There's been some pretty good RPGs coming out on the Xbox 360. Most of them have been awesome, but everyone once in while there's one that just doesn't quite cut the mustard. Unfortunately, Square Enix's Infinite Undiscovery has trouble even getting the jar open.
Infinite Undiscovery takes place in a world containing a moon, which is the home of a god who is considered the source of magical blessings upon humans. Those that are born under certain phases of the moon are tattooed with sigils known as Lunaglyphs, which grant powers and abilities. A group called the Order of Chains has shackled the moon to the ground, disrupting the flow of power and balance, thus bringing disarray. The hope and fate of the world rests in the hand of Sigmund the Liberator who has the power to cut the chains and restore order. You take on the role of Capell, a musician who mysteriously looks like Sigmund.
The character personalities are well defined and enjoyable. The dialogue, which is mostly voiced over, really fleshes out the almost 20 playable characters. Narrative inserts are engaging and something to look forward to as it enhances the story.
The gameplay leaves something to be desired. There are many aspects to the combat, which is good and bad. Although real-time combat provides a variety of moves, the amount of button-pressing that comes with performing the abilities is overwhelming and hard to remember at times resulting in constant sifting through the tutorial for a refresher course. You have the basing weak, but fast attack and the strong, but slow attack as well as combos. These are hard to connect on mobile foes due to the lack of target autolock and lengthy animations. You will always be controlling Capell, but the “Connect” feature allows you to issue commands to allies and utilize their abilities either in combat or through small puzzle-solving situations. If you die then you have to wait and hope that a party member sees fit to revive you before the timer ticks down and it’s game over.
The lack of save points right before boss battles can be frustrating, resulting in a lengthy retracing and refighting your way through a dungeon or area if you die during the encounter. Seeing as how some of the boss fights are complicated and may take a few tries to get the fight down, you may be doing this a lot.
Visually, this is one of the prettiest games out there.The world is beautiful and full of color and detail, but the directions you are given to find the next waypoint are extremely vague, which makes it easy to get lost along the winding paths. You will come across the frequent “go south” or “go west” and that’s it. It’s sounds simple enough but a few landmarks to look for from the quest-giver would have made the search a lot easier and less time-consuming.
As far as RPGs’ go, Infinite Undiscovery comes in short at about 20 hours. There’s just not much there but the basic storyline and stunning graphics. Features like item creation add a bit of side enjoyment but not enough to make you feel as though you got your money’s worth. Pass on this tittle at its’ current price of $39.99, but if you can find it in a bargain bin or Gamefly it, then give it a shot.
Labels: Douceswild, role-playing-games, Square-Enix, XBox-360
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