Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes review

Summary

I did not start to get acclimated to the vintage style of Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes until the game was a little bit closer to its conclusion. During the course of the role-playing game, I gained the knowledge that I should carry as many healing and reviving supplies as I could before engaging in a boss battle; nevertheless, this knowledge did not adequately prepare me for what we were about to encounter.

When I eventually defeated a late-game monster that I had been having trouble with, I let out a breath of relief. However, I was surprised to learn that it had a second phase. That was to be expected in a role-playing game, but there was no way I could have anticipated being trapped in a pseudo-time loop.

The monster unleashed a massive cinematic assault that my injured and bruised team had little hope of surviving, which resulted in a game over screen that gave me the opportunity to replay the encounter. In an effort to change the course of my actions, I confronted the boss once again, only to have it use the same fatal strike that it had used before. It didn’t matter how many times I went through this cycle; the result was always the same. Eventually, I simply gave up and opted to start my game from the place where I had had the most recent save.

Hundred Heroes review

In Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes, a classic role-playing game that serves as a spiritual successor to the Suikoden series, that one short event embodies every single annoyance that keeps the game from reaching its full potential. A lack of regard for quality of life and bad performance on Nintendo Switch bring this intriguing throwback down, despite the fact that it has a tale that is interesting, colorful characters, and turn-based fights that are impressive.

Hundred Heroes review: 1 versus 100

Nowa, the commander of the Alliance’s resistance, is the protagonist of Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred warriors. He is tasked with assembling warriors from all around the continent of Allraan in order to fight back against the oppressive Dux Aldric and his Empire. What makes that narrative so captivating is the fact that it is constantly switching allegiances between a number of different participants. There are many who see the light and turn their allegiance to Nowa, while there are others who betray the Alliance for their own self-centered motives. I kept wondering right up to the very end since there is a continual tug-of-war going on between both sides.

Heroes are characterized by lively personalities that give them a sense of individuality.

The villainous character of Dux Aldric is really interesting. Despite the fact that he seems to be a brutal tyrant for the most part, his reasons appear to be reasonable. He is looking for more rune lenses, which, when worn, bestow extraordinary powers on the wearer. On the other hand, a significant number of them are held by a select few individuals who enjoy privilege, and Dux Aldric intends to democratize them. According to him, the aims justify the methods; thus, even if it is noble, it is contaminated by violence. The addition of this gives Dux Aldric, the antagonist, a great deal of complexity, and the excellent pace of Hundred Heroes ensured that I remained attentive for the whole of the game.

The narrative structure and cast of characters in Hundred Heroes are comparable to those found in Unicorn Overlord, which was released this year. As is the case with the protagonist of the latter, Alain, Nowa has the ability to recruit new individuals from all throughout Allraan. In spite of the fact that there are a great number of them, they each have vivid personalities that give them a sense of individuality. There are a few characters that I really appreciate, such as Francesca, a nurse who has an ironically short and violent temper, and Goldsmid, a goat-giant hybrid who is evocative of the demonic Baphomet (but is actually the kindest person ever who loves to pick things up for you). Both of these characters are among my favorites.

Even though not everyone is capable of engaging in combat, they may still be used as support characters that possess unique talents. While Yulin, the maid, doubles the amount of experience obtained while in the party, Janquis, the butler, doubles the amount of money won at the conclusion of the fight. Due to the fact that players are only allowed to carry one support character at a time, they are obliged to give careful consideration to the order in which they wish to prioritize their party setup responsibilities.

In order to assist with the Nowa’s headquarters, such as the cultivation of crops, it is possible to enlist other characters who are not involved in combat. The overwhelming range of character types is mirrored in the fact that they all stick about headquarters, gradually contributing to the resistance force. This provides a depth of friendship among the characters and makes the game more immersive.

Minigames are abundant in Hundred Heroes, and one of them involves re-building the headquarters itself. It is possible to change the location into a vast, tiny town by using a variety of materials, such as stone and wood and by enlisting the appropriate individuals. In addition, there is a war minigame that is comparable to Risk, in which players may organize soldiers to fend off invaders. It is true that the forces get more powerful as more characters are recruited. (The names of the donors of the Kickstarter campaign are really the names of the faceless non-player characters who fight under commanders; this is a cunning allusion to the game’s development beginnings.)

These minigames are not all exceptional in their own right. There is a sand boat racing game that has lousy controls, and because to the poor performance of the Switch version, it was difficult to even finish the game. One of the characters that may be recruited can only be unlocked after achieving a certain time placement. After numerous futile tries, I eventually threw away the towel and went on without her.

Hundred Heroes review: Collaboration is what makes the dream come true

Nowa goes around the whole of Allraan in order to enlist the support of supporters for his cause while also preventing Aldric’s minions from advancing on a number of different cities and dungeons. At times, the narrative may not seem to be in a state of urgency; this serves as a signal for Nowa to go out and find more individuals to recruit in order to drive it ahead. Because of this, there is a lot of breathing room in the storyline of the game between all of the political tension amongst the characters.

