User Reviews (1 - 11 of 47)

Show these reviews first:

Highest Rated
Lowest Rated Newest
Oldest Most Helpful
Least Helpful

Overrated, boring, and trite.

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 25 / 61
Date: December 25, 2001
Author: Amazon User

Strange how some people regard Grandia as the best Saturn RPG and one of the best on the PlayStation. While Grandia possesses some interesting qualities, it is completely dismantled by a series of devastating flaws that cripple the game. This review will be formulaic, but it will get the point across.

The graphical engine was very good. 2D characters and 3D environments that can be rotated at will. I like nuances, and Grandia possesses many. I like knocking over teapots and making clotheslines as I walk into them. The spell effects were boring, however, and the FMV, while technically good at the time, just wasn't exciting.

The music is overwrought and almost silly. The main themes seem bombastic and pretentious, as if the game is saying, "Come look at me, I'm important!" The compositions are impressive musically, but they feel emotionally hollow. There is one song, a piano & violin duet, which I loved. It was completely gorgeous. I also liked how the combat music changed as the game continued. RPGs often frustrate me by giving me the same combat music through the entire 40 hour game.

In Grandia, using specific kinds of magic or weapons makes you more skilled in that capacity. Naive gamers have said that Grandia's character growth system is innovative and interesting. It is not innovative, in my mind, and not interesting. Such systems have been done in 8-bit Final Fantasy games and reams of Japanese RPG with lower profiles (the SaGa games come to mind). Also, because the game is so long, you'll probably learn every spell and weapon technique about 50% though the game. Since this removes any real incentive to engage in combat, all future battles are suffocating in how boring they are.

The combat is boring. This is mainly because it is incredibly easy. I didn't spend extra time advancing my characters (I tried to finish the game ASAP, actually), so I definitely wasn't too strong. Still, not a single boss offered any form of challenge. Even the final boss felt like nothing more than a ponderous standard encounter. It seems evident to me that a game cannot be exciting when there is no threat...no sense of danger or challenge. This wouldn't be _that_ bad if the battles didn't take so long. So, you get thousands of long, boring, simple fights over the course of the game. The dungeons are amateur in design, and made about 10 times more dreadful because of the combat. There's also a gauge in combat that shows when when each character will take an action. However, this does not create any real strategy because all the characters move at different speeds, so it's just a funky gimmick.

The story is not bad, but it is badly told. It uses about every hackneyed Japanese RPG element imaginable, but it doesn't remedy this problem with interesting characters or compelling twists. The translation is just dumb. Sony broke it down to simple diction and pure, fatuous juvenalia. The "romantic" relationship between Justin and Feena is basically insulting -- it has the maturity of an elementary school infatuation. Sue is an utterly pointless character, who's involvement in the story is simple arbitrary and ridiculous. What is the creature "Puffy"? The game never explains. I expected some kind of enigmatic quality to the creature, with a revelation disclosing all at some point (like Nall in Lunar). This never happens. It's stupid. The voice acting is hideous. Attemps at humor fall flat. Attempts at emotional expression are cringe-inducing.

The game took me about 50 hours to beat (though I tend to be slower than some). In my mind, the game is about 35 hours too long. So, expect the "meat" of the story to be padded with superfluous side-quests packed with obnoxious combat and torturous dialogue. I like side-quests...when they are optional or purposeful. In this game, the side-quests are neither. Adventures in a ghost ship or on a mysterious prehistoric valley might sound fun on paper, but without important story revelations or fun gameplay, it's boring. Granted about 10 hours of the game is pretty interesting. But that's a mere 20% of the game. In school, that would be an 'F'...a FAILING grade.

The game is just tedious. It's boring and insipid and hackneyed to death. I'm sure there will be many who say, "Grandia rulez! you lie!" and give me a "not helpful" vote. I didn't write this to please anybody...I wrote it because I think Grandia does not deserve the praise it receives. Heed my word, and perhaps you will save 50 hours of you life. That's a long time! 50 Law & Order episodes! A genuinely good RPG! Think about it.

