The release of Reminisce marks the second volume of the .hack//G.U. series following the successful first volume, Rebirth. While it is unclear on just how successful .hack//G.U. Rebirth was in terms of sales overall, Rebirth was definitely as success to the fans that did buy and played the game. Well at least it was a success to the majority of the fans that did play Rebirth. Reminisce picks up right where the Rebirth cliffhanger left off leaving all of us fans wondering what will happen next in this exciting G.U. storyline. Let's take a review look at the second volume to see if Reminisce is able to carry the exciting hype feeling that Rebirth left us with when we finish that game.
STORY
Tri-Edge is back with friends.
Become stronger Haseo.
Reminisce picks up where Rebirth ended with a cliffhanger of Atoli being infected by AIDA after Haseo and the team of G.U. defeated Tri-Edge in battle. Haseo and G.U. were able to save Atoli from AIDA but the cost of the rescue was Atoli losing her Epitah which resulted in making AIDA stronger, allowing AIDA to spread throughout "The World" faster. More and more players in "The World" are now becoming infected with AIDA. In fact AIDA has grown so powerful that is was able to transfer all the players within "The World" into its own duplicate server called the AIDA server where players within the game ended trapped on the AIDA server without any means of logging out and back into the real world. And if things couldn't get any worse, Tri-Edge defeat at the hands of Haseo and his friends seem premature as Tri-Edge makes a return appearance within "The World". This time around however he's not alone as he's accompanied by two other strange figures resembling Orca and Balmung from .hack//SIGN. With the threat of AIDA growing larger and larger, Haseo enlisted the help of past adversaries such as Alkaid, Endurance, Matsu, and Sakubo in the aid to fight against AIDA. Even if AIDA is stopped, will this mean the end of Tri-Edge and his friends? Reminisce will finally reveal the secret of Tri-Edge as this second volume in the trilogy of .hack//G.U. begins.
Overall this chapter was pretty good on its own. It started strong with the re-introduction of Tri-Edge (Kite) but this time Tri-Edge is back with his two friends with what one can see was Orca and Balmung. This created a sense of mystery and excitement within the storyline. If you're a .hack//Sign fans that alone will have you giggling with anticipation in hoping there might be a connection between .hack//Sign and .hack//G.U. Unfortunately the story shifted to Sakaki and his motives and character in question. This is where the story started to leave me with a somewhat bad feeling. I personally like Sakaki and his character in volume 1 and seeing the story sort of shifted his cool, mature status into a lunatic status seem sort of a far out in the left field sort of plot development. Then as you get near the end of the story, the final revelation on Tri-Edge too was a bit of a disappointment. I won't go into spoiling the plotlines but lets just say the secret of Tri-Edge was kind of a let down for me as I was hoping it had some sort of connection to the past series, .hack//Sign. But outside of those personal disappointments, the chapter was an entertaining one. There wasn't much of a cliffhanger though at the end of the story like there was in Rebirth. Reminisce story didn't exactly left you wanting to know more about volume 3 unlike Rebirth did when you finish playing Rebirth.
Score 8/10
CHARACTERS
The Descendants.
No new characters were really introduced in this second chapter but with such an all star cast of characters from the first volume, new characters aren't needed. What you do see is a bit of a shift and focus on some of the characters that were introduced in the first chapter. We are mainly talking about characters that served as supporting characters in the first volume getting elevated to main character status in this volume. This actually helps their character development as back in the first volume while they were supporting characters they didn't really received much attention than. Examples of supporting characters from Rebirth that got promoted to main character status are Alkaid, Endurance, and Sakubo. And if you are a Rebirth fan than you know these three characters were great supporting characters that deserve to be promoted to main character status. There are other characters too that were given much more spotlight than what they got in the first volume. What this does in the end is give the entire cast of .hack//G.U. a well rounded crew with each character having a strong presentation in the game. The voice acting in each of these characters continues to be top notch in the series so far.
Score: 9/10
GRAPHICS
"The World", a place of beauty.
