Vagrant Story, an action RPG by Square, eschews the traditional JRPG format. It introduces a complicated, but engaging battle system that is largely successful in creating an enjoyable experience. If you're looking for an RPG that breaks the mold, and don't mind wading into a dense battle system and a few annoying design choices, Vagrant Story is for you.


Vagrant Story's battle system combines turn based combat with a bit of reflex. Instead of random encounters, battles take place within the rest of the environment. When you spot an enemy, you can surround yourself with a sphere, and attack any part of a creature within the sphere. Meanwhile, enemies will do the same. You can generally pull of a few moves between each enemy move. For the most part, once you've encounter an enemy, you won't be moving much around the field, so this turn based game play will dominate. Never the less, it feels like a lot more freedom than a typical turn based RPG, and the combat is a lot more fun. In addition to the turn based combat, reflexes come into play during attacks as you can try and time button presses alongside both your attacks and enemy attacks in order to enact bonuses. Beyond this simple structure lies a complex web of stats, typing, and more that will take a while to master. As you begin the game, you'll find that a lot of bosses are basically impervious to your attacks because you haven't mastered the mechanics. However, I found that once I got a bit of experience with the mechanics, realized which statistics actually mattered the most, and found some spells to change my typing, most of the game was a breeze (except for the final boss). However, both the challenging early game and the easier mid/late game were enormously entertaining.


In addition to combat, Vagrant Story contains numerous puzzles. These puzzles involve moving various types of blocks in different ways so as to clear chasms and reach ledges. Many of these puzzles are innovative, and a few were quite difficult. While most of them were valuable additions to the game, they were not without their problems. For instance, it's often difficult to tell if a gap can be jumped. When you reach the other side, it's usually by the skin of your teeth, and you often have to time your jump perfectly. Hence, you'll often have to attempt a jump half a dozen times before you know if you've solved the puzzle or not. In my opinion, this is just poor design. However, whether some puzzles are too difficult or just too poorly designed to deal with, there's solution videos to these puzzles available online, so you shouldn't avoid the game because of them. In addition to some poor puzzles, the game has a number of other irritating elements. For instance, you raise your stats primarily by acquiring stat boosting items throughout your journey. However, the strength of these items is randomized so you have to keep saving and resetting your game if you want to obtain their maximum effect. The game would have been stronger if the developers had simply set the value between the minimum and maximum and kept it consistent. An even more important problem is that a good chunk of the world is inaccessible on your first play through. To get to these bonus areas, you have to start a new game plus and play the game all over again (devoid of challenge as your gear and stats remain). The developers should have made these areas accessible without replaying the game first. (Note: I did not replay the game so I don't know how much these areas have to offer) These issues make Vagrant Story a somewhat uneven experience, but their worth dealing with due to the stellar content surrounding them.


In addition to the game play, Vagrant Story also weaves a cut scene driven plot into the adventure. The story follows a “Riskbreaker” named Ashley as he enters a demonic city in pursuit of a mysterious figure wielding dark powers. While there were some interesting elements and ideas in the plot, I found the presentation very difficult to follow. For instance, I often found it difficult to visually distinguish between characters, and the story sometimes seemed to assume knowledge of the world I either missed or was never provided with. However, the story isn't necessary to enjoy the game. You can skip it if you want at any time. This contrasts to many other JRPGs where the story is the foundation of the game. How much you want to engage with it is up to you.


Despite some notable flaws, the overall experience of Vagrant Story is quite engaging. It's always nice to see video games which break the mold. Vagrant Story does just that, and is certainly worth a playthrough.

You describe everything well and I think all of the ratings are represented. As far as the game, if I'm gonna play a JRPG it'll be 50/50 combat/story. Following the story sounds frustrating... Thanks for the review.