Simply put, Grandia is a must have. While it does have flaws, few are truly damaging to the overall package of the game. Grandia is the most artful, love-filled, and enjoyable piece of gaming art-work I have ever played. The only major flaw it has is that at some point, it has to end.

"Welcome!"

You have now found your new home, Grandia. While you may have to occasionally leave to use the bathroom, there are ways around that, too. For instance, set up your TV and PlayStation in the bathroom, and spend your entire time sitting on the can while playing Grandia and yelling at your mom for some pop-tarts and Diet Coke.

Sadly, the game does begin just a bit slowly. For the first couple of hours, in fact, it's unlikely you'll even see battle. You are Justin, a mischievous boy whose father was a great adventurer. 15-year old Justin dreams of sharing his father's life of adventure, but instead he lives with his mother in a large town called Parm. It's an exciting time for those in Parm, as they are now on the brink of an industrial age, thanks to the Joule Foundation. Also, explorers have recently discovered a new continent! A new town, called New Parm, has been established there. Adventurers are pouring in, joyful for the chance to explore this new frontier. Meanwhile, poor Justin is stuck at home, playing at adventures with his friend, Sue, and the town bullies. His one link to adventure, though, is the spirit stone, left to him by his father.

This is where you cut in. A treasure hunt for some "magical items" to prove to the town bully that you are a real adventurer. This section of the game is a bit slow, with nary a battle to be seen, however it makes a great introduction to Justin's character.

"The plot thickens."

Of course, it takes a while, but it does. The story of Grandia has a rather large cast of characters, most of which lack depth but are interesting and endearing all the same. Best of all, those most central to the story weren't very predictable throughout most of the game. Relationships between the characters change in a natural way, frequently enough to keep the player interested.

Grandia, unlike many other recent RPG releases, is proud and indulgent of its upbeat and colorful atmosphere. The result is a game with a realistic portrayal of the human spirit, a will to survive and perhaps stay ignorant, despite all odds. While the villagers are shallow, they still manage to portray this well, along with the places they live in.

Grandia is a story with a moral, a story that reminds us we don't have to live the mistakes of our past over again, but that we can instead we can make new options for ourselves. Even cynics like myself will be touched by the way this message is portrayed. In the end of the game, I felt that I understood everything fully, and was happy with the outcome.

Translation is always a worry which can have big effects on the plot. Well, the translation in Grandia isn't fantastic, but it's good, and won't become annoying or cause any real problems to the player.

"Hey! You got Role Playing all over my Game!"

While the plot and outcome of the game is out of your control and cinematic, as is becoming the standard, there's still a good amount of role playing. How does one manage this? Well, it's interesting, and subtle. While running around in towns, you'll get the chance to play around with stuff. You can tip over teacups, knock maces off the wall, etc. While this doesn't affect the outcome of the game in any way, it's fun! And it makes you feel more like the mischievous adventurer Justin, and less like whomever you are. In other words, you become Justin, rather than Justin becoming you. A very good approach, if I do say so myself.

Furthermore, as Grandia is truly a story of adventure, Grandia makes you feel like an adventurer. While dungeons can, at times, be annoyingly large, there is almost always a new one to explore. I felt like a free spirit, exploring new frontiers, destroying new monsters and whatnot. Watch out, though, I lost track of how many fetch quests I was on. Luckily, the reason I didn't bother keeping count was that no matter how pointless, they were still fun.

"This activity is really delightful! Hahahaha!"

When asked to describe the game-play of Grandia, I say, "Think Lunar, except fun." And that does a good job of describing it, too. Game Arts took many of the ideas formed with Lunar, and then fixed them. You, as in Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete, can see enemies before you encounter them. You can choose to avoid enemies, or to run into battle. Adding a bit of tension and excitement to the maps, monsters will often chase after you. The big deal here is that where you are when you run into an enemy matters. If they run into any one but Justin, it's an ambush, which means they get the advantage. If you run into them from behind, you get the advantage.

Most importantly of all, you and your enemies are basically allowed free movement on the battlefield. Placement comes in to strategy frequently, especially with many attacks hitting all enemies within range. You are also allowed two defend options, one of which lets you run around the battlefield, much like the defend option in Lunar.

As has become the standard for RPGs, strategy is based on time. If you time things well, you win. If you time things poorly, you die. If you time things REALLY well, you just may be able to avoid being hit at all. If you keep your standards for yourself high, you'll get the most enjoyable and interesting battles ever seen in an RPG.

