A mixture of a visual novel and a Japanese RPG, where there are a bunch of side quests, but there is no usual turn-based combat system – you have to fight in a dynamic “reel time”. Yes, authors Eternal Radiance know how to surprise. Thank God, mostly with a plus sign.
Three strong and independent anime girls
Eternal Radiance made by the Taiwanese from Visualnoveler, which had already been noted for light eroge Ascendant Hearts and a very unusual visual novel Anime Studio Simulator. It’s no surprise that in their new game, the leading roles are once again played by cute chicks. But this time without eroge and nudity patches – just beautifully drawn girls, always dressed in outfits with frills and stockings, even if they are warriors fighting evil.
And first of all, the main character fights – Celeste, who serves in the Order of Knights, but so far is only a squire there and has not undergone the initiation procedure. To do this, she must complete a very important task – return a powerful artifact to the order. As usual, something went wrong, and after defeating the boss, the desired artifact was snatched right from under Celeste’s nose by another pretty girl. Who is she, where is she from?? For a long time nothing is clear.
Naturally, Celeste was not given a pat on the head for what happened and was suspended, as they say, until clarification. But she didn’t sit idly by and went AWOL, deciding to find the thief on her own. And two more pretty girls began to help her in this – the shooter Valana and the magician Ruby.
However, before they join, interesting events happen. Valana, for example, saved Celeste’s life when she wandered into the desert without water supplies or a magical shield, and we had to save poor Ruby ourselves. After some time, her friend from the knightly order begins to “attack” Celeste, who for some reason sincerely considers her a traitor. And the thief of the artifact turns out to be a member of the legendary secret society, the mere mention of which makes those around him tremble with fear.
The story is really captivating, and the fact that it is presented in a visual novel format and is accompanied by numerous meetings and dialogues gives it, if not depth, then certainly detail and atmosphere. And all this is accompanied by these cute scenes when girlfriends feed each other soup, lick lollipops together or just chat while lying in bed. The hints are obvious, but, I repeat, no hentai – just the right degree of intrigue and charm from what is happening.
Eternal Radiance – a completely serious https://wilberforceinstitute.uk/uk-arbitrage-betting-sports-betting-systems RPG: with leveling up, talents, skills, enchanting equipment, battles and numerous quests. By the way, elements of a visual novel made it possible to saturate the game with a bunch of characters who give out side quests. It is clear that most come down to the fact that you need to find/bring something, learn/meet, but there are also non-trivial cases, such as participating in a theatrical production about vampires or working as a barker for a local gunsmith – we decide how much we need to wave a sword in public.
In addition, right during the exploration of locations, when we move from entrance to exit, fight, look for chests and defeat bosses, topics for conversation arise. One of the partners, for example, may notice strange footprints in the snow and offer to study them. Or another will suddenly remember the legend about the ghost of a woman who appears during a snowstorm, and will ask to investigate these rumors.
In general, something is always happening, and this something, as a rule, involves traveling through various locations: there is snow, hot deserts, picturesque forests, and caves, where Celeste suddenly wants to eat blue mushrooms – this, they say, makes a person much stronger. You never get bored.
Better on hard
Directly in battles, the visual novel format is replaced by real-time action, which does not amaze with graphics, but pleases with its dynamics and convenience. There are rolls, blocks, regular and strong hits, combos, but this, of course, is not a gloomy “soulslick”, but a rather bright and spectacular hack and slash.
We control Celeste herself, and the rest of the girls mostly act on their own. Although sometimes we are asked to choose in the allotted time what they will do – heal everyone, inflict massive damage, or impose an attack bonus for the entire squad. In addition, each girl’s rage scale gradually fills up, the output of which is activated by us – we press the necessary buttons, and cute anime girls in bows turn into furies that cause especially powerful damage..
As they beat their opponents, the characters themselves learn new active skills. Celeste can choose them, replacing, for example, a shield with healing or a magical aura that deals damage to everyone around. But the rest, as a rule, choose their own skills from the available ones.
Also all the girls get experience. But even here we can only upgrade the main character – for allocated skill points we learn new or improve old abilities. They are divided into attacking and defensive and cover almost everything that is needed, and even more: we improve melee or ranged attacks, reduce the damage we receive from behind, make all available combat skills more effective, like the same shield or magic arrow, and so on.
Some things can be upgraded easier and cheaper, for one skill point, while others require more investment. And here it is important to choose which path to develop – upgrade melee/ranged combat or magic. And choose equipment to go with it – weapons and armor options are not exactly in bulk, but enough for thoughtful shopping. Each of them can also be improved with the help of enchantment scrolls – and these can first be made and synthesized by special craftsmen.
As a result, our girls quickly become so strong that at easy and normal difficulty levels, enemies cease to pose a serious danger to them. But on the “hard” there are always bosses and elite enemies (or even groups of them) who give you a light – this maintains interest in further leveling up and selecting skills/talents/equipment/scrolls to suit your tactics.
In addition to the fights, interest in what is happening is maintained by the plot, quests, the girls themselves and their relationships. And in principle, this cannot be separated – the authors of visual novels managed to make a fairly complex JRPG, which organically combines VN, leveling, and dynamic battles in “real time”. So to all anime fans Eternal Radiance strictly recommended.
Pros: plot; characters; setting; atmosphere; quests; role-playing and combat systems; various locations; nice music and cute art.
Cons: sometimes there is not enough nonlinearity; on “normal” it’s too easy; graphics in 3D locations seem poor.