Nostalgic? Or just plain generic?On May 8th of 2014, Nicalis, Inc released a JRPG on the 3DS eShop called Grinsia. It's a nostalgia filled JRPG that looks and plays like a game from the 16 bit era of gaming. I bought the game for $10.00 a couple of years back, but didn't actually start playing through it until recently. Now that I've beat it, I can say whether or not it's as good as some of the JRPG's you can find on Vizzed.
Graphics: 7/10 Grinsia's visuals are a great reminder of how good 16 bit era graphics are, even now in the 21st century. The character sprites and the different environments throughout the game help make this game look like a nostalgic blast to the past. The battles look like something you'd see from one of the SNES Final Fantasy games. The only issue I have with the visuals is the backgrounds during battles are unnecessarily large, mainly because the environments during those battles are very bland, with nothing more than what's supposed to be grass on the world map or the ground in a dungeon. Overall though, the visuals in Grinsia are still good enough for me to give the graphics a 7.
Sound: 5/10 Normally when I play a JRPG, I expect it to have a very memorable soundtrack that will stay in my head after I've heard it. Unfortunately, Grinsia does not provide very memorable music. The boss theme reminds me a little bit of something that you'd hear in Chrono Trigger, but it's still nowhere near as great as soundtracks from the SNES era. Not only that, but there aren't very many songs in the game to begin with. While it's nice to listen to while playing the game, the lack of actual tracks and the fact that the music isn't memorable gives me a good reason to give Grinsia's sound a 5.
Addictiveness: 5/10 Back when I first started playing this game 1 1/2 years ago, I didn't get too far into the game before I realized that certain cities in the game cause the game to freeze if you enter them. That problem caused me to stop playing it for awhile. Eventually, a patch was released to fix the glitches, but by that time, I lost interest in playing the game completely until very recently. While this isn't as big of a problem now (though there are a few bugs that never got fixed), the fact that the game was released like that still bothers me to this day. Aside from those game breaking glitches, the rest of the game was playable, and the combat reminds me of JRPG's of the past such as Final Fantasy and Chrono Trigger. One feature that Grinsia has that doesn't do it any favors is the ability to set actions to automatic, which basically lets the game battle for you. I don't get the point of this feature, and I don't get what purpose it serves, but honestly, it's a joke. I don't get why anyone would want to use this feature, especially if you're experienced with JRPG's, like me. Other than that feature, there's nothing else Grinsia does that really differentiates itself from 16 bit RPG's. For these reasons, I'm giving the addictiveness a 5.
Story: 3/10 In this game, a family of archaeologists turned treasure hunters go on a quest to find ancient ruins and save the world. As you can see, the plot summary is pretty generic. While a generic plot isn't necessarily a bad thing, having not only that problem, but also a uninspired cast of characters ruins what could be a really fun JRPG. Unfortunately, Grinsia has both. Character growth is pretty much non-existent here, and the dialogue is very bland for a game that tries to be like the great JRPG's of the 16 bit era. Overall, Grinsia's mediocre storyline and it's poor cast of characters force me to give this category a 3.
Depth: 7/10 With this being an eShop title and all, I didn't expect this to be a super long game. Thankfully it actually can take up to 40 hours to complete, so it's got a good amount of content, a there's plenty of areas to explore, such as dungeons and towns. The dungeons found throughout the game can take awhile to get through, and there's a high encounter rate for monsters, so you'll be busy gaining plenty of exp while progressing through the game. Overall, there's about as much content as you'd expect from a game like this, though there are longer JRPG's out there. For these reasons, I'm giving the depth a 7.
Difficulty: 3/10 As far as 3DS JRPG's go, this is one of the easiest titles I've played besides Pokemon Y. None of the enemies in the game really pose much of a challenge. Even the final boss is relatively easy to beat, though it's one of the tougher battles in the game. The only 3DS RPGs I've played that are easier than Grinsia are Pokemon Y, Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Gates to Infinity, and Paper Mario: Sticker Star. Overall, this game is definitely easy enough for me to give the difficulty of Grinsia a 3.
Overall Score: 5/10 While Grinsia may look and sound like a nostalgic trip to the 16 bit era of gaming, it doesn't come close to being as good as the Final Fantasy's and Chrono Trigger, in terms of story or overall experience. Grinsia's storyline is about as generic and uninspired as you'll find, with little to no character development to boot. It doesn't provide a challenge, and it still has a couple of bugs in there, even with the patch.
This game had potential to be a big hit. Instead, it's just a generic old school styled RPG that doesn't offer anything that we haven't seen before. That's not always a bad thing, but when you have a boring storyline put in there, it makes Grinsia a mediocre attempt at making a SNES styled RPG at best. Overall, Grinsia is getting a 5 out of 10 from me. My advice, stick to playing the classic RPG's that can be found here on vizzed, and don't waste $10 on this game, it's not worth it.
Graphics
7 Sound
5 Addictive
5 Depth
7 Story
3 Difficulty
3
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