It’s one of those games that completely polarises opinion, but for me Etrian Odyssey is one of the best DS titles available. It’s certainly the best game to get an English translation that’s never actually made it to PAL shores, which is strange because it was a bit of a cult smash in the US. It’s an unapologetically old-school first-person dungeon crawler, very reminiscent of ridiculously tough PC title Eye of the Beholder, with a difficulty curve that’s not so much a steep incline as a brick wall.

Yet that’s one part of what makes it so utterly satisfying. Creeping through this leafy labyrinth with your party step by step might feel archaically slow compared to many fast-paced modern RPGs, but it’s a genuine achievement when you reach the next floor. This rare sense of accomplishment in an age of hand-holding, casual-friendly titles might be gloriously out-of-step, but I love it for that.

The other key factor - and one which elevates it above its ancient inspirations - is the touchscreen cartography. As you progress, you’re required to fill in the map yourself - completing the layout for a floor, complete with a key to where items and monsters appear, once again just feels wonderfully gratifying.

Enough about the original, anyway - I’m here to tell you that Atlus has just announced that the sequel, Etrian Odyssey II: Heroes of Lagaard, will be hitting US shelves on June 17th. With new character classes, over a hundred side-missions and a host of brand new skills, I’m not expecting a radical change to the formula, just a little bit of tweaking. Which suits me down to the ground. Sensibly, Atlus has also included the feature to save while you’re in the dungeon, without having to return to the surface as in the original. While that will reduce the tension of desperately struggling back to the labyrinth’s opening with your characters on their last legs, desperately praying you don’t encounter any powerful beasties, this is much more suited to handheld play. And thus there’s less chance of losing two or more hours of progress thanks to batteries running out before you’ve had chance to reach a save point sassenfrassenrassen.

Adios then, summer months. I’ll bring you a full review of EOII shortly after its release - assuming someone can prise the DS out of my clammy hands long enough, that is.

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This entry was posted on Friday, March 28th, 2008 at 10:56 am by Chris Schilling
DS, Latest Games, Misc news.