At first glance, Luminous Arc seems like it would be a horrible game. The battle system seems like a gimped version of Final Fantasy Tactics. The controls are horrible. The graphics can’t even compare to some 16-bit era games. Even the story is subpar; it’s filled with Jrpg cliches, and the characters are really really annoying which is compounded by the horrible voice acting. And yet, the game as a whole is greater than the sum of its parts and is actually pretty fun.

I originally picked up Luminous Arc to tide me over until the new Advance Wars game so I wasn’t expecting much out of it. From everything I read, it seemed like the standard Japanese strategy rpg that we’ve seen over and over. (I think the genre got a kick start from Final Fantasy Tactics and peaked with Disgaea: Hour of Darkness.) However after playing the game for a good thirty something odd hours I do have to say that it was a lot better than I expected.

Honestly, there’s nothing really special about Luminous Arc. Like I said in the intro, the difficulty level is so low a five year old could complete Luminous Arc without breaking a sweat. (I was able to finish the game without losing a single battle.) The game feels extremely unpolished and rushed. Some Srpgs have been polished and fine-tuned until they absolutely shine and have intricate battle systems that require actual “strategy.” Luminous Arc, on the other hand, exchanges any hit of strategy or tactics with cute Japinamu characters and the cliche “Oh my God the church is really evil” tripe. We get it Japan, you don’t like the Catholic church.

The interface was also just horrible. The touch controls suck. Seriously, it seems like the DS would be perfect for srpg’s with the touchpad and all, but Luminous Arc’s use of the touchpad was cumbersome and unresponsive and I found it much easier to use the standard d-pad. And there were times where you wish you could just rotate the battlefield to better your view, but nope. Not in this game.

And don’t even get me started on the voice acting. I realize that this game was probably intended for otaku-gamers, loli-chan fanatics and little kids, but come on, is it asking too much to hire some voice actors who don’t sound like they’ve been sugar coated and dipped in honey? I almost got a toothache playing this game. (I found myself skipping through the scenes with voice acting.) Then again, the voices did give the characters a little bit of personality.

Oh, and Luminous Arc has the longest cut-scenes EVER. You’ll have to wade through hundreds of text boxes just to advance the story at times. I mean, who really gives a shit about the story in in Srpgs right?

And yet, despite all of its flaws, Luminous Arc was really a fun game. I can’t really explain why, it just is. It’s kind of like how Uma Thurman looks hot, but when you look at her up close, she looks kind of like DJ Qualls.

And now for some other things I didn’t get about Luminous Arc:

→ What’s up with the whole Kopin shit? I realize that Japanese software makers love to have mascots for their games, but any of the main characters in the game would have sufficed. The Kopin scenes were terrible and were a complete waste of time. Thank God they were short.

→ Why do witches have such big ta tas? Anyone? Did they use some of their powers to “enhance” their bust-sizes?

→ What was the point of Pollon? Seriously, what the fuck?

→ Even though Nikolai seems to be girl-crazy, it’s pretty apparent that he’s a latent homosexual. Why doesn’t anyone call him about on this?

BING BING BING BING!

Score: 7.5

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