Whenever I see your shining soul I just wanna…close…my eyes…or something. Know the song? Eh?? Eh?? In any event, this soul has it all! It has shine…and that’s really all a soul needs, right? As hinted at by the title, this game is a sequel! A sequel to a game called Shining Soul, actually. The Shining Soul series is a spin-off, of sorts. It didn’t spin from another soul, though! No! It spun from something with a bit more…force. That’s correct, Genesis (Sega, not Phil Collins) fans! Shining Force! Unlike Shining Force, Shining Soul is an action RPG where you control a single character.
The main funitude of this game comes from the ability to customize the main character in many different ways. For starters, you can choose from up to eight different character classes (although there is a secret character, it’s just one of the eight classes with higher stats and a new look). These eight classes include mages and warriors of various types, and once you decide which character to be, you can choose from one of 10 color schemes for each character. But that’s not all…no, not EVEN close. You can then decide what type of weapon(s) or spell(s) your character will excel in! And if that isn’t enough fun character creating for you, then congratulations.
The controls! Yes yes YES this game suuuure does have them. It also has visuals and audio! It has all sorts of pretty pictures and sound effects and background music, and you can press buttons and move and hit things…but that’s just not good enough, is it? We’re looking for perfection here! PER-FEC-T-TION! And this game can only reach the “above-average” mark in these categories…*sigh*…so it goes, so it goes. But, however, also, though…this game does reach for the stars with one particular area.
REPLAY VALUE! This game has hordes and hordes of it. If you didn’t start reading this review right here, you’d know that you could create a character. After you do that, though, there is still more game left! You go on a completely non-cliché journey around an island, and later some mainland areas, defeating several bosses along the way and eventually defeating the evil dark power that threatens to take over the whole world! Not exactly a groundbreaking story, here, but what exactly would one expect?
Anyway, after you hack and slash your way through a dozen or so levels of monster filled action/excitement and finally do defeat this evil dark thing, you get the chance to DO IT AGAIN!!! That’s right! This game has a sort of super New Game+ feature, which lets you replay any level you have already beaten at any time during the game, and lets you replay the game in a harder difficulty once you have beaten the final boss. Cool, eh? Yea, you know it. Combine this with the multiplayer feature for a whole boatload of fun times playing this game over and over with your closest buddies.
Business time, business time, we’ll stop on a dime when it’s business time. This game can be businessed for about $29.99 from a GameStop or EB Games, and I’d say it’s worth every penny.
