Title: Azure Saga: Pathfinder
Platform: PC
Genre: RPG
Developer: MassHive Media
Publisher: MassHive Media
Release Date: March 13, 2018
Azure Saga: Pathfinder is an RPG. And, to be fair, it’s going to remind you of other RPGs as you pass through it. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
Starting off, the story is very reminiscent of what you’d expect from a Star Ocean game. Synch and his android companion Noide are searching for Synch’s father. Pursued through space, they’re attacked and crash land in cryo stasis on a nearby planet.
Upon realizing that the world in question is significantly less advanced, they follow The Prime Directive whatever protocol they’re supposed to follow in such situations. Despite the fact that the world appears to be high fantasy Medieval and Noide dual wields pistols.
While looking for the materials to fix their ship they happen across the hot girl High Priestess Clery. They help her to fight off monsters which Noide notes give off the same energy signature as a key component in their ship.
And that’s probably more than enough, given the fact that they have no clue how long they were in cryo sleep, to give away what might be a large chunk of plot. While the plot isn’t rewriting history, it’s competent enough to hold your attention.
The translation isn’t perfect; I noticed a few rough spots. But it’s far from the worst I’ve seen and can mostly be ignored. Well outside of the situations (like end of battle quotes) where it’s almost funny.
While the story reminds me of Star Ocean, the maps bring an air of Breath of Fire into the game. That being said, combat has a dash of Chrono Trigger mixed in.
And this is the thing that bothered me, at least a bit. Early on, the resources you get from fights aren’t really enough to give you an edge. Money earned this way is pitiful, and outfitting your characters is actually kind of hard because of that. This isn’t exactly helped by the fact that inns are expensive early on.
And when you move to a new dungeon, enemies love nothing more than to take up residence in your rectum for as long as they can. Thankfully, restorative items are relatively cheap, but subsisting entirely off of them feels wrong as far as the flow of most RPGs would have it. While it’s less of a problem later on, the early game feels weird because of it.
Battles offer some basic tactics. You have your techs, of sorts, and most have a preferred monster group they deal more damage to (amorphous, beast, etc.). And, by choosing the right techs for a given party, you can use united skills; combos that deal extra damage to a monster group, as well as deal an effect, for the cost of those 3 skills combined for all three characters. Guarding can restore a bit of MP while reducing damage taken, but it’s rare that the MP gained is worth wasting an action, at least as far as I played.
You have very limited equipment options; basically accessories. They are, however, socketed, allowing you to modify them somewhat with gems, which have their own effects. There are also tattoos later on, but once again I didn’t get that far.
Overall, the game isn’t hard, so long as you understand what it wants of you. That said, I found it hard to play for long sessions, since it’s not a hard game overall, despite the fact enemies can hit like a truck. Then again, I’ve played a lot of RPGs, so your mileage may vary.
Azure Saga: Pathfinder is best played with a controller. It just makes moving around a bit easier. It’s also a huge help in the menus, which are a little odd to navigate. I noticed a few times, especially on the world map, where it wasn’t registering my button presses, but that’s not a huge thing.
If nothing else, the game is pretty, and doesn’t take up much in the way of resources doing so. I find that the map sprites are the most appealing of the lot. The battle sprites are detailed, though they do seem to be animated in a style similar to flash marionettes. They also only bear a certain degree of resemblance with the artwork from cutscenes. Still, animation happens, so there could easily be an explanation beyond my knowledge as to why.
Azure Saga: Pathfinder is probably a pretty good game to get into RPGs with, I’d argue. After all, I imagine your engagement is related to your experience with the genre. And it’ll certainly fill the void this season if it’s what you’re looking for. Unless of course, like me, you have a large backlog.
“Azure Saga: Pathfinder offers a decent JRPG-style romp; easy to get into, and playable in chunks.”
Final Score:
3.5/5
*We were provided a copy of this game for review*
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