Pocket-Sized Polish- Hexyz Force Review

SeanNOLA’s Take: Legends say that at the end of its life, an elephant will instinctively travel to a barren place, where it will wait to die away from its pack, surrounded by the bones of the ancestoral pacaderms. It seems like traditional Japanese RPGs have been using the PlayStation Portable as their Elephant’s Graveyard for some time now – rehashing antiquated tropes and storylines, and waiting for the sweet embrace of financial indefeasibly to shuffle the genre off to Video Game Valhalla. However, just when fans of the genre are ready to give up and dig themselves out of the mountain of tired moé garbage that has plagued the system; they see a shining beacon of hope that calls to them with its siren song. “Hey, this game is kinda okay, I guess, for a JRPG on the PSP,” it sings to them, steering them into the potentially hazardous waters. Hexyz Force has been the brightest beacon I’ve witnessed in quite some time.

Despite all the buzz around developer, Sting Entertainment, I couldn’t help but approach Hexyz Force the same way I approach my desk job: with a cup of strong coffee and a sense of begrudging familiarity. The story revolves around the world of Berge, which was split into halves, a light half and a dark half, during an ancient war between the gods. Now, hundreds of years later, the world is in danger of being destroyed by a terrible force, powered by hate and lust for power. There are two intertwining stories to play through, one as a snarky, flirtatious teenage girl trying whose temple home is attacked by monsters, while the other stars a knight revolting against his king for killing innocent elves in the forest. At first glance, there is absolutely nothing here that you haven’t already experienced a hundred times over. However, within the first few hours of Hexyz Force, I was horrified to learn that I was actually smiling.

The map-aided dungeon-crawling is punctuated by fights, which are thankfully triggered by bumping into enemies, rather than random occurrence. The turn-based combat does very little new, aside from the addition of an elemental pattern system. Each character can carry up to 4 weapons at a time; each with a different element. Each time a friend or foe attacks, their element is added to a cue. Stronger attacks become available by creating specific elemental patterns, such as 5 fire attacks in a row, or alternating wind and earth attacks. The small change makes tough encounters feel a lot like dynamic puzzles, rather than menu mashers.

Hexyz Force never sets out to reinvent the wheel (or even the tire, for that matter) it adds so much polish to the antiques that it all feels new again. Even though the character design and game world are thematically uninspired, they look great. The environments are rich and the character models are very crisp. The character animations are a little stilted, and the paper-doll story telling mechanic only serves to make you avatars feel that much more lifeless. It really is a shame that such nice looking models are covered up by uninspired talking heads – I would have much rather seen my avatars act out the dialog, rather than two cardboard cut-outs waggle back-and-forth to one another.

The story those talking heads are telling is actually not terrible. The fully animated cut scenes are surprisingly well acted and the script, for the most part, does not read like an 8th-grader’s creative writing project. The setting and build-up are derivative, but the characters and motives are actually interesting and enjoyable. There are compassionate heroes, sympathetic villains, vague political intrigue and just enough humor to balance out the mood. There are two story lines to play through, each weighing in at about thirty hours a piece. The protagonists from each cross paths at certain points during the game, but for the most part, the two quests operate independently of one another.  That is a lot of game, if you have to patience for it.

Playing Hexyz Force is like finding a BigMac in the desert: you know in the back of your mind that you’ve had better sandwiches, but when you’re starving to death, it’s a hell of a lot better than eating sandy camel pies. Much like Mad World and The Conduit were called ‘good games…for the Wii!” the same can be said for Hexyz Force in regards to the PSP. When compared to other recent JRPGs made available on the platform, it is a polished gem, but would easily be buried by scores of other adventures found elsewhere.  Hexyz Force is an excellent role playing game for the PlayStation Portable, which translates into a pretty good experience over all – hopefully it has raised the bar for what we can expect on the platform.