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RPG Grind Time – Video And Hands-On Impressions Of Lost Sphear
Square Enix subsidiary Tokyo RPG Factory, a studio heavily influenced by classic RPGs from the ‘90s, made its debut last year with I Am Setsuna. The game was a nice homage to popular RPGs of yesteryear, especially Chrono Trigger, but struggled to find its own identity or bring much aside from nostalgia. Even so, the studio’s first game showed potential, with entertaining combat and moving music. Now Tokyo RPG Factory is set to try again with a new game called Lost Sphear, which borrows heavily from I Am Setsuna, but hopefully, Tokyo RPG Factory can build upon what it has learned and add some fresh ideas.
In Lost Sphear, the main character awakens to his hometown disappearing and must go on a journey to rebuild the world in order to save from being lost forever. I recently played a brief demo to see how it was shaping up, which showed off combat positioning, vibrant locales (a nice change of pace from I Am Setsuna’s dreary snow), and fantastic music. You’re still exploring towns, discovering loot, and engaging in side activities like cooking.
From what I played, Lost Sphear’s ATB system seems very similar its predecessor, bringing back the momentum system, which grants you additional damage if you press the square button when a blue light flashes across the screen. Because the demo takes place early in the game, we didn’t get to see any combo attacks, but it was refreshing to finally have the ability to manually move your character across the battlefield and give them the best placement possible to hit multiple enemies at once. You can see the game in action and learn more about it by watching the video below.
For more on Lost Sphear, you can check out Joe’s impressions from E3, which share more of its improvements.
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