What's so Grand about this game anyway?

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: June 30, 2008
Author: Amazon User

I'm rather baffled by all the positive reviews for this game. I bought it a couple months ago after reading all the good reviews and thinking this game must be a shining gem that has withstood the test of time. Well, now I'm rethinking that assumption... No doubt many people will disagree with me, but on with the review!

Graphics (6/10): Sigh. Everything is pixelated. I'm not sure whether the graphics for this game were considered good when the game was released or not. On the bright side, the character designs are good as well as the towns. The dungeons are another matter, but more on that later.

Music (6/10): I still can't figure out why people claim this game has a great soundtrack. I've even heard people claim that Grandia's music is some of their most favorite of all time. I wonder if Grandia is the only RPG they've ever played? Anyway, the majority of the tracks weren't too bad. Unfortuneately, I remember some pretty bad ones. There's one jungle where the "music" seems to only be ambient jungle wildlife sounds, which got annoying after the 50th bird call. Unlike others, I found the Gumbo song to be one of the most annoying village themes ever. It's okay right at first, but then starts to grate on your nerves the longer you stay in the village. One more thing-the voice acting deserves mention. It's bad. I rank it as the worst voiceing I've ever heard in a game. It sounds like they literally pulled people off the street and offered them $10 to read off some lines. Terrible.

Battle System (8/10): Nothing really wrong with the battle system. It's a variant of turn-based, with a small bar in the corner indicating who will go next. While the bar does let you see when you're characters will go, I didn't really find it all that useful. What keeps this section from a perfect score is the abilities-and how you level them up. Using them over and over again strengthens your magic, but not how you'd expect. SPEED increases, not strength. I found this very frustrating and pointless. The speed doesn't really increase enough to make much difference- and leveling spells takes forever.

Gameplay (4/10): Was the rotating camera really necessary? I've played games with rotating camera angles (like Xenogears) that worked just fine, but in this game it doesn't. The problem lies in dungeon navigation. If the graphics had been better, or if there had been better dungeon design, perhaps navigation wouldn't be so confusing. It's really hard to tell where you are because the dungeon design is so bland and repetitive; there are usually no landmarks with which to navigate, with the result that I actually wound up back at the entrance thinking it was the exit. On another note, something else that bothered me was the fact that even by the end of the game, you couldn't really return to much of anywhere you had been previously. I kept expecting be able to return to Parm eventually, but no such luck.

*NOTE: This part's an extremely important part--the game is glitchy. It would freeze randomly, forcing me to reset and start over. The cds themselves were in good condition with almost no scratches of any kind, and I've heard this same complaint before, which leads me to believe the glitches are a flaw of the game design. This is a huge turnoff--this added in extra frustration to an already boring game. This flaw knocks points off the score.

Characters (7/10): The characters are interesting at first, until you realize that everyone's the same. All possess the same plucky, happy-go-lucky adventurer personality. I have nothing against light-hearted games, but everyone really did seem to have the exact same personality; there was just no balance to the party. Speaking of party, there was a high rate of people joining and then permanently leaving, this (or something else?) really meant that no one really got any siginificant character development. Most everyone had no back story of interest (or at all) and were not well developed.

Story (5/10): Here's where Grandia really starts to "sag in the saddle", so to speak. The first 1/4 of the game and the last 1/4 are interesting and engaging. I really enjoyed the start in Parm; rummaging through people's houses, reading Justin's diary for some amusing stories, and laughing at the way any alcoholic references were changed to "coffee". Man, those were good times. Unfortunately, it all goes downhill from there. The middle of the game becomes a neverending series of filler events. The first couple "villages in need" or "musty old ruins to explore" didn't bother me at all, but after that, I started to feel like I was stuck on the wheel of karma or something. It just got really repetitive, until I just knew the next village I came to would have to be saved by me from some disaster. Well, what I refer to as the "main" story picked about the last quarter of the game, but it wasn't nearly original or interesting enough to make up for the huge amount of filler crap in the middle. By then, only my sheer will power kept me playing to the end.

Overall (4/10): Note this score is not an average, it's my subjective overall score. I must say, given the flaws of this game, I'd never play it again. It's too bad really, it could've been a decent game if the makers had cut out the middle of the "plot" and fixed the glitches. I really wouldn't recommend this to anyone unless they absolutely have played every other good RPG out there and are just dying for something else to play. Even then, it may be better to just replay an old favorite instead.

Good For Beginners, Ideal in fact

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: July 11, 2000
Author: Amazon User

Being an old Sega Saturn owner I used to dream of being able to playing this game in English, now thanks to Uncle Sony I can. I really wanted this game to be the best RPG I'd ever played, along the lines of Phantasy Star IV, Panzor Dragoon Azel or Final Fantasy. But whilst this game is good, it just cannot compete with those games.

Grandia is far too easy, most people sight the fact that the battles are half the fun in this game, believe me they aren't! They become tedious as even the bosses don't pose much of a challenge. I even beat the final boss without a scratch!

Plus points are that the story is nice, if a little perdictable, but it really picks up the pace on the second disc. If you're new to RPG's than I can think of no better introduction to the genre, the young may find this fun also.

Boring or charming?

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 2 / 4
Date: July 16, 2001
Author: Amazon User

I'm having great trouble recommending Grandia because of its tendency to become extremely boring. This happens for several reasons: first off, the game offers nil challenge - and I do mean none whatsoever. Secondly, the "real" story hardly unfolds until the latter part of the second disk. Meanwhile, the player is occupied with the various and sundry sidequests, like saving villages and defeating evil monsters - things that don't have any bearing at all to the central story.

The story itself, involving a lad named Justin who hopes to become a famous adventurer, relies heavily on the backstory, which in turn is very vague and muddled. The tale of the ancient empire of Angelou and its eventual fall due to the corruption of its people is hardly inspired. What keeps Grandia together, however, is the excellent characterization: the people of Grandia are convincingly human, if a bit mellow, though the awful voice acting spoils the effect of some of the key scenes.

Gameplay-wise, Grandia has some interesting ideas, but it executes them so they contribute to the tedium. For example, magic and special moves aren't gained when the character levels up: instead, each character can increase his proficiency with the various elements (fire, water, wind, and earth) and weapon types (swords, daggers, whips, projectiles, etc.), thus gaining attribute boosts and special moves. However, this interesting arrangement ultimately makes even the most routine battles longer since the characters are forced to cast magic as often as possible to increase their abilities.

The ability to see enemies in the dungeons (like in Chrono Cross) is also welcome, though enemies move extremely quickly and there is a whole lot of them, so you can expect to fight just as often as in any other RPG.

However, the actual battle system is very nicely done and becomes very intuitive with practice. In addition to the usual variables, the player must also take into account his distance to the target and its "openness", since the characters actually move around the battle field. Also, Grandia has a visual aid to help you figure out whose turn is next - the "IP Gauge." Being able to stun enemies and knock them back on this gauge - and get knocked back yourself - adds an element of strategy to every battle, which would be very nice if the game offered any challenge. As things are, the battle system goes to waste.

Graphically, Grandia is clean and bright, with colorful sprites on fully polygonal backgrounds. Unfortunately, some of the enemy sprites are less than pretty, and some magic spells are downright embarassing. There are some short bits of FMV, but the single anime sequence is repeated far too often.

Grandia might possibly be suited for young players who could appreciate the low challenge, whacky voice-overs, and charming story. Older gamers who are looking for a more purposeful adventure should look elsewhere.

A good game, but not great

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 1 / 5
Date: August 02, 2002
Author: Amazon User

Well, after a couple of months, I have finally beaten Grandia. All in all, the action of the game was good, the growth system fantastic, although the combat-laden progression of the story got tedious at times. In general, I would have beaten such a game in a couple of weeks, and it would have received 4 (maybe 4 and a half) stars.
HOWEVER...
This game took me a couple of months because I could not STAND the glitches. Ever so often, the game would freeze up on me, which caused me endless frustration. Were it not for the fact that I could save so often (which in general makes a game very easy), I would have returned the game long ago. However, I stayed the course, and the game itself was pretty good. I have to drop a star off of its rating, however.

