The Last Remnant Review: Square Enix’s fall from grace.

HDD installs FTW!

by Sutton Dagger

©2008 Steven Sutton

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The pedigree of titles Square Enix have developed is incredible.  They and their separate entities are considered the premier Japanese Role Playing Game (JRPG) developers on the market. So with great anticipation I booted up my copy of The Last Remnant, but what ensued can only be described as the ‘fall from grace’ of  Square Enix.

In terms of the story, The Last Remnant is certainly capable of holding its own against other recently released JRPG’s. The young protagonist, Rush Sykes, is your typical melodramatic male teen, furiously devoted to those he loves, especially his sister.

His younger sibling Irina is kidnapped and what unfolds is a sweeping tale of political turmoil, centred on the mysterious and magical artifacts called remnants. These remnants, which shadow the large urban centres of the land, have various properties and are used as powerful weapons by warring factions.

Even as the main character, Rush is hardly the most entertaining or likeable persona. In fact, the supporting cast have a greater impact than the protagonist, both in regards to colleagues and adversaries. The voice acting lends well in enhancing these personalities, with a distinct English voice cast supplying the dialogue for the majority of Rush’s allies. Delivery is generally acceptable though pacing can be a touch disjointed.  Sometimes the dialogue flows whilst in the next scene there will be a noticeable gap between delivery.

Arguably one of the main features in a JRPG is the battle system. The Last Remnant tries to invigorate the turn-based style seen in many titles of this genre, but doesn’t quite pull it off. Instead of having individual members of a party to control, The Last Remnant uses a combat style that relies on building ‘Unions’ out of individual ‘Units’.

These unions use the collective Hit Points (HP) and Action Points (AP) of each individual unit and combine them into the base unions’ overall statistics. Coinciding with this new approach, you will also be battling enemy unions, making for some intense, colossal encounters. You can set up your unions with the units of your choosing, with different formations selectable that add stat upgrades in particular areas (be it offensive or defensive).

While the union approach is unique, it severely diminishes the control you have over your individual units. Instead of basic commands (Attack, Magic etc), Square Enix have gone for a more broad stroke mentality, with whole union commands. Unfortunately this method limits player strategy and diminishes the effectiveness of combat, with commands becoming available only within a certain context. More than a few times whilst my Union was low on health, I was unable to heal them as the game had not deemed it necessary for that option to be selectable.

Hand in hand with the limited options in battle, inventory management for characters (other than Rush) is non-existent, instead NPC’s are ‘meant’ to request equipment at their own discretion, and as you can imagine, it doesn’t quite work.

Though your team-mates would ask for items occasionally, there were often instances where I had better weapons in my inventory, yet I couldn’t actually equip my colleagues, which again is another limiting factor.

Taking away from the whole experience is a myriad of technical issues which are enough to blemish most aspects of the overall package. Using the Unreal Engine 3, Square Enix has developed a title that displays all the faults prevalent with this engine.   From texture pop-in to frame rate issues, The Last Remnant has them all.

The issues are also compounded by exceptionally long and frequent loading sequences. Everything from entering combat to entering a new area will result in a static loading screen, but fortunately the NXE allows for Hard-Drive installs which cut the load times in half. For those without a HDD though, it renders the game near unplayable.

These faults are not just minor occurrences either, textures (be it wall, floor or even character textures), can take upwards of 5 seconds to load upon entering an area. These can happen both in battle and in the normal world environment. The issues are also compounded by exceptionally long and frequent loading sequences. Everything from entering combat to entering a new area will result in a static loading screen, but fortunately the NXE allows for Hard-Drive installs which cut the load times in half. For those without a HDD though, it renders the game near unplayable.

Following in the same vein, the frame-rate is a disaster, often grinding to a halt during combat when a stable frame-rate is needed most. The issue is exacerbated the further  you proceed into the game and as the number of enemies on-screen increases.

Quick time events are used in battle to maintain a certain urgency in combat, but regrettably these button cues become hard to time as a direct result of the poor frame-rate.

Graphically The Last Remnant is a mixed bag. Some area’s are beautifully crafted open vistas, whilst other environments are generic, bland and lifeless. The cities themselves have gorgeous eye candy in the form of monolithic remnants, yet the cities themselves are sparse with very little locations or houses to explore outside the pub and guild halls. The city areas are broken up into exceptionally small sub-regions, creating a disjointed feel to the cityscapes.

Character models, like the environments, also show potential but ultimately become boring and mundane. With the large amount of members in any given union, the individual characters need something that distinguishes them from other units.  Unfortunately with limited variety the units are often re-used character models making the battles that much more confusing. That said, the main cast are all reasonably detailed, with facial animations that stand out.

In terms of sound, The Last Remnant has a rousing score, which is easily one of the most memorable aspects of the game. Tsuyoshi Sekito is the composer, having previously worked on various Final Fantasy titles, and he is obviously a talented musician.  The Last Remnants score is indicative of this. The battle music in particular is top-notch as is the opening theme.

In spite of The Last Remnant’s numerous faults and issues, there is still something here for the Japanese RPG enthusiast.  Some will be pleased with the considerable length of the game, mixed with some interesting battle mechanics and fantastic score. Unfortunately an abundance of technical flaws mare the overall experience and what we are left with is a mildly entertaining title that doesn’t hold a candle to past Square Enix offerings. Ultimately this is a game for the hardcore and the forgiving.

©2008 Steven Sutton

”6.8/10

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