The game's graphics are identical to the first game which isn't a surprise since the engine and design of the entire game was pretty much an off shoot of Rebirth. .hack//G.U. is pretty much one big rpg game that's been chopped up into three parts so the look and sound of each chapter should be similar to one another. Just like with Rebirth, the strength of Reminisce graphical look is its story scenes, background environments, anime character designs, and the excellent lighting and coloring of this game. The weaknesses that still plague the game graphics are the designs of dungeons and fields where things look a bit too ordinary and dull. Each new fields and new dungeons still look the same one after the other. The only difference is that some fields or dungeons are larger than the other. The new city of Dol Dona seems a bit average in designs and small compare to the first city of Mac Anu. But overall these weaknesses in the game graphics are minor at best as the game overall still gorgeous to look at most of the time.
Score: 9/10
MUSIC
It is time for me to make my entrance?
The musical track once again is by far one of the best out there. There are more tracks in this game than what was in the first game. New tracks are introduce that are mixed in with tracks that were introduce from Rebirth giving the overall musical soundtrack as one of the best rpg sound in the genre. Unlike with most rpg games, Reminisce will give you many tracks that you can consider your favorites in the game. Usually a good to great rpg game usually have about 3 super top musical tracks that define the game to gamers but with Reminisce, you'll be loving almost every tune as each of them are composed and orchestrated excellently. This is pretty much Rebirth soundtrack with excellent new musical scores added. What I like about Reminisce soundtrack is that the game developers made sure this is a serious epic soundtrack where every score has a serious tone to it that defines the story as an epic story before told. The voice acting in volume two is once again top notch with previous voice actors returning with the exception of the voice actor who did the voice of Ovan in the first volume. It's not 100% sure but I believe the voice actor who did the voice of Ovan in this chapter is different from the person that provided Ovan voice in the first volume. In all honestly everything is perfect in this game when it comes to music and sound effects. It's just more quantity to an already outstanding quality.
Score: 10/10
GAMEPLAY
The bigger they are, the harder they fall.
Kicking Chim Chim time.
Game Information
Genre: Action RPG
Publisher: Namco Bandai Games
Disc: 1 DVD Disc
Memory: 489 KB
Players: 1 Player Mode
Analog Control: Yes
Vibration Function: Yes
Rating: Teen
Release: May 2007
Assuming that you've already played .hack//G.U. Rebirth than you would already know by now how the gameplay is set up in .hack//G.U. Reminisce. Pretty much all of the gameplay elements from Rebirth was converted over to Reminisce. You can also port over your Rebirth save file onto Reminisice to get a small extra feature but it's nothing too big. The setting of the game has change or moved to a new city, Dol Dona, from Mac Anu in the first volume. You can still access Mac Anu but most of the storyline, quests, and areas will involve you playing on the new server that the city of Dol Dona resides in. Like before you are controlling Haseo and two of his friends in an action real time hack and slash gameplay. You be logging back and forth between "The World" and your desktop to check up on e-mails to acquire bookmark keyword areas where you can use the Chaos Gate to warp to the dungeon or field that the bookmark takes you. Your objective for both dungeons and fields is to gain access to the Beast Temple to open the chest there. Making your way to the Beast Temple also progresses the storyline of the game. The game is fairly straight forward. Anytime you get stuck in terms of not knowing where to go or what to do next, checking your e-mail or the city map usually will give you a blue circle indicating for you to go to that location to get the story going. Here's a quick rerun of the returning key features that was available in Rebirth but now for Reminisce.