Review

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 16 / 18
Date: November 29, 1999
Author: Amazon User

Gradia is a game recently ported to the playstation from the deceased sega saturn. A great game as far as RPG's are concerned. The game offers solid gameplay, a good plot, and most of all in-depth characterization. Something not found in the current RPG's. Although it may not offer as much "eye candy" as other games (like the current Final Fantasies) the game does go farther in terms of its plot and characterization. Something that appears to have been lost with all the new playstation role-playing games. The game offers a variety of challenges, and is probably by far one of the best RPG's since Final Fantasy VI, Chrono Trigger, and the even newer Xenogears.

A very good RPG

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 7 / 7
Date: December 04, 1999
Author: Amazon User

Different theme then most RPG's these days. Based on a sense of adventure rather then the usual go out and save the world. Graphics have their own feel and are very good although they don't have the visual splendor that are found in Final Fantasy 7&8. What the game lacks in visual splendor it more then makes up for in character. I enjoyed Final Fantasy 8 greatly and to my surprise I enjoyed this game just as much. Don't pass this one up! Some of the best RPG's are missed due to very little exposure on T.V or magazines. 9.0 out of 10.0

Simple Clean Fun With a Price

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 5 / 5
Date: May 17, 2004
Author: Amazon User

Grandia is simply a gem. The cast of characters are a little predictable, but definitely distinct and unique from one another. It is a decent port from the Dreamcast, but I have seen better.
+ Level Up System:
You level up just like any other RPG with experience points after each battle. However, your weapon level up upon their usage. Each character can use up to three different weapons. Upon leveling up a weapon, something is leveled up such as HP, Vitality, Strength ect. This is the same for magic. Magic is first aquired by finding Mana Eggs and using them to buy magic. Afterwards, the more you use a certain magic, (Fire, Water, Earth, Wind) you level it up, giving you more skills. This makes leveling up a lot more fun, and even adds to the battles as you need to use certain magics to aquire new skill.

+Battle System
This is one of the best types of Battle System. First of all, it is a mixture of active time and turn base battle. Every enemy shares the same Active Time Bar. Once a character reaches a certain point, you have all the time you need to select your attack. Not only that, but certain attacks can affect the active time greatly, sending the enemy, (or your characters) backwards in the active time bar. OH! And did I mention there are NO random battles. The enemies run around in the screen with you, and you see them before you come in contact. Once defeated they disappear. Come close enough to them, and they will chase you though.

+Characters
There are a few characters that join and leave the party. However, there are two that stay throughout the entire game, (Justin and Feena). Each character has their own history, personality, and special movies. This still does not make for good character development though. They are highly predictable. The voice acting and even dialog script is laughable. Such phrases such as; "100,000,000 DEGREES! TAKE THAT!" and "OH WIND, TWIST LIKE A TORNADO!" seems a little cheesy for me during battle.

+Graphics:
The graphics are decent, but there's nothing special about them. The world is in 3D and the camera can be rotated.

+Story:
The story seems very cliche to me. A young adventurer named Justin wants to find new quests for himself. He's a troublemaker and later finds himself on the journey of a lifetime. He meets up with many new people and eventually realizes only he (with the help of his friends) can save the world. It is not very unique or at all intriguing enough, but many of the small side stories is what makes it interesting.

+Overall:
This is a great game! It's fun and well worth your money. It claims to give over a hundred hours of gameplay, but I beat it in 47 hours. Though the character and stories are weak, the gameplay is not. Grandia II is just as good, and with the hopes of another Grandia to follow, things should only improve.

