The Last Remnant was the second Xbox 360 exclusive from Square-Enix. It follows the story of Rush Sykes and his search for his sister who was kidnapped from their home. In his search he meets the Marquis of Athlum, Lord David, pronounced Daveed, and his generals.
The most noticeable thing about this game was the battle system. In a break from tradition you didn’t control your main character you controlled their union or team of up to 5 people. You didn’t have control over each members actions rather gave them a broad idea, for example use magic attacks called mystic arts, or combat attacks called combat arts. Each member then used a corresponding action depending on how many Action Points the union had.
The story was enough to keep me playing, I just got stuck on a side quest so had to start again, I explain why in the next paragraph. The battles may seem complicated but they can be picked up really quickly and give you something a bit more to think about. The graphics can get a little heavy when you have a lot of characters/enemies on the battle field, but it’s generally not too bad.
My biggest annoyance with this game was the levelling up system. You don’t get experience from each monster you kill, instead your skills level up depending on the use of them. Now the game tells you to try and get as many monsters into a battle as possible to increase your battle rank, however what you really need to do is avoid battles as much as possible as your stat upgrades come from fighting monsters that are stronger than you. It took me most of a play through to find this out and then started again following the tips I had found on how to do better.
Overall I enjoyed the Last Remnant once I was playing properly. The storyline is strong and the game play is decent. If you want something a bit different to your turn-based JRPG’s then give Last Remnant a go. As a little nugget of gaming gold the voice actor who plays Rush was one of the original Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers.