Because a single mistake may throw off my rhythm, I need to carefully think out my strategy before I approach the situation.

Neither the map nor the field include any indications of the characters that are available for recruitment. The players are required to seek out every nook and cranny across the whole of Allraan, yet their sprites are easily distinguishable from one another. Have you ever seen a man wearing a crown and crimson robes moving about amid a gathering of people who seem to be from the same town? There is a good chance that he can be recruited. It felt like I had just unearthed a diamond amid a pile of pebbles when I happened to find a new character to recruit. It was a really satisfying experience.

Putting all of that effort into the turn-based gameplay of Hundred Heroes, which pits six heroes against each other at the same time, pays dividends. The strategic difficulty of choosing various assaults while keeping in mind the timetable of when my friends and adversaries will strike is something that I really like having to deal with. It is essential that I carefully plan out my strategy, particularly when it comes to boss fights, since even a single mistake might quickly throw off my rhythm. When a teammate has taken a significant blow, there is nothing more frustrating than frantically trying to defend them.

Auto-battle is a helpful choice for those who do not like to show off their mental prowess to a significant degree. It gives characters the ability to take action on their own to eliminate opponents. If you simply want to plow through conflicts, this is an excellent technique to prevent your brain from functioning properly. In the auto-battle mode, the behavior of the AI may also be modified. In situations where there are more than four foes on the screen, I have the ability to instruct my squad to utilize certain strong spells. In the event that there is just one opponent remaining on the field, this is a very helpful way to prevent your magic user from deciding to perform their spell that consumes the most MP.

The main combat concept is made even more interesting by the addition of additional fighting variations. There is a mechanic known as Hero Combos, which allows select character pairings to launch cinematic collaboration attacks that do a significant amount of damage to monsters if both of them are present in the party. It is a breathtaking experience to see moments like that in Hundred Heroes because of the game’s amazing combination of character-sprite graphics and digital landscapes.

Hundred Heroes review: A relic to the extreme

In spite of the fact that I have a lot of positive things to say about the fighting, the fact that Hundred Heroes is a vintage game takes away from some of its features, such as Hero Combos. The fact that there is no way to skip through the animations that occur during battles means that players are forced to watch the same ones over and over again. Additionally, Hundred Heroes has traditional random encounters, and it is very frustrating to be forced to endure the game’s never-ending conflicts, particularly in situations where it is not always possible to escape.

There is a severe deficiency in the quality of life aspects across the board. Upon interaction with save locations, the most apparent omission is that they do not replenish the player’s health and maximum power. When I reach the conclusion of a long dungeon at the save point immediately before a boss battle and my group is not in any form to face it, this provides a significant challenge for me. In every one of these scenarios, I had to trek all the way back to a town, spend the night at the inn in order to restore my party, and then drag my butt back to the save point, all the while attempting to reduce the number of random encounters that I triggered. This is how a lot of older role-playing games operate, so choices like that could make some people happy. In my opinion, it serves as a useful reminder of the reasons why evolution is a positive thing.

There is a possibility that Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes is too true to itself.

In Suikoden games, there are often party members that can be recruited and who make these types of capabilities available to the player. In the game Hundred Heroes, you come across a character that has the ability to teleport. In this manner, the party is able to unlock quick travel. In addition, there is a female character that can be added to your party if you want to make her your support character. This includes the option to change your party at save points. In the event that there is a support character that can restore full health and maximum power at save locations, I have not yet been able to locate such a necessary ability. Despite the fact that this type of worldbuilding and execution is great, I do wish that some of these capabilities were simply regular features rather than being conditional.

This frustration is amplified by the fact that Hundred Heroes will throw in a gauntlet of combat on several occasions. These encounters sometimes require me to fight up to four waves of foes in succession, and I do not have the option to heal, save, or use equipment in between. When I came into a situation in which I did not have sufficient healing supplies for a boss fight, I had to reload an earlier save in order to get them. After that, I had to go through the full war minigame again before engaging in the boss fight. My excitement was completely depleted for no other reason than those regular pain locations.

It is also the case that Hundred Heroes does not do well on Switch. There were a couple updates that were released throughout the review time, which, thankfully, helped to relieve some of the early problems that were encountered. In the past, there was a wait of five seconds between hitting the menu button and the menu appearing. This delay has been reduced to one second. Although there are still some issues, such as frame rate stuttering when exploring the open world and some glaring pop-in difficulties, there are still some complaints. Suddenly, trees and plants materialize out of nowhere, and the loading times between moving through the various places continue to be quite lengthy.

In its role as a successor to Suikoden, Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes may be said to be true to an extreme degree. The war tale is superior to those found in the majority of Fire Emblem games, and the fact that it has such a colorful cast of characters is a real highlight. In addition, the turn-based combat system is among the very finest that I have seen in the form of a similar system in recent years. An annoyingly archaic role-playing game concept and a lack of quality-of-life elements are two things that put a damper on the whole adventure. There are a few things that may have been done differently to make Nowa’s narrative a more compelling tale to bring back from the front lines.

This review was conducted on the Nintendo Switch version of Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes.