Title: Resonance of Fate (Known as End of Eternity in Japan)
Platform: Playstation 3 and Xbox 360
Players: One
Developer: tri-Ace (Star Ocean series, Valkyrie Profile series, Radiata Stories, Infinite Undiscovery)
Publisher: Sega
Release Date:
Japan: January 28, 2010
North America: March 16, 2010
Europe: March 26, 2010
Excluding rereleases, Resonance of Fate is the eleventh game developed by tri-Ace so far, and the third game developed by them this generation. With the development team including those that made Valkyrie Profile 2, it takes a few notes from that game, while mixing things up with flashy combat involving weapons like handguns and grenades. This also marks the first time tri-Ace isn't working with (Square) Enix, instead going to Sega for publishing the game.
It takes place on a heavily polluted Earth, with a single, tower-like structure called Basel being the only place people can live. On Basel there is a clear segregation of people, with the upper class living on the higher levels of the tower, and the lower class living on the lower levels, and there are some definite secrets hidden within the constructs of this giant tower...
There are what are essentially employable mercenary groups called Private Military Firms (PMFs) on Basel that take on various jobs, and that's where our three heroes: Vashyron, Zephyr, and Leanne come in.
Japanese voice: Ken Narita
English voice: Nolan North
26 years old, he used to be a subordinate of the Cardinal organization, before being the lone survivor of his squad. He now has his own Private Military Firm (PMF), and has recruited Zephyr and Leanne for his company.
Japanese voice: Hiro Shimono
English voice: Scott Menville
A 17-year old orphan, he has a tough attitude about life. After being helped by Vashyron, Zephyr joins his PMF.
Japanese voice: Aya Endou
English voice: Jessica DiCicco
A 21-year old woman, she was saved by Zephyr at a preious point in her life, and joins Vashyron's PMF.
Note that this is a pretty basic description mostly summarized from this link. If you want to get all the details, it might be best to go there and read up on anything confusing.
Basics
Resonance of Fate boasts a pretty unique batlesystem, referred as "tri-Attack Battle" (t.A.B.). It's a fast-paced system that's not only flashy, it also requires some thinking. It allows you to direct our three heroes in a variety of ways, using a variety of weapons and abilities. This is kinda hard to describe in the most logical order, so forgive me if it's a bit overwhelming and confusing.
First of all, t.A.B. is difficult to describe with one direct term. It takes traits of turn-based RPGs, Action-RPGs, and even Strategy-RPGs (the most commonly used comparison in that case being to the SRPG Valkyria Chronicles).
The dungeons in this game are basically a big battlefield, with some rooms having enemies in them. There's no transition to a battlescreen unless you're exploring the outer regions of the Basel map, in which there are random encounters.
In battle, you have your three characters, Vashyron, Zephyr, and Leanne, and a group of enemies hanging around on the battlefield. In t.A.B., enemy actions begin when you take actions. Meaning when you move, shoot, etc., they move, shoot, etc. This gives you time to stop, analyze your surroundings, and act.
You're free to control any of the three characters, and switch between them to choose the one most appropriate for the situation. When you control any of the three characters, a blue gauge appears on their information on the lower-left side of the screen. That's their action gauge, which determines the time the character has to act. When a character moves or does any other kind of actions, the gauge decreases. Once the gauge is empty, that character's "turn" is over and you're either switched to another character or the enemies, if they happen to be ready to act right before the gauge is empty, will do their actions.
Using the D-Pad, you can cycle through the various enemies and objects of interest on the battlefield that you can target. The are things sch as oil drums and walls to hide behind, which you and your enemies can use to their advantage.
By holding the attack button, a character will take aim at the selected target and "charge up" their weapon. When charging a weapon, a ring-shaped gauge fills. Once the gauge fills, you have a charge and releasing the attack button will make the character attack. The ring charges at a faster rate depending on your distance from the enemy, so being closer allows you (and your enemy) to react faster. Weapons gain more charges as you get stronger, which lets you do skills.
Damage
The game has two ways for the party and enemies to deal damage to each other: Scratch Damage and Direct Damage. Direct Damage affects HP directly, but the damage dealt through it alone sometimes isn't always enough to get the job done. This is where Scratch Damage comes in. Scratch Damage doesn't decrease HP directly, instead it builds up on an enemy, and when Direct Damage is dealt to an enemy, any Scratch Damage is added onto that number. Meaning if you do 450 Scratch Damage then hit the enemy for 10 Direct Damage, it becomes 450+10 for a total of 460 Damage done.
Weapons like Handgun will do a "gauge crack", which splits up the enemy's HP. This causes the enemy to be stunned, and should you take their HP past the split, you can gain an IS point.