Desktop: Your virtual desktop is very similar to a real desktop. You have access to your e-mails, latest news, internet forums, and desktop media such as music and wallpapers. Here you can make contact with your party members outside of the game when you aren't playing The World and catch up on the latest news on the real world outside of The World. The World: The World is made up of three sections, the actual game itself where you need to log in to play The World, the official website of The World, and the official forum of The World where players that play The World can interact with one another and exchange thoughts and ideas. In other words, The World is set up just like a real MMORPG game that you would normally play outside of Playstation 2 games. Previously "The World" was made up of just two areas, city of Mac Anu and the battle arena area known as Lumina Cloth. In Reminisce, the game introduces a second smaller city called Dol Dona. Chaos Gate: Chaos Gate is the warp gate to town, fields, and dungeons. Just like with all previous .hack games, you can access bookmark areas where you have already learned the keywords from e-mail conversation, topics in the forums, or just from party members. You can also have the Chaos Gate put together random keywords to create a random area for you as well. If you prefer to do it manually than you can just plainly match up different keywords that you have learned and picked up during your adventure to create your own access areas as well. The big change made to Chaos Gates in Reminisce is that you can now upgrade the functions of your Chaos Gate in dungeons and fields. By upgrading your @Home, you can open up functions for you to transport from one Chaos Gate to the next, access your storage from @Home through your Chaos Gate, and even access your @Home Alchemy Factory for you to alchemize your weapons, armors, and accessories. @Home: @Home is the entry point for all normal Guilds for all the players that play in The World. In other words, if you wish to drop off items in your Guild inventory, sell items through the Guild Shop, check out the Book of 1000s, visit the Alchemy and Bike Factories, or just plain visit your Guild, than you would go to the @Home area and enter the @Home to access your Guild. In Reminisce, your @Home has been moved from Mac Anu to Dol Dona. Guild Shops: Certain Guild Shops will appear during certain time in Mac Anu and Dol Dona. Guild Shops sell items and equipment that normal shops don't usually sell. Haseo (you, the player) also has his own Guild Shop. You should sell your excessive items through your Guild Shop than to a NPC shop as you will get more money back by selling items through your Guild Shop than through a NPC Shop. Trades: Like with the previous .hack games, you can trade items with your party members and fellow PC players found in dungeons, fields, Dol Dona, and Mac Anu. Trading for items is a great way to gain and acquire hard to get items that normal shops don't usually sell. Steam Bike: Very early in the game you will gain access to the Steam Bike. This little vehicle will allow you to travel through fields and the towns of Mac Anu and Dol Dona faster than simply running. The new improve twist here is that you can now tune up your Bike's various parts to improve the speed, grip, and steering. This is useful when you want to tackle the Bike course mini games. You can buy tune up parts at Junk shop found in both Mac Anu and Dol Dona. Tuning your Bike will take place inside your @Home in the Bike Factory section. Alchemize: Like with the first game, you can head into the Alchemy Factory to alchemize your weapons together to enhance and upgrade them for better performance. The difference in this game is that you can now alchemize your armors and accessories instead of just your weapons. Party Affections: By answering e-mails with various party members as well as trading items and giving gifts to your party members you can raise their affection up for Haseo. The point of raising their affection for Haseo is that their actions in combat will be friendlier toward Haseo. An example of this is that a high affection for Haseo will mean that a party member will more likely heal Haseo when he's low on HP than a low affection for Haseo. Arena: The game does provide a Battle Arena for you to fight in. This is actually part of the storyline where you need to fight in the Battle Arena Tournament to get your rank up so you can fight a certain key story character. However it is also possible for you to use the Battle Arena outside of the storyline just to have fun as an extra feature to play with. The Battle Arena has actually been scaled down in this volume. You don't really get to use the Battle Arena much until after the actual storyline game ends Chim Chims: Chim Chims are little egg like creatures that you can kick to get Chim Spheres. You can find them in dungeons or fields. By collecting Chim Spheres from Chim Chims, you can open certain gates or activate certain warp devices. Lucky Animals: Like with Chim Chims, you can usually find a Lucky Animal in a field or dungeon. Catching and kicking a lucky animal will have that animal grant a special effect onto your party to help your party for a limited amount of time. Each different Lucky Animal will give off a different special effect. In addition to Lucky Animals you can also find Unlucky Animals as well. Of course Unlucky Animals will give off special effects that will hinder your party instead of helping your party. Surprise Attacks: During battles it's possible for you to get a drop or a first strike on the enemies if you are able to approach them carefully without being seen by them. Once you are close enough the Surprise Attack option will show up allowing you the option to do a Surprise Attack. A Surprise Attack is a massive rush toward the enemy knocking them backward while doing a critical hit damage to them. Skill Attacks: Each party member has their own set of skill attacks they can learn base on the weapon they can equip. All weapons have a default skill attack but once you start using the weapon more and start using a skill attack more, the weapon itself start gaining experience in level. You'll be able to unlock more skill attacks once a weapon reaches certain levels. More Skills have been added in Reminisce and the maximum weapon level have also increased in Reminisce. Rengeki Attacks: Rengeki Attacks are basically higher level versions of a skill attack. If you attack an enemy with enough combos, blue and purple rings will appear around them indicating that their defenses are weaken and they are vulnerable for a Rengeki Attack. Translation, if you see blue and purple rings on an enemy it means you can do a Rengeki Attack on them. Awakenings: Awakening is a powerful group attack that you can perform for a limited amount of time. You have a morale gauge that goes up each time you are successful in doing Rengeki Attacks. Once your morale gauge is full you can perform an Awakening Attack. There are three types of Awakening Attacks that you can set your party to do. There is a Beast Awakening, a Demon Awakening, and Divine Awakening. Beast Awakening is where all your party members for a limited amount of time will be stronger and faster doing greater damage than normal to all the monsters. Demon Awakening is where all your party members will gather to do an AOE magic attack on all the enemies for a set limit of time. Divine Awakening is the new Awakening introduce in this chapter. It's a really all out powerful attack with a nice graphical look too.