One of the best parts of the Battle System is that not only is there a time you have to wait to choose a move, there's also a period of time afterward during which you must wait for the move to actually happen, based on how much experience you have with whatever move it is that you're using. This provides layers of strategy on its own! Think about it: Not only do you have to choose a spell by how effective it will be, but also by how much time you will have to wait for it to take effect. Will another spell that could kill your whole party be cast by an enemy before you can cast yours? Could you do a little more damage in a little more time? Is it worth the risk to begin with?! Wow. Surprisingly, it's not an overwhelming experience, but it does allow room for you to learn throughout the entire game.

Also worth mentioning is the IP bar. This fantastic innovation allows you to see how close both you and your enemies are to getting to choose your commands. This helps out with strategy, giving you a chance to eliminate enemies in order of how urgent it is for them to die. Skilled players will sometimes be able to make it out of battle unscathed, if they're cautious.

Then there's the fantastic character growth system. Each character has specific types of weapons they can use, and each variety of weapon will yield improvement on your character once it's experienced enough to level up. You can also learn new abilities by leveling up your skill with these weapons. Furthermore, you can give magic attributes to different characters by buying them with "Mana Eggs" at shops. These attributes level up in the same manner as weapons, and once you level up the proper attributes enough, you can get new attributes.

The equipment system in Grandia takes advantage of what Game Arts learned while making Lunar. It's like Lunar's, except much more smooth and comfortable for players. Well done indeed.

The end result of this system is that you get a character growth system full of depth with a lot of room for customization, and the most entertaining battle system I've ever played in an RPG. The battles were so fun, I actually looked for them. I looked for them high and low, trying to perfect my technique. I have yet to meet some one who didn't like the battle system.

"The notes are my friends!"

While I know that Iwadare's music is a little quirky and not every one loves it, I can't help but love it myself. The musical styles in Grandia portray their locations and world in a coherent and comfortable way. Each area has its own theme, its own style, but at the same time complies to some basic rules set by the theme. While not all themes were fantastic, those that weren't were good. The instrumental-voices in the music are fantastic, too. Trombones are instantly identifiable as trombones, and those...little clicky things... are instantly identifiable as those little clicky things. Sadly, the only emotion that is strongly felt in Grandia is wonder and amazement, so that's about all you'll feel from the music, too, aside from the occasional bit of cheerfulness or mystery. I suppose one should expect this level of quality, when Skywalker Sound is involved.

Grandia managed to finally do something I've wanted for years now. Multiple battle themes. One for normal battles, one for a normal battle where you were ambushed, and one for boss battles. Not to mention a completely different set for the second disc.

Also, as a very nice touch, during battle, vocalizations specific to the type of enemies you're fighting are played semi-frequently. While some of these are cheesy, it adds a good deal of atmosphere to the battles and shows an attention to detail that gives me a warm fuzzy feeling inside.

The one thing that hurts the sound category is the voice acting. While most voices fit their characters relatively well, they are stressed by any display of emotion (save Feena's) and for the most part hurt the game more than they help it. I like voice acting, but I like it even more when it's well done.

"Architect.or painter.? Architect, or painter? NYARGH!!!"

Much like in XenoGears, the art department and level designers got to do both! As one might expect, Grandia is a graphical precursor to XenoGears. With less evolved hardware to work with when it was originally released, Grandia is in every way a slightly dumbed-down version of XenoGears, with a little bit of a trade off. In XenoGears, the world around you is a detailed and organic 3D landscape. In Grandia, it's not quite as detailed or organic, but still leaves you with a warm fuzzy feeling inside. The world of Grandia is full of variety, though, and is very nice to look at.

In XenoGears, the characters were lovely 2D sprites, but pixilate pretty badly when you zoom in on them at all. In Grandia, the characters are 2D sprites, which look a little bit awkward, but have an above standard amount of depth.

Also, as with Lunar, each character has numerous extremely well done portraits that are displayed during dialogue. Some are extremely memorable, and most are great. They aid in the display of emotion greatly.

In battle, the effects are functional. They aren't fantastic, but they most certainly get the job done with the appropriate amount of flash.

As far as FMV goes, which just about every RPG seems to have these days, Grandia is a mixed bag. While the environments in the FMVs are smooth and relatively well done CG, they lack inspiration. Luckily, the few creatures you'll see in the FMV are lacking in no way, they all interested (and occasionally shocked) me. The characters during FMV aren't much to speak of. Lazily drawn Anime people with few frames of animation to speak of. Luckily, you won't have to spend much time looking at them. FMV is used properly in Grandia, mostly to create overviews of locales or to display things too grandiose for the game's engine itself.

"I finished the puzzle!"

In the end, Grandia is a coherent, well told, heartfelt, artful, and all-around fun RPG which no fan should be without. If you like RPGs, you should buy it, end of story.