Pros:
Great system for leveling up magic/skills
Fun battle system!
Good length for a game

Cons:
Laughable dialog and voice acting
Weaker story / cliche / cheesy at times
Very linear

Great RPG for sure, but not for everyone

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: April 18, 2000
Author: Amazon User

I played this game after finishing Lunar:SSSC, and I had really high hopes for Grandia, being made by Game Arts and all. I think I was spoiled by Lunar though. I have to admit, this game didn't impress me much and failed to make my personal Top 10 list. It still is a great RPG worthy of 5 stars, but I didn't get the same satisfaction that other gamers received. Grandia is a very long game, I had just over 90 hours clocked when I beat it, which included completing all 3 hidden dungeons. The story is a very good one, but it is drawn out so much I sometimes forgot key elements that hadn't been brought up for hours. Rather than being thrown into a story and playing it from that point, like FFVll for instance, your characters in Grandia slowly adventure their way through the story and it develops as you continue. On your journey which spans 3 continents, the main character Justin will start out as a rather immature boy, but finishes his quest as a mature hero. There are a bunch of characters who help Justin in his adventure, including my favorites, Sue and her pet Puffy. The party will encounter many quests on their journey which allow the story to unravel.

The best aspect of Grandia is the battle system. I like seeing the enemies on screen before I fight, something that I'd like to see in all RPG's. The battling itself was fun, it was cool being able to level up individual weapons, but leveling magic was kind of tedious. I especially loved the ability to pass on earned exp. points of characters that have left the party, to other characters. I don't recall seeing this feature in other RPG's I've played, and it really should be incorporated in future games. The characters were well done too, but I didn't get attached to them at all. Most of them either leave just when you're beginning to like them, or come too late in the game for you to get to know them. One of the things I didn't like in Grandia was the poor voice acting, which was superb point, were well done, but others, especially Milda and Justin were plain irritating. I had to laugh when I heard Col.Mullen's voice, was that actor tortured into doing his part? This is something that can shape your image of a certain character, if a voice is bad for instance, your image of that character may be a negative one. I believe this is why characters in the Final Fantasy games don't have voices, there's no fear of turning gamers off just by how a character sounds. The graphics were pretty good, even for being 2 years old. The CG sequences were good, but unnecessary. They didn't do much for the story and were very few and far between. The majority of them can be seen simply by watching the credits before even starting the game. The music was effective in its respective environments and is actually creepy in some cases, especially a track played in certain ruins that has subtle voices in the background. There aren't any awesome vocal pieces though, which I think the game would have benefitted from. Like I mentioned before, the game is very long, which would be a good thing if the extra length had relevance to the main story. Instead of focusing on the story at hand, a good chunk of these quests Justin embarks on are simple retrieval tasks that do nothing but make Justin a hero in whatever town he is aiding. It came to the point where playing the game turned into a chore rather than being a fun experience. I think this was the main story though, Justin going on quests and becoming stronger while the search for Angelou and General Baal was put on the backburner. Definitely not my kind of story, but other gamers love that kind of thing. Overall, Grandia is a great RPG that will appeal to some and turn off others. If you're the kind of gamer who likes a lot of fighting and adventuring, this is the game for you. But if you're one who likes deep, immersive stories and well-developed characters that stick around for the ride, Grandia may not cut it.

This is a great beginner's RPG that can be played by anyone who can read game text and understand it, 10 years and older sounds appropriate.

*3.5/5 stars which rounds to 4.

Not the best port, but still a fine game

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: January 19, 2003
Author: Amazon User

Pros:
-A fun, stoyline.
-Charming, likable characters.
-One of the coolest battle engines for an rpg.
-Character development (ability-wise), one of the best seen on a console.

Cons:
-Voice acting is some of the worst I have ever heard.
-Game is a tad easy.
-Some slowdown.
-A few extra areas or mini games would have helped to break the linearality.

Overall:
The storyline will keep you engaged and with the exception of Gadwin, you will absolutely fall in love with the characters. The game is fun, has one of the coolest battle and ability upgrading systems seen on a console. Not perfect, but the good definitely outweighs the bad.

Review Page: 1 2 3 4 5 Next 

Actions