Some enemies have different parts on their bodies, such as armor, auxiliary guns, and even the classic of gun-heavy media: exploding barrels. You can attack these parts to affect the enemy, open them up for more attacks, or do to extra damage.
Note that in t.A.B., friendly-fire does exist. You're capable of hurting your allies if they're in the range of your attacks, and the same applies to enemies. An enemy that uses heavy explosives is capable of killing everyone on the battlefield should they use them in close range.
Weapons and items
There are three types of weapons: Handguns, Submachine Guns, and Grenades. Handguns are light weapons that can do Direct Damage, SMGs are light weapons that do Scratch damage, and Grenades are heavy weapons that do Direct Damage. Each weapon has their own advantages and skills. Each character has two "item slots" (basically what they hold in each hand), which is what the weapons fit into. Some weapons require both, others only require one, and in that case you can combine weapons (two Handguns, Handgun + SMG, etc.).
Every weapon type gains experience through hitting the enemy, which means that they also level up. When a weapon levels up, another charge is added to the weapon, and they can gain new skills.
Weapons also determine the level of the character, meaning if Vashryon's Handgun level is 20, SMG level is 5, and his Grenade level is 1, Vashyron's level is 26. As a character levels up they gain HP, skills, and charges for the weapon that leveled up.
There are also different types of bullets, and different types of grenades. There are bullets with an ice+freeze effect, and grenades with a fire+burn effect, for example. You can use these various types of ammunition and grenades to add status effects to enemies and/or deal more damage.
Invincible Actions, IS Gauge, and Resonance
One of the most notable aspects of t.A.B. are Invincible Actions. Using these, you can make a character run through the field, and during which they'll be invincible to all attacks and capable of stacking up lots of damage.
When you use an Invincible Action, you choose the position that you want to character to run or jump to, and then let them go. As they run/jump to their location, things move in slow motion. This allows you to target+attack several enemies and build up damage. Note that if a character runs into an obstacle (like walls), the Invincible Action can be canceled out.
The series of orange blocks at the bottom of the screen is the IS gauge. By using Invincible Actions, you consume one block. When a character's HP is filled with scratch damage, a certain of blocks will shatter, dependent on the character's HP. When it shatters the pieces are scattered across the battlefield, and the point(s) can't be added back until the pieces are collected. By resting at an inn or after certain events, the gauge will fill completely. When you kill an enemy, destroy a part on an enemy, or take an enemy's HP past their split from a Gauge crack, you can regain one IS point. The IS gauge is also refilled by clearing a room of all enemies.
If the IS gauge is empty,you go into Danger Mode. During Danger Mode, all damage done switches from Scratch to Direct (this include friendly-fire!), meaning any Scratch damage done beforehand will be added on should you get hit. You also become extremely vulnerable, all three party members have severely delayed actions (and get hilarious running animations), and enemies are capable of acting while you act. So if you throw a grenade, it'll take a moment for it to explode, allowing the enemy to easily walk away from the grenade. While difficult, it is possible to recover from Danger Mode by fulfilling the conditions to regain an IS point, but you need to have a slot to gain the point. If all of your points are shattered, killing the enemy won't save you from Danger Mode.
You also have Resonance Attacks, which are potentially even more powerful than Invincible Actions should you use them right. When you use an Invincible Action and pass between your two other characters, you gain a Resonance point, which is denoted by the number above the character info. Note that if a character does any action that isn't an Invincible Action with the runs between two characters, a Resonance Point is lost, and this includes switching the controlled character.
Should you manage to plan out everything well enough pull it off, you can do a Resonance attack using the points. A Resonance action is basically an Invincible Action, but with all three characters at the same time. Using the Resonance button, the character positions with line up to form a triangle, and if activated the character will run to a point on that triangle. The number of points is how many times the character will run, meaning a character will run back to their original position if you have three points. The characters will attack in order, meaning you're capable of building up a lot of Scratch Damage and finishing them off with Direct Damage, or whatever else you may choose to do. Just like an Invincible Action, obstacles can screw things up, but it'll only cancel it out for that character.
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Videos:
Gametrailers 1
Gametrailers 2
Gametrailers 3
Gamespot 1
Gamespot 2
IGN 1
IGN 2
IGN 3
Various cutscene clips:
One
Just to get this out of the way now, "infamous" cutscene that constantly gets posted
lol
rpgland (import) - 8/10
RPGfan (Import) - 88%
Eurogamer - 8/10
Game Informer - 6.75
Don't really know where to put this, but thanks to DarKaoZ for the images and Urbanscholar for helping me make most of the thread title.