Not much to say that hasn't already been said in the review of Rebirth since the gameplay is pretty much an exact mirror of the one that was done in Rebirth. Even with a few minor changes and improvements, the game plays just like it did in Rebirth allowing fans to jump right in from the get go. The gameplay still has the same strengths and weaknesses that Rebirth has is that it can be very addictive and fun doing battles in real time with NPC partners but yet after awhile things can get a bit repetitive since you are basically going back and forth between the same dungeons and fields over and over. If you enjoyed the gameplay in Rebirth than you'll have no problem enjoying this game but if Rebirth gameplay wasn't something that you prefer than you might want to skip the sequel than unless you are playing purely just for the story of .hack//G.U.
Score: 8/10
EXTRAS/REPLAY
It's the Crimson VS card game.
Pretty much all of the extras in the first chapter, Rebirth, were brought back in this second chapter. The Quest Guild is back but this time in the new city of Dol Dona. There aren't as many quests you can pick up from the Quest Guild in this game when compare to what was presented in the first game but it's enough to keep you going. NPCs side quests are also back but this time you need to redo them again. The NPCs are still located back in the first city, Mac Anu. By now you should be very familiar with each of these side quests that each of the NPC required you to do for them. The Book of 1000s is also back that you need to continue to complete from the last point where you left off from Rebirth. And finally you can also pick up some extra leveling areas from posts in the forums on your virtual desktop. Like with the first game, completing these extra quests will net you items, equipments, or unlocking movie clips or musical track clips on your desktop.
Two new extra features were included in Reminisce. The first is the introduction of Bike Missions. By completing various Bike courses in a time limit setting, you can win various prizes.
The second new feature is the opening of the Crimson VS card game that was seen in .hack//Rebirth but wasn't open yet for playing. The card game itself is base more on automatic gameplay where you just set which cards you want in your deck and the PC just plays out the card game for you and you just watch the results. Playing Crimson VS doesn't seem to serve any real purpose at all in this game other than a side distraction from playing the actual rpg game of Reminisce. But than again that's what mini games and extras are all about, a side distraction that takes you away from the storyline rpg gameplay.
The game itself doesn't really end after you complete the storyline gameplay as you can continue to just explore various areas and level up even though the level caps at level 100 in this game so there's really no replay+ value in the game at all. But the fact that you can just keep on playing should be good enough to hold you over till the final chapter in this series comes out.
Score: 9/10
If you reach the bottom of this review than by now you can pretty much guess that the overall score of Reminisce will be a good one. Reminisce actually matches Rebirth score for score in each section with the exception that maybe the overall story isn't as good as I had hoped but that's more of a personal preference than anything else. I thought the whole revelation of who Tri-Edge really is was kind of a let down and adding to the fact that in this chapter I believe they ruin a good character like Sakaki since I thought he was a really cool character in the first chapter. These are minor personal preferences than anything else. Reminisce pretty much mirrors Rebirth in everything so if you love Rebirth than you'll love Reminisce for sure. I highly recommend all .hack fans to pick up this second chapter of G.U. while they still can as .hack//G.U. looks more and more like one of those unrated rpg gems for the core rpg fans out there.
