through is required if you want all of the achievements, though I could not imagine ever playing through this game again, no matter how fun the battle system might be.

Well, I'm gonna end this here. In short, I was not entirely impressed with Eternal Sonata, so now I think I'll turn my attention towards Lost Odyssey and report back.

Update:

After posting this, I decided it would be helpful to outline some of the items that I think could make this game better:

- Include a higher number of monster designs. For any given area you constantly fight the same 2-3 monster types over and over again.
- Develop a more cohesive storyline. This thing is all over the place and the ending was almost incomprehensible.
- Allow more than 340 achievement points to be collected in the first play through. Why attempt to lengthen the game by forcing a second play for those who would like to see as much as the game has to offer?