Summon Night: Swordcraft Story (USA) GBA ROM

CRC-32: 3ea860c2

Review by Switchblade1080:

Summon Night: Swordcraft Story is an awesome game and definitely a hidden gem for the GBA. It has a captivating story…Swordcraft Story :b and its combat is definitely one of the most fun I personally have in an RPG. And its published by ATLUS, so you can’t go wrong with that……except for Virtual Hydlide ofc…

GRAPHICS:

Well…to be honest, the game’s graphics on paper look bland. It uses a lot of the same sprites on its architecture and the color palette is all brownish gray with a bit of pink. But in practice, it actually doesn’t bother me. In fact, the graphics are actually appropriate since its a town that constantly gets submerged after the next couple of years…AINT NOBODY GOT TIME TO MAKE IT PRE-And also the main part of the game has you exploring dungeons so that’s not exactly something I’d call visually appealing, but it does feel foreboding; giving a sense of isolation and scale that I seriously can’t explain properly (I may be exaggerating on that last part though). You do travel into different locations (And even fight their local creatures there) but your main hub is that one town you’ll spend most of your time with. But the characters sprites have been given considerable effort (they even turn their heads) and their all very colorful so they are definitely the #1 cause of me not minding about the overworld much. On the other hand, the battle sprites look awesome!! That’s because the game’s combat is a real time side scroller (more on that later), and the supposedly dungeon background and foreground looks pretty as well.

GAMEPLAY:

The red meat of the game; combat takes place in a side scroller…in an RPG. Something like the tales series but faster paced. And you know what?? I personally couldn’t get ENOUGH random encounters when I grind, since I actually learn more and more about the enemy’s patterns. this game boasts 5 different weapon types for you to use Swords are balanced, they have a fast attack rating and quick hit recovery so you can still remain defensive. Axes deal a lot of damage in one hit and has a lot of durability for blocking, but have a slow hit recovery which leaves you vulnerable to attack, Spears are as slow to attack as axes directly, you can attack in longer ranges, and can even do a spinning attack when the enemy is too close, but the normal attack can overshoot the enemy when you’re too close. Knuckles are one of the fastest weapons in the game, their normal attack is 4 rapid punches and you can even chain an uppercut against enemies to stun them (some are resistant or immune to it though), but they’re incredibly fragile and not finishing their basic attack can leave them stunned for half a second. Drills are a special type of weapon, more technically balanced than swords since they have one of the best attacks in the game (Drill Charge), they can do one hit with decent damage (axe), leave the user immobile while dealing dps (faced forward or up) but their durability is chaotic between drills, and they’re hard to use but mastery can make easily make them THE best dps weapons in the game. The beasiary kind of lacks variety in design and you DO face off against a different colored stronger enemy, but most of the time they do have new attacks you haven’t faced before so there is at least some change of pace involved. You also have a form of familiar called a “Guardian Beast”, who is basically a supportive spellcaster of sorts that can assist you in battle (also the closest of what counts as “magic” in this game) but they’re only mostly good for buffing you instead of using that awesome screen clearing move they get when they’re high of a level enough. The game also has stat customization, in which ATK, DEF, and AGI are the only stats, its not much but it does create a more personal aura to the character instead of just the name.

SOUND:

Perhaps the lowest point of this game, even for a game made in 2003. The sound still utilizes 8-bit compositions when the GBA is capable of far more, the game’s music is still appealing and its not obnoxious and sometimes its even appropriate (And I’m all for 8bit sound, but at least it also comes with a few bells and whistles). And at least most of the sound effects are up to speed with the hardware. But its still far from the worst I’ve witnessed and if anything, its actually pretty good.

STORY….SWORDCRAFT STORY:

The white meat of the game; this game takes place in Wystern, a city that is at the constant verge of earthquakes and most dangerously; a flood that will eventually submerge its citizens for the next couple of years. And that is not your story!! You play the role of an aspiring warrior/blacksmith person called a Craftknight in the sheer hope to be as awesome as your father Shintetsu (Who looks like Sparda)…like you haven’t heard of that before!! The story isn’t much about the end goal as its all about the journey. And as much as you can conceive that as your Main Character’s personal goal, there is a lot more going on. The Story is perhaps one of the most captivating things about this game. And you can tell its good when the first thing that happens after choosing your gender is your mom waking you up (with you mishearing it as making up) and you falling off the stairs, bweaking your node xP. And then under suspicions of amnesia your mother asks for your name because….you fell off the stairs. And you can bet it only gets better from there. In fact, the story is so good even the nameless people in their houses (you know, those old RPG NPCs that say the same thing all over again) have their own plot (Like the little boy with a deathly craving for curry) to look forward to. The game still has a very serious story that’s more than just a tournament arc.

REPLAYABILITY:

The game’s story has 10 arcs measured in “days”, the story delves you into 50 dungeons while the postgame puts you into 50 more dungeons. If you enjoyed the fast paced gameplay and exploration to build more weapons and stuff, then this is the resting place for the endgame. Where the restrictions for the next couple of floors are blocked by KICK ASS BOSS FIGHTS!!…but if that actually bores you to death then it is still an overall fun experience after the story.

OVERALL:

This is an awesome game, almost no-one talks about this game as review material and I think more and more Gaming affiliates like Normalboots or Hiddenblock need to cover up this game at least once. It has awesome Graphics, Gameplay, and Story on a GBA game and no one gamer with a reputation for playing games even mentions it….I think…if you enjoy fast paced real time combat in an RPG with a captivating story and interesting world to explore, this is it.

BONUS-EMULATION:

I can say I’ve played it on my own Nokia N70 with little problems, especially due to its sound. And its even faster on any s60v3 symbian device…so it says a lot since those 2 things are even weaker than a Samsung Galaxy Y. So if you have an android smartphone these days and your craving for an not too well-known RPG with real time combat and great story, there’s no excuse for you to skip this game!!

TIPS FOR BEGINNERS:

There are some things that the game itself doesn’t explain at all, or if it does…isn’t told to you directly.
– Your choice of Guardian Beast depends on the questions you answered..if you want a specific GB consult to a guide.
– In boss tournaments, one of 2 conditions to winning the fight is to break your opponent’s weapon. When this happens, you now have that boss’ weapon recipe for yourself.
– After crafting a weapon once, you can imbue it again as a magic weapon through the use of Mystic Ore (dropped by living weapons). Different Guardian Beasts can imbue 2 types of weapons though all of them can imbue swords.