Disgaea: Hour of Darkness

Alexey Petrovsky
	29.03.2004

Disgaea: Hour of Darkness Developer: Nippon Ichi Publisher: Atlus (U.S.), Koei (Europe) Genre: Tactical JRPG Released: May 2004 (Europe), the U.S. game is already available Works such as Disgaea: Hour of Darkness - a huge rarity in the Western market, where Japanese design style mass audience simply do not understand. For this reason, the appearance of perpetrator of this article in English was a real treat for the few fans of these creatures. However, Nippon Ichi, developer of Disgaea: Hour of Darkness, to create not just the original tactical JRPG (TJRPG), but something quite unusual both in terms of fun, parodies the style and design and in terms of innovative gameplay that expands the boundaries of the genre. Before us is a rare case when the mechanical elements fade into the background, giving way to pure pleasure of playing. The same one that was in the players during the NES and SNES and is almost completely lost with the advent of mnogopoligonalnoy three-dimensional graphics and the CG-movies, less and less different from reality. Prince of the Netherworld The Story of the character in the game begins where life usually ends up a mere mortal: in the coffin. Our hero, the demon of royal blood named Laharl, trying to awaken from a two-year sleep Etna, his vassal. Waking up, Laharl discovers that his father, the ruler of Netherworld (the world of demons), had died, and there's going real chaos: each of its residents tried to seize the throne. Our protege, without hesitation, decides to regain his rightful place a ruler, destroying the competition. Along the way he met the demons, men and angels, forming at the end of these creatures are a kind of coalition, which, of course, have to save the world. If you're expecting an intricate plot and complex intrigues, then immediately warned - you will not here. Disgaea literally riddled with numerous jokes related to the well-known games and Japanese cartoons. What are incredibly funny announcements of the next episode, parodied analogues of anime series! True, at the end of the story takes a more serious look, but somehow the product of Nippon Ichi is a real gift for people who are tired of overly serious and dramatic stories of modern role-playing games. At the same time, gamers are waiting for something like Final Fantasy, will be disappointed: the stage, revealing the game's history, serving in Disgaea is just a kind of "rest" from the gameplay, which is now and will be discussed. Of Being an Overlord As befits a TJRPG, on the battle field, conventionally divided into multiple cells, you can specify each character to move around the map and what to do: attack (if there are opponents of the affected area), using a variety of spells and items, or just defend. All this you're probably familiar with, and nothing new is not represented.But it is worth a little deeper into the combat system, as become apparent at first glance small details. Battles often take place on the maps, divided into segments (green, red, blue, etc.), and the whole area, identical in color to that on which the special pyramid (geosimvol "), acquires the property of geosimvola - for example, invulnerability of the characters, a sixfold increase in the enemy forces, the inability to use magic, and others. With geosimvolov can get a distinct advantage, and put him in enemy hands. But even if such items are already placed on the field at the beginning of the battle, you can either destroy them or just throw in another, colorless place. If the first option all clear, then lifting and throwing things, characters and creatures in need of a more detailed explanation. When you are close to any object, angel, demon or man can take it and throw in a few cells in any direction. What's interesting, you are given the ability to make a whole column of my heroes, holding each other and can thus reach in one move (or rather, dokidat certain character) to the opposite end of the map. Why do it? A simple example: Sometimes in the beginning of the Battle of the whole area can be dangerous for you to increase the effect of the characteristics of opponents, which is created geosimvolom placed in the far corner of the field, and to survive, you will need to deal with malicious pyramid in the first turn. Here podymanie subservient characters you can quickly reach the desired point of the map. But this use of geosimvolov not end there. In every battle there is a special scale of bonuses, after filling out a victory in the event you will receive various prizes: weapons, gold and experience points. But usually this line increases very slowly, so that to speed up the process you can apply multiple techniques. The first is to destroy colored geosimvola on dissimilar to it in the color cell. But you can also use other means, perform group attack. This is a very effective form of attack on the enemies can be executed only when finding your characters next to each other. If done correctly, instead of one hero's attack will make several, and a ruler, responsible for the prizes increase. This type of battle command is useful by the fact that experience points after the destruction of the opponent are given to each party to attack, regardless of the damage to the enemy damage. Here, incidentally, lies one of the main problems of the game: your players gain experience, only by killing the enemy. Therefore, the development of magicians who specialize in healing spells, seriously hindered, and the only way out of this situation is to use