Lunar: Silver Star Story Incomplete
Written: Oct 29 '05
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Excellent soundtrack, innovative features
Cons: Lacking character development, too easy, short, felt incomplete.
The Bottom Line: For kicks of nostalgia and if you have a Sega CD, I'd say this is worth it. If not, get Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete for the Sony Playstation.
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| C_A's Full Review: Lunar: The Silver Star for Sega CD |
Lunar: The Silver Star (Sega CD)
Well, amidst my Sega CD collecting craze of early 2004, I snagged up an ex-rental copy of Lunar: The Silver Star. I have previously played Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete for the Playstation and thoroughly enjoyed it, so I figured I would play this game out of respect for a classic. I thought to myself, “Well, this is it. I have the RPG that has been praised as groundbreaking for the genre.” Did Lunar live up to the hype? Well, kind of.
The game centers on the main character, Alex, who wants to become the “Legendary Dragonmaster.” To do this he must go to the four dragons around the world and pretty much seek their approval. He also travels along with Luna, who is very important to the story, but leaves your party about one hour into the game, which was a bit puzzling.
Lunar is totally lacking in character development. If this were the first time I had played Lunar, I would not be able to give a damn about any of these characters. Alex is a freaking mute. The rest of the characters are bland and although some of the dialogue gave me a chuckle, it was nothing too interesting or enticing. Lunar is also only about twelve to fifteen hours long. That is far too short for an RPG. There was no character development because they didn’t give enough time! If I recall, this game did have characters interacting often with NPCs, which I will give Lunar good credit for, but the problem is that it wasn’t good interaction.
Playing through Lunar is surprisingly easy. You gain a level every four to five fights. If you powerlevel for five to ten minutes, you can obliterate any boss quite handily. The final boss is a pushover at level sixty. The characters seem heavily unbalanced in this game, with some of them being almost useless. The character Kyle has useless skill attacks and small power enhancements that go with regular attacks, Jessica is just a weak healer, Mia is a magic caster and a healer, and Nash is just a magic user. There is far too much emphasis on magic in Lunar. Even Alex doesn’t have any flashy moves with his sword. A redeeming quality is that he can summon dragon powers that he has obtained over the course of the game, but still, it’s just more magic.
Graphically, Lunar could’ve been put on Sega Genesis. The ‘cut-scenes’ were mostly just two frames of mouth-movement animation, which was nothing impressive in the least bit. I’m not saying this should’ve been on the Genesis, as the lack of CD music would have greatly diminished this game’s quality.
The music was excellent for Lunar. They really took advantage of the CD audio capabilities. It’s a shame a lot of these tunes were thrown out the window for the remake. The sound effects, however, were loud and irritating. Ow, my freakin ears. What a love-hate relationship there.
Overall I’d say Lunar is at least worth trying assuming you have Sega CD, but if you don’t have this system, do yourself a favor and get the much better refined Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete for the Playstation. Lunar really does feel like an incomplete game that just screwed around with concepts.
Pros
• Excellent soundtrack
• Innovative features and quirks applied in future RPGs
You know what burns me? (Cons)
• Total lack of character development
• Way too easy
• Nails on chalkboard sound effects
• Too short
• This game really was ‘incomplete’ after all
• I hate mute heroes.
5.9 out of 10
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
C_A
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Member: Celestial Avenger
Reviews written: 15
Trusted by: 9 members
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