Radiant Historia (2010)

For me, this was a game where every aspect felt good, but was just short of great. One of the biggest strengths I enjoyed being the story that revolves around jumping back and forth across timelines to solve puzzles, progress, and thwart a mysterious figure who was also jumping across time sabotaging events that you'd then have to undo.

Another major strength and unique aspect was the battle system that involved your enemies being positioned on a grid system where you could move them around with specific skills, usually to stack them in the same spot to rack up damage easier, or to knock them out a formation that buffed or healed them.

The story didn't end up doing as much with the premise as I had hoped however, with some of the late game reveals not really giving me the kind of weight and impact I had hoped for. The battle system also felt just a bit underutilized, with not enough interesting stragetic uses for the grid and combo system. Fights that were just against one giant enemy in particular were particularly boring as they didn't use the system much at all. These were extra annoying if you felt like using Aht since her hardhitting spells require laying traps that you knock enemies into, but there is no space to lay traps against giant enemies that take up the whole grid. I played through on Hard which up until the later end of the game felt way too balanced around your party's levels, as attacks would often do either 1 damage or a ton and I wasn't really going out of my way to grind or anything.

Overall, it's a really well rounded and cute adventure that eats up a good amount of time to see through. Its plot and progression is engaging enough that I kept wanting to see what would happen next, but I couldn't find myself feeling overly passionate about anything. A good experience, but not one I could rave about.