Posted in: Movies, Recent Updates, Video Games | Tagged: entertainment, Final Fantasy, Hironobu Sakaguchi, Mistwalker, mobile gaming, Terra Battle, video games

Terra Battle Is A Forward-Thinking RPG

By Sage Ashford

I'll admit that when Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi announced that his studio Mistwalker's next project, Terra Battle, would be another mobile title, I was beyond skeptical: I was flat out uninterested.  I've long been a detractor of mobile gaming, if only because its more lucrative claws have lured away so many classic Japanese franchises and developers.  But it would be petty of me not to admit that Terra Battle is one of the most enjoyable gaming experiences I've had all year.

Terra Battle was developed in a fairly short amount of time, so it's actually surprising just how much content there is –each chapter consists of roughly ten sections, where you face off against enemies in a grid-based combat system.  When two characters of your party surround your enemies, the attack begins.  This sounds simplistic, but the game introduces tons of variables, such chaining additional attacks by having other characters beside yours on the same row, or the ability to "push" characters into new spots on the grid by moving one character across another.   This creates a battle system that is easily taught in the first chapter, but incredibly difficult to master, as I've been playing for over a week and still don't feel I have a proper handle on things.

The story itself is fairly simplistic, as each chapter and section starts off with a small vignette detailing the adventures of your heroes as they attempt to save the world by exploring a tower that goes into the depths of the planet to find the Maker. It's no more than a few words each time, just enough to progress the story.  It doesn't pretend to be especially deep, but it it's interesting enough to warrant the few seconds it takes to read.

But the story is the only element that's simple, as the game offers dozens of characters, each with their own unique skills to aid you against increasingly difficult opponents, and their own job classes that require special items to upgrade. In that respect, Terra Battle is actually quite the forward thinking RPG as it offers not only its own specific "grinding" area, where players can gain XP at a vastly accelerated pace, but also specific arenas to pick up the materials to upgrade their characters rather than forcing you to rely on whatever drops you get from the normal campaign.  Each of these areas have their own rules and enemy types that players must learn to overcome, offering plenty of variety for those that get bored easily.

Of course, as a mobile game the free to play elements are eminently on display, as well.   To engage in any battle requires a certain amount of "stamina", which recovers at a very slow rate (one per every few minutes) unless you use an "energy"  to completely refill the bar. Energy, which also buys characters, can be bought at a shop in various amounts ranging from a single energy to 100.  It's also granted to players who login consecutive days or finish chapters of the game, so how invasive it is will depend entirely on how addicted you become to the game.

In my opinion, the F2P Terra Battle is geared more towards small, bite-sized sessions for gamers who only have time to play on a bus ride or between classes.   Early on, the free energy can easily fool players into believing that its suitable for playing for long periods of time, but as the difficulty spikes in later chapters and stamina requirements for grind areas and story chapters, eventually you realize that it's impossible to progress without investing money.   And that's without discussing the awful RNG (random number generator)-based character recruiting system, which can grant you anything from an actual decent character, to stat-boost to existing ones.   It's the worst sort of gambling–you feel justified in the money you spent if you get what you want, but when you don't (which is all too often), it feels like a rip-off.   I'm hoping they eventually fix this in some form of update.

Speaking of updates, Terra Battle has come up with a neat way to implement their own.  A twist on the popularity of Kickstarter, Terra Battle employs something known as a download starter, where new features are added each time a certain number of downloads is reached.  Mistwalker really got creative with this one, promising everything from additional characters by popular artists to co-op battle to even a console version of the title. The best part of this is that they require only new downloads–not a single purchase is required or even mentioned.

It's almost the opposite of Kickstarter, which often requires several times its initial budget just to offer a fully featured game.  At nearly a million downloads and counting without even having opened up to several of its largest markets, reaching the end of its download starter road is all but assured.  It's a genius idea–using the popularity of mobile titles to subsidize the creation of console ones–and one I hope to see more of in the future, as mobile continues to overtake everything else as the most dominant gaming platform.

Terra Battle is available on both Android and iOS.

Sage Ashford is a college kid with far more hobbies than he has free time.  You can find him on Twitter @SageShinigami, but also at his own blog Jumping in Headfirst.

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