Chou-Mahou Tairiku Wozz (1995)

The Magical Land of Wozz, for SNES

Rating: 8.3/10; Great

Highly recommended for any Jrpg fan

Wozz is a traditional Jrpg which seems to draw inspiration from some of the best SNES rpgs. Aside from the typical towns, overworld, dungeons, random battles and turn based menu combat, it has Final Fantasy style inventory, Breath of Fire style art for battles, Ogre Battle formations (based on which characters are assigned to the front or back rows), a crafting system kind of like Star Ocean, tanks like Metal Max, robots like Robotrek, and a quirky setting and atmosphere like Earthbound and Paladin's Quest.

The game stars 3 protagonists, one of which you choose to be the main character. This has a minor effect on some parts where the party briefly splits up and on a few scenes including the ending. There is Seifer from FF8, the selfish arrogant hot shot who serves as the group's warrior, despite using a bow. Ness from Earthbound, the bumbling psychic who serves as the group's mage with elemental nukes and healing. His magic system is fun to use to exploit enemy weaknesses for big damage, which is important because he can never equip a weapon. His unarmed attacks do significantly less damage than the rest of the party, so you are encouraged to nuke on most turns. Good thing mana restoring items are cheap and you can carry up to 999 of any item. There are a small number of spells to keep track of and the nukes increase in power as you fight more battles. His psychic abilities are even more interesting; they can be used while silenced and telekinesis gives a random element attack which could be more powerful than a magic spell. Or it could suck. There seems to be terrain effects on what elements are available and it reminds me of Mog's dance. He can also summon robots to replace him for an added layer of tactics to the combat. These robots are created by the 3rd protagonist; Lucca from Chrono Trigger, the sensible genius inventor who fights with guns. Her only unique combat ability is scan, which synergizes extremely well with the mage for pinpointing enemy weaknesses. Her main contribution lays outside of battle with the crafting system. She learns recipes with levels, from treasure and from story events. She can mix consumables, which is not very useful, make weapons and armor better than those available in stores and loot, and make robots and vehicles. The required ingredients are clearly listed but I hoarded everything just in case it was needed for a future recipe. And then there were the items that I did sell not realizing they could not be purchased and were needed for a late game recipe. She can also try to invent things without knowing the recipe. I was able to make some better weapons and armor by randomly combining things in the early game but gave up experimenting soon after. Each recipe requires 3 different items and the amount of each is not simply 1. So the odds of guessing recipes are very low, though you can use a guide to make seriously OP stuff.

Vehicles include tanks, ships and aircraft and are only used for getting around the world map. They have their own stats, hp, attacks and healing items, leading to a very simplified version of the vehicular combat from Metal Max. A single vehicle fights in place of the party and has plenty of uses of powerful attacks that can wipe the floor with enemies. Unfortunately, it is game over if the vehicle is destroyed and they can't keep pace with the survivability of the party, so it can be a liability to use tanks later on. Not so much for the ships and air since water and sky enemies don't change and you can't use the party there anyway. The 4th party position is for the several side characters that join during the adventure. Sometimes a specific character is mandatory but for most of the game you choose who to take. The end game even allows you to take everyone and swap between them with a single button (not in battle though). These side characters are arguably better than the 3 heroes, since every one does good weapon damage and has useful magic. Sometimes it may make you wonder why the world even needs the 3 heroes in the first place, but it is good for balance because otherwise certain heroes cough Lucca cough would be kicked out of the party. Not that it really matters because the game has a fair challenge level. Even if you power up with grinding and the best possible gear for that part of the game, the enemies will always be reasonably threatening. They can hit very hard with both regular attacks and magic, to the point where you are strongly encouraged to learn their elemental weaknesses to burn them down ASAP. Bosses can also be quite challenging, though it varies quite a bit; some of the mid game bosses were quite easy. There are also some repeat bosses, which were way too easy and the game missed an opportunity to create interesting challenge there. Imagine if you had to fight an entire party of early bosses rather than just one at a time. There was one particular trio that I thought for sure the game would escalate by making me fight all 3 at once. I was disappointed.

The story is interesting with pretty good characterization, especially for the 3 heroes. The other party members and even generic npcs are not bad either. There are a few sidequests but nothing particularly complex or time consuming. Everything combines to make a charming and fun experience that does not really have anything holding it back. The only real complaint I have is the lack of auto battle or some way to avoid random battles with easy enemies. I would also have liked more importance for the robots and vehicles since they seem more like optional flavor than needed tactical advantage.

Pro

• Good story, characters, and setting
• Some replayability from main character choice
• Good combat and fun abilities
• High enemy damage makes for engaging combat
• Many weapons have a random chance of bonus effect
• Relatively user friendly crafting system

Con

• Thief enemies that don’t return the item upon defeat
• Graphics glitch that sometimes obscures your damage numbers (though I can’t rule out it being from emulation or the English patch)
• Save points
• Tanks are underwhelming and can result in unfair game over
• Crafting system encourages hoarding and inventory clutter
• Some items needed for crafting cannot be purchased or crafted
• Side party members (and their gear) not available in the post game
• Can’t tell who can equip armor from the inventory; have to check each character’s equip screen
• Description for accessories does not show stats
• Repeat boss fights that are too easy