How:
The game was frequently mentioned on review websites and forums, bought it for 5€ at Gamestop as a first game for the PSP for long trips.
Pros:
- Huge replayability value with loads of extra contents
- Extremely non-linear
- Can be very challenging
- Epic final battle
- Some very good in-game graphics and special effects especially near the end
- Very good character portraits
- Can revisit past events and undertake new paths to get different outcomes
- A lot of different classes, skills, magic spells, items, and so on
- Many special moves that gradually unlock with experience
- Economy works well
- The game records all previous events, dialogues and cut-scenes
Cons:
- The story is very contrived, full of difficult-to-memorize names, and dialogues that are extremely hard to follow
- Sometimes when action happens at the borders of the screen, you cannot see who's aiming at who and what's the induced effect (you only know a posteriori)
- Music is boringly epic
- Some of the game mechanics are too tedious to be actually usable (e.g. recipes, beast hunting)
- Some character classes cannot use certain magic spells for no apparent reason, even if the spell can be learned and the character has the right magic skills
- Not being able to see the map/enemies before entering the battle field greatly reduces the strategic value of the game (e.g. entering a map full of undead without bringing someone able to exorcize them)
- Grinding new characters for experience can be very difficult as the game progresses, since enemy strength is balanced with the player's strength
