Review: Theatrythm Final Fantasy

With a rather odd name and an appropriately odd concept to go along with it, Theatrythm Final Fantasy is (in my opinion) the latest in the small-but-growing number of non-rerelease/remake 3DS games worth purchasing. It is a hybrid RPG/Rhythm game, using the music from final fantasy games in a very Elite Beat Agents way.

Personally, I think the RPG and Rhythm game elements could be better integrated in this game. The game does a fairly good job of making them relevant to each other, but ultimately doesn't do it in as good a way as you would hope. For instance - the scoring system doesn't care about the RPG elements of the game at all; any character, item, or ability selections that you make for the level are completely irrelevant in terms of your final score. That isn't to say they're completely irrelevant overall - your characters' collective HP (and any defensive items/abilities you choose) determine how many notes you can miss and still live, and various abilities will help you kill monsters more quickly or walk further in different types of levels, giving you better loot or more experience for your characters. It's nice that there is progression for your characters, but the fact that they don't actually help you get the highest scores for each level (other than letting you live longer) is frustrating.

Similarly, in the Dark Note mode, the game is all about character advancement - this mode is much more focused on leveling your characters and collecting loot. You go through a "field" level first, getting some loot and experience and determining which bosses you can then face in the second, "battle" level. You definitely want to kill the bosses in the battle levels, as they drop the best loot - including the crystals that unlock more characters. As you level up, you get dark notes of a higher difficulty that give correspondingly better loot.

As an aside, the dark note sections use a mere 20 of the 70+ songs that come with the game, and never use DLC songs. Personally, I think designing the game this way was a rather foolish choice, especially considering this mode will be one that more hardcore players will sink a *lot* of time into.

In the dark note sections, the two parts of the game are integrated better, but it still isn't perfect. For one, you're still assigned a score based solely on your rhythm game performance, but it isn't saved and is therefore essentially completely irrelevant. However, it does take a combination of RPG prep and rhythm game skill to actually get good loot from this system, which is nice; however, one problem I have is that the battle songs are still of fixed length in this mode, meaning that you finish them without ever getting to the bosses if you stack defensive abilities or simply aren't using high enough level characters - meaning you can "win" without actually getting what you want. Personally, I'd make the songs loop until either your characters or the boss is dead in this mode.

Indeed, I'd consider making the battle music loop until a boss enemy is dead for every mode. Really, the battle levels end up feeling less like battles and more like, well, rhythm game levels in which you happen to be watching some guys beating up some other guys with little investment in the outcome. You do want to kill the enemies to get loot, but really, while you may care a little bit about how your guys are doing, the game really doesn't seem to give a hoot, which is frustrating. No record of how well you did in battles is recorded anywhere, in any mode - only the scores in series and challenge mode, as well as simply if you completed the level or not. In dark note mode, the boss's identity and loot is recorded when you defeat them, but there's really no tangible, lasting reward from defeating bosses beyond loot that they happened to drop when defeated. Mind you, the loot can include new ability scrolls and collectibles that can unlock new characters once you get 8 of them, so there is definitely progression, but there is still a distinct feeling that the game doesn't really care how well you do (which you do care about, in dark note mode especially), and in the dark note mode, doesn't even really care too much if you do win any particular level, as it just throws a new level at you whenever you beat one - which, after you beat 50 or so of them, is kind of underwhelming as a reward.

But it is quite a fun game, most definitely; don't get me wrong. The music quality seems to range from above average to outstanding, the character selection (though I might have fewer unlocked from the get-go, and give them more distinct abilities and stats at level 1) and rpg customization is nice, the difficulty range is very solid (though I might unlock the middle difficulty from the get-go, rather than requiring the, for veterans, yawn-inducing basic difficulty to be defeated first), there is quite a lot of content and rewards for completing it (mostly in the form of new characters, but also other collectibles), and the core gameplay is quite solid as well. I definitely like it, but it has distinct flaws.

On a side note, this isn't the first Rhythm Game/RPG hybrid that I've reviewed here - I have also reveiwed the fun little indie game called "Sequence." Sequence is much heavier on the RPG side of things - it has an actual story, VA's, equipment, and fights that end when the monster dies, rather than when the song ends. Of course, those are just design choices, but I do think that Theatrythm could've benefited from an increased RPG focus, and Sequence shows a way that that could've been done. Similarly, Sequence could've benefited from having more (and better) songs to lay its RPG systems on top of, as well as better and deeper character customization.

Overall, here's my design lessons of the day for this game:

-If you're going to have a mode that the players are going to play over and over, try to make is as varied as possible (while still keeping it true to the game, of course).
-Align the rewards and acknowledgements your game gives with the goals of the players. Oftentimes, this isn't a problem by the structure of the game, but if you have optional objectives that you put in place for the player, be sure to properly acknowledge when the player hits them.
-If you're going to hybridize two genres, make sure you incorporate the best aspects of both (that fits in your concept, obviously), and incorporate them in a way that does them justice, rather than just slapping the trappings of one onto the other.
-While unlocking higher difficulties by beating lower ones isn't a bad idea in principle, forcing players to start at the absolute lowest difficulty and work their way up from there - especially in genres where skills from one game are transferable to other games (rhythm games being among the best examples of this) - is something that should be avoided.