Looking at Vagrant Story, you can simply feel the amount of work that went into this game. This is no six-month kludge. It does not rely on a particular ingenious concept or special effort to carry areas that were let slide. It does not, as yet, have perceptible weak points. For now, I'll withhold comment on Famitsu's much-ballyhooed perfect score for Vagrant Story, but let it be said that, when playing the import version, I am very impressed indeed.

Vagrant Story is a fully 3D action-RPG, which is a little odd when you scan the credits and note that the bulk of its staff comes from the Final Fantasy Tactics development team. Despite its 3D backgrounds, after all, Tactics drew its inspiration primarily from grid-based isometric strategy games, which were more or less a 16-bit phenomenon. It's strange, then, to see its creators jump into the 3D age with both feet, creating a polygonal world that is not only well-constructed, but also well-directed.

It's a long step away from Ogre Battle. Rather, Vagrant Story brings to mind the most cinematic PlayStation adventures, games like Parasite Eve and Metal Gear Solid. Especially Metal Gear, whose flair for neatly-directed real-time cinemas Vagrant shares. The lengthy introductory set-piece, which weaves together the credits, cutscenes, and combat sequences, is as impressive as anything I've seen in that vein since Solid's denouement, with the sharp, stacatto impact of the Bushido Blade 2 introduction (including the same effective use of blood spatter).

Blend those two games together and you'll also get a good impression of Vagrant Story's combat system. It's very much like Parasite Eve, but with none of the sluggish control, delays or separation that marked Eve's ties to RPG and Resident Evil-style gameplay. You don't switch to a separate battle screen when you encounter an enemy. Instead, you can draw your weapons and fight at any time, bringing up the wire-frame range indicator, selecting a target, and executing an attack immediately. There's no need to wait for your turn to come around, and you can maneuver freely about the environment while engaging an opponent. In other words, it's very nearly an action game. Though the battle system still bears trappings of its RPG roots, they're outweighed by reflex-based elements - for example, through the acquisition of experience and the application of deft timing, you can execute combination attacks and other more destructive maneuvers.

After all this discussion of how Vagrant Story differs from FF Tactics, though, I hasten to note that it is still its father's son, as it were. While the visuals and gameplay are a giant step ahead, the characters still bear Akihiko Yoshida's distinctive stamp, and the story is filled with Tactics' rich medieval skullduggery. Indeed, "medieval" is an excellent word with which to describe Vagrant Story's atmosphere. It's like taking a trip back to my history studies. The world is painted in the dark, weathered tones of pre-Renaissance Europe, when dirt abounded and bright colors were the province of the absurdly wealthy. Though it may sound a little dull, remember that Metal Gear was almost entirely gray, and it had more style than a fistful of other games. Vagrant Story, despite the fact that it has as much brown as Tomb Raider, bears that same abundance of style. Yoshida's designs mix realistic colors with just a touch of fantastic (or anachronistic) concepts, and they're beautifully rendered in 3D - this is one of the best transitions between 2D concepts and polygonal models that I've ever seen. The structures around them, castles and cathedrals, loom massively: dark, grim, and foreboding, but still inspiring in their scale. The excellent camera work and scene direction, which I've commented on before, is accompanied by a lovely score. Square games are famous for their soundtracks, to the point that the superlatives rather bleed together, but Vagrant Story's music compares to the best, from quiet atmospheric pieces to the insistent themes of battles and dramatic moments.

Though it may ingratiate itself with its exceptional style, Vagrant Story looks as if it may be carried by the depth and potential of its gameplay. Like Parasite Eve, it allows you to build and modify your arsenal of weapons, but there's more to it than just cannibalizing an old gun to power up a new one. You have many different types of weapons (swords, axes, crossbows, and others), some of which you collect and others which you can build yourself out of raw materials. The way you use a weapon also affects its characteristics - wield it consistently against a particular type of opponent (the undead, dragons, or what-have-you) and it will become more effective against them. Certain weapons are also linked to special attacks and magic spells - altogether, though this is a one-man adventure, it looks to require the strategy and preparation of a mainstream RPG.

Lucky for us indeed, then, that Vagrant Story is guaranteed an American release, in all likelihood within the year. Exploring the Japanese version, there are just enough touches of English to convey the feeling of a deep and complex story, as a conspiracy unfolds in the exploration of a city gripped by evil. But if you require details on that sort of subject, I can't do them the same justice as Square's own Vagrant Story website, www.vagrantstory.com. The site is almost completely translated into English, and filled with media and information on this remarkable game. I recommend a trip there, and I recommend experiencing the game itself as soon as the opportunity becomes available.

Vagrant Story Movies

Intro FMV MPEG (highly recommended) - 4.6 MB
Shootout MPEG (odd crossbow, that) - 3.9 MB
Blood spatter MPEG - 3.0 MB
Portcullis MPEG (short and nifty) - 1.0 MB
Sneaking about MPEG (no action, cool camera work) - 3.6 MB
Dragon combat MPEG - 4.2 MB
A long look out the window into the dawn... - 4.5 MB