group attacks. A bit of corruption And where do without it in the world of demons? We told you about the battles, but how to fight without the support of the government? That's it you'll have to enlist at the meetings of the Assembly of the Dark (Dark Assembly), to carry out new laws: the expansion of the assortment of goods in the shop, the increase and the weakening strength of monsters, granting access to new territories, and others. In addition, you are allowed to create characters by the desired class: magicians, warriors, archers, monsters - more than 120 species. At your disposal are over a hundred characters, but in the battle allowed the use of only ten. The convening of the Dark Assembly and for the accession of new characters to your team you have to pay mana, you can get in battles. Dark Assembly, as mentioned above, is a kind of parliament Netherworld. Any important decisions can be taken only with the consent of the authority. Senators treat you differently: some you hate, others love you, others do not care for your person. In addition, the higher the level of civil servants, the more influence it has. Accordingly, your main task is to get votes, "senior" officials, whereas senators low level of special attention do not need.Improve the image of you members of the Dark Assembly is only one way: giving them gifts. Yes, yes, gifts, not money, as you've probably already thought of. And as a gift to the senators do not have to present some kind of expensive weapons and armor, for the happiness they have enough and cheap candy, bought far in just a few "hells" (Hell - game currency). The main thing to like a present to the recipient, otherwise the official attitude to you will only get worse. But, however, even if the new law was approved by the Dark Assembly, you can always join battle with disgruntled senators. Inner space It's time to talk about the world of objects (Item World) - a place designed to increase the performance of things. Made all the simple and ingenious: you select an object (weapon, armor, etc.) into which you want to go, while you show the approximate level found in its enemies. Then you have to go ten fights in a row, and for victory in each of them you can either destroy all enemies on the map, and send any of your character in a special teleporter automatically transporting you to a new level. Withdraw from the world of objects is allowed only after the passage of ten battles. So that each such trip is very dangerous, and, in case of bad training, you risk to see the familiar sign "Game Over". But at the same time, after a dozen battles characteristics pumped object will increase significantly. As you've probably noticed, the game is quite clearly divided into two parts: fighting and training to them. The latter includes all activities in your castle: journey into the world of objects, the convening of the Dark Assembly and the buying / selling things. To battle, you can get by selecting from a menu the desired location of combat. In general, people are hoping for a long journey over a vast territory, will be disappointed as much as the fans will be pleased meter, knowing that the game offers a heroes' development up to 9999 levels. World of objects and the Dark Assembly is a truly ingenious design Nippon Ichi. And people who are accustomed to pass the game a hundred percent hold a Disgaea several hundred hours, while everyone else will spend on the creation of Nippon Ichi somewhere in 50-60 hours, without delving into the study of its many features. On the graphics and music Say a Word After seeing the picture, you've probably already realized that the graphics in Disgaea, not only does not meet modern requirements, but generally not much different from the representatives of the genre TJRPG on PSOne. Just as in Final Fantasy Tactics for the first Playstation, two-dimensional figures of the characters, and all the surroundings - a three-dimensional. Naturally, about any plot rolls here and speech can not be, and the whole story is revealed through the painted portraits of the characters made ​​in the spirit of Japanese animation. What is interesting, such a combination of primitive graphics and nice pictures, not only is adequate to the plot and style of Disgaea, but perfectly conveys the atmosphere works Nippon Ichi. In using two-dimensional models of characters and a three-dimensional area also lies one of the main disadvantages of Disgaea: a small number of camera angles. As a result, sometimes there is no clear location of your characters and enemies. However, such situations are rare. But the music in Disgaea is good. Of course, its soundtrack you do not want to buy, but in the game sounding melodies and songs cause positive emotions. In addition, developers gave you a choice between Japanese and American voice acting, each of which is gorgeous. Tastes Differ Despite all its advantages, Disgaea: Hour of Darkness - a game for amateurs. Some it will upset his style, simple plot and primitive graphics, while others, conversely, a product of Nippon Ichi will result in a complete delight precisely because it did not like the first group: the Japanese view, funny story, "warm" atmosphere, and ridiculous dialogue. Some will be happy to go fight the battle, while many of this process quickly tired of the lack of an exciting story line. Anyway, fans of the genre TJRPG Disgaea exactly like it. All others are also encouraged to buy it if you do not brezguete outdated graphics and gameplay prefer a twisted narrative in the spirit of Final Fantasy.