| Makai Kingdom review |
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Makai Kingdom is the latest SRPG to come from the furtive imaginations of Nippon Ichi. Originally called Phantom Kingdom for its Japanese release, the game centres on the self-proclaimed “bad-ass freakin’ Overlord” Lord Zetta. Unfortunately for him, the paranoia that surrounds the position leads to Zetta turning into a book: The Sacred Tome.
The Sacred Tome grants the wishes that are written in its pages, and being a book, Zetta cannot pen any prose himself, given he has no arms or legs. To wit, he has to rely on his fellow Overlord chums to aid him in getting his netherworld back, and hopefully his body too. If only everyone was after the same goal.
The story returns to the quirky comedy that was seen in Disgaea, only this time it’s not quite so well paced or scripted. There is, through the middle of the game, quite a spartan level of progression at times, and when the narrative does continue there can be a lot of stuff to sit through especially in the final chapter. Although some of this can be skipped, much of it cannot, even in the Game+ mode. A pity as this doesn’t change and doesn’t need to be revisited on a subsequent play-though, other than for the multiple endings.
Back is the grid-less map, which was introduced in Phantom Brave, only now it seems to work a little better. As bodies don't remain on the map when enemies are killed and there are fewer objects scattered about, it is less cluttered, especially given areas are much bigger, often with initially hidden regions opened by destroying a key object. This definitely helps with the positioning of the troops. Thankfully the annoying Confining system has been dropped and replaced with the Invite system, essentially just a matter of using Zetta to select a unit, and placing it within its restrictions on the map. Units remain available for use until they are killed, rather than disappearing after a set number of turns: less strategic maybe, less infuriating definitely.
The same graphical engine remains too, so those that had an issue with the old-school look and feel will have the same complaints this time around. The character types are, again, imaginative and very well animated, just a little low resolution. It worked for the previous games, and it still works now; it isn’t really worth complaining about. Sadly there seem to be a couple of bugs present.
Mostly the bugs are down to the AI. Sometimes selecting an enemy to attack and then letting the PS2 decide how to move the unit to get in range can lead to a character falling out of bounds (i.e., falling off the map and no longer useable for that round). There is also an issue with placing units into buildings: the AI will jump up the side of the building until its movement points are used up, never managing to make it inside. Moving the character onto the building yourself and placing it inside shows this is purely down to the AI not doing the job properly. There also seems to be an issue occasionally with lifting and throwing items in a free dungeon. The game complains that the item cannot be thrown due to there being too many items on the map, despite this not actually increasing. However, most players will be unlikely to experience these issues, only extensive hours of gaming have presented them. They are only minor issues, but they are issues nonetheless.
Once units are placed, they can be moved about, attack the opposition with skills and magic, and utilise items in their inventory or on the landscape, much like every other Nippon Ichi game. However, just when you think you've seen all there is to SRPGs, Nippon Ichi always seem find something different to throw into the mix. This time they've come up with vehicles and buildings, and whilst it might not be evolutionary, it does add a new heady tactical play to the game. Other than this, Makai Kingdom plays similarly to Phantom Brave and Disgaea: it’s a case of placement and destruction, this is what SRPGs are all about.
Structures give stat boosts to any character that is placed inside them. Boons such as a percentage increase to Attack and Defence, or a boost in experience and Hal gained on the map (the game currency) can be had from the differing types. Judicious placing of the buildings in the first place can mean extra reach to enemies or objects for the units inside them, another considered ploy. Items picked up on the maps can be thrown into buildings and kept, that is unless they are destroyed. Its level determines the ease of demolishing the structure, and the character that created it determines that level. Once gone any character gaining stat boosts from it will lose that bonus and any unit inside it killed. This makes placing and defending them an important policy.
Vehicles can give a huge leap in Attack, Reach and Defence for low-level characters, especially useful through the earlier chapters of the game. Vehicles cannot be created, although they can be levelled and improved, rather, they are gained as bonuses at the end of level.
Vehicles and structures don’t need to be used in the game, but from a strategical viewpoint it makes sense to. The increases in stats, especially Defence and Attack, can really boost low-level characters. Thus making it that little bit easier against the stronger enemies, plus some of the attack animations look great; they’re worth using for that alone.
Each enemy unit on the map is worth a number of points, earned when that unit is destroyed. All maps have a minimum point requirement in order to complete that level and so can be ended when that point has been reached, regardless of whether everything on the map has been destroyed or not. For each hundred points, up to a maximum of one thousand, a bonus is awarded to the player, similarly to that in Disgaea. Along with the aforementioned vehicles, these can be Exp points, Hal or items; in fact, some of the more powerful items in the game are only available in this way.
Whilst on the home map, Zetta’s netherworld, there are numerous options to create characters and buildings, buy and sell weapons and equipment, and do all the maintenance stuff, like organise the contents of buildings, the pilots of vehicles and the equipping of troops.
Much of this relies on the collection of mana, a lot of mana in fact. This is probably the most annoying aspect of the game. Mana is gained by defeating enemies and appears to be based on the enemy level. It seems to take an age to get a lot of it and as character levels rise, the cost of mana to create things, such as new characters, buildings and free dungeons also increases. This makes for an infuriating spiralling inflation situation: as it’s easier to kill things with higher-level characters, these inevitably end up with the most mana.
Along with the main storyline levels to defeat, any character in Lord Zetta’s army, assuming they have sufficient mana, can generate free dungeons to explore. The level of enemies in it and the number of floors in the dungeon is directly linked to the level of the character creating them. This again raises the mana issue as it makes creating training dungeons for low-level characters a trickier proposition. The difficulty of the opposition soon ramps up in the higher-level dungeons, but this is where the best items and greatest bonuses are earned. They don’t require visiting in order to finish the main story, but if seeing all the game has to offer once the core narrative has been defeated appeals, the free dungeons will become a second home.
As with previous titles, there are a number of character classes to be unlocked, special weapons and items to be discovered and hidden boss levels to be defeated. These bosses will all be familiar to fans of the Nippon Ichi series of games and actually make for some better narrative. The fights can be very tough though and a lot of time will need to be spent levelling and re-incarnating in order to defeat them all, which does start to become a little tedious due to limited power-levelling areas available. That said there is enough to keep the player going in Game+ mode, for the short term at least. In the longer term it does not have quite the same charm or draw that Disgaea still seems to posses.
On its own, Makai Kingdom stands out as a solid and decent example of the SRPG genre managing to bring in the new elements of buildings and vehicles, but it is less strategic than Phantom Brave, and the story isn’t as enthralling or interesting as Disgaea. Nonetheless, fans of Nippon Ichi will lap this up despite the cream not being quite so fresh, and rightly so too. |
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System: Sony PlayStation 2
Genre: Role Playing Game
Developer: Nippon Ichi
Publisher: Nippon Ichi
Players: 1
Version: United States
Reviewed: Sep 2005
Writer: Marty Greenwell
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Pros:
- Buildings and vehicles add something different to the mix
- Plenty to discover once the main game is defeated
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Cons:
- Unevenly paced narrative
- Becomes repetitive in the longer term
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