Threads Of Fate

After the first few hours of Threads of Fate, it really wasn't looking good. The graphics were fine (blocky yet cartoony and colorful, like Brave Fencer Musashi), but the battles were way too easy, the dungeons simplistic, and the lack of items and weapons annoying. And the music--good lord it's bad. Threads was on track for the big 2.0 when suddenly, around six hours in, things started to get more interesting--a few good boss battles, more involved dungeons, and best of all the story finally picked up. So it gets better, but it never gets great. A few control issues are never resolved--why have autoaiming for action/RPG realtime combat? It only leads to frustrating mistakes when fighting multiple enemies. The camera itself isn't really a problem, but the fact that you don't have any control over it is frustrating when you have to make jumps in 3D. The way the two parallel story lines intersect and diverge and the very different powers of the main characters themselves (the guy can transform into defeated enemies, the girl learns all kinds of magic) is a pretty innovative idea. As far as replay goes, though, it's hardly two games in one-more Like two half-games in one, since both quests add up to roughly standard game length (24 hours or so). Some mini-games and funny story bits kept me interested to a point, but there was never enough to the control, plot, characters or gameplay to ever get me even close to addicted.

Here's an RPG that tries to deliver a little bit of everything--hack-'n'-slash action, platform jumping, puzzle solving and multiple story lines. It's just that Threads of Fate doesn't do a spectacular job at any of this stuff. Combat gets boring quickly, but I think that has more to do with the ho-hum action stages than any faults with the combat system. The story itself takes too long to get interesting with both characters. And if you're not a big fan of cutesy RPGs, ToF ain't gonna change your mind. I do like the novel continue system, which has you collecting and trading coins to stay in the game. But otherwise, this is an adequate-but-forgettable action-RPG.

ToF would be something special if the battle system was more complex, and the overall quests were longer. Instead, it's just another slightly above-average RP6 on the shelf with the rest--and if I'm going to dedicate a lot of time to a game like this, I want it to be a stellar experience. Even with its interesting story (later in the game) and two characters to choose at start (with character-specific intertwining quests), there's just not enough here. It has a decent number of dungeons to work through, but only one town to visit. The characters you meet up with aren't very memorable either. I want to like it more, but it'd be best to rent ToF rather than buy it.