The Disgaea series has a long history of fun games for handheld devices and last gen consoles. NIS America is releasing a new game in the series exclusively for the PS3. Does it survive a move to the next generation, or should they have left the dood in the past? Read our review to find out.
Since the dawn of time…Humans have always feared “the darkness”
Vampires, werewolves, zombies, ghosts…
Although it differs slightly from culture to culture, people’s fear of the darkness has grounded them into living conservatively.
In the current world… Thanks to wars, terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, accidents caused by human error, and daily incidents of murder…
Humans have grown to fear the actions of their own kind even more than the darkness itself.
This is the story of a group of heroes who have stood up to fight back against such a corrupted society.
Disgaea 4: A Promise Unforgotten, is a Tactical role-playing video game for the PlayStation 3 and is the fourth installment of the Disgaea series by Nippon Ichi Software.
Disgaea 4 takes place in Hades, a prision in the Netherworld where people are sent after they die for the crimes that they have commited while they were living. The story follows Valvatorez,who is a vampire and a former tyrant who gave up his powers after promising to never drink human blood again until he manages to input fear into Astina, a girl he met 400 years ago, but she died before he could do so. Due to his lack of powers he was reduced to being the Warden and Prinny Caretaker of the Hades prison in the Netherworld. Pissed off and displeased with the Netherworld’s corrupt government, Lord Valvatorez rises up and seeks to overthrow it in order to take the title of Overlord. During his conquest he receives help from his loyal servant Fenrich, a fellow caretaker of the Prinny Prison, and a young girl named Fuka, who was killed by an artificial demon created by her father, and was meant to turn into a Prinny.
And thats all I can really tell you about that due to that fact I’d be giving away some key things to the story, and we really dont want that now do we?
- Lord Valvatorez DISPISES not keeping his promises
There is so much you can do in this game, just awesome, everything from leveling up your weapons to making new characters. Being able to buy your skills at The Evility Shop in the game and how it works is cool. The thing we like the most is Magichange, for the reason that it makes your character more powerful and gives you a ton of experience.
Your probably thinking, ‘Ok that’s cool and all, but what the hell is all of that?” Well if you continue reading you’ll find all of this out and more soon enough.
Cam-Pain HQ:
Place people next to each other to increase chain rate. Able to place various units within evil symbol spaces to boost skills.Can have a member of the party call a senate meeting to vote for various things from stronger enemies to embezzling contributions from senators. Also can place units into the cabinet.
The Evility Shop:
The Evility shop is a place to purchase Evilites, Special Skills, and Magic.You pay with mana, and you get that by defeating enimes.You can equip up to two evilites. One should be unique to the unit’s job or monster class.Human-type units can equip one additional evility, and monster-type units can get two additional Evilites.
Lift & Throw:
During battle, enemies wont always be within your reach so you use the Lift & Throw Technique in order to reach an enemy that is far away or on higher ground.
Towers:
Lift a character who is already lifting another character.
You can learn special Skills that involve Towers at the Evility Shop.
Also you if you lift multiple units and throw each of them in order, you can move farther.
A down side to making towers is, if you end your turn while having a tower, you’ll take damage.
Lift command can only be used by, Human-type units, not Monster-type.
Geo Panels and Geo Blocks:
Geo Panels are pieces of land that possess spiritual elements, the building blocks of the Netherworld, dood!
Geo Blocks are the crystallized version of those spiritual elements.Using these elements can have a great advantage to your battle, but if your not smart about it, the battle might just get turned around and possibly get you that Game Over screen everyone loves to see(Sarcasm to the max).
The different colored panels and blocks can have different effects, For instance if you have blue Geo Panels that say +50% enemy defense, and you throw a green Geo Block that has +50% exp on the blue panel and destroy it, all the blue panels will get destroyed and be transformed into green panels, making them +50% exp. Increasing your experience and success rate with the battle.
New features of the game as followed
Magichange:
Magichange is the Monster-type units’ secret weapon, dood! A Monster-type will transform into a weapon when using Magichange, and the Human-type unit standing next to it will use that weapon for stronger attacks, you can both earn exp by doing so. The species of monster will determine what type of weapon it is going to be.
Advantages:
- Tempory use of the monster’s Evility.
- Magichange skills become available.
- Both units gain exp
Disadvantages:
- There is a time limit to the change, can only be used for 3 turns
- Two units count as one, so if you die then the monster weapon will die along with.
- If you end up using all the turns for with that change, whoever Magichanged will disappear.
Demon Fusion:
Only Monster-Types can fuse,when two monster units stand next to each other you can use Demon Fusion. They will become gigantic, and you will get hidden powers.
Advantages:
- Fuse more for higher stats, usually can combine 2 units, but if you use the Special Method, you can fuse up to a max of 4 units.
- Absorb Evilities of fused characters
- Wider skill range, since you are pretty big, you have a wider range of attack.
- Able to push aside enemies or your own units at your destination of choice.
Disadvantages:
- Movement limitations, Enlarged units need a 5 panel area shaped cross.
- Vulnerable to enemy attacks, Basically bigger unit, bigger target.
- SP consumed on each turn costs 20% SP for each turn that goes by. When it reaches 0% the fusion ends.
Fused Magichange:
Well do we really have to describe how this works? But you do have to have certain evil symbols to do this feature.
Overall Disgaea 4 is a fantastic game, everything from the story to Fused Magichange. The graphics my not be the best in the world but the gameplay more than makes up for it. Hours of fun and a great sequel to the Disgaea series. Personally I would recommend this to any Final Fantasy Tactics/Fire Emblem lover, I sure as hell love this game. All the new features and humor in it are great. It has been a while since I’ve played a good Tactical role-playing game and Disgaea 4 is a perfect choice for players that love those kind of character building, strategy type games. I can proudly say this game is definitely my cup of tea.
