I've mentioned before that I'm a big fan of JRPGs, though I've never really examined in much depth why that is. I suppose it has something to do with responding to the general template that games in this genre seem to routinely follow and the use of gameplay systems that work just well enough to pull me through their plots. As a kid, I loved those big, noisy Saturday morning cartoons that were ostensibly for Western audiences but were more often than not actually inked by Japanese studios. There's just something so grand, so eloquent about the innocence with which my favourite JRPGs face the world.
But even I have limits, and prior to booting up Eternal Sonata, I was grateful that this game seemed to be a decidedly different take on the JRPG. Not concerned with "chosen" teens who have to save the world, Eternal Sonata promised a different kind of story, a far more personal story that is more indebted to actual history and actual place than most JRPGs. It could reasonably be said that most JRPGs are heavily indebted to two film sources: the work of Hayao Miyazaki (and often, specifically Castle in the Sky or Nausicaa) or the cyberpunk anime Akira. Eternal Sonata didn't really seem to fit into either of those categories.
And truth be told, when Eternal Sonata is operating on the level of being a somewhat wild experiment within an often rigidly formulaic genre (which, you know, I don't necessarily have too many problems with that formula except on a "putting on my critic's cap" level), it's far more successful than it has any right to be, offering a glimpse at what could be the future of console JRPGs. Unfortunately, though, for all that the game promises to break with tradition, when it falls back into the loving embrace of convention, it deflates all too quickly.
Developed by the studio tri-Crescendo, who would follow up this game two years later with the superlative Fragile Dreams, Eternal Sonata tells a bizarre tale. Ostensibly, the game takes place within the mind of Frederic Chopin, the famed Polish/French composer, as he lays on his death bed. Within his mind, though, there is some sort of struggle going on – a ragtag group of characters, all named after musical elements (i.e., "Polka," "Allegretto," "Beat," "Viola," "Salsa," etc.) are making a pilgrimage to the central city of Forte to implore the king to cease the production of mineral powder, a substance that cures people of their ills but also makes them into mindless zombies. Interestingly, Chopin himself is also a character within his own mind, which brings up the quandary of which reality is the "true" reality, and until he can figure out what his "dream" means, he won't be able to escape from it, whichever it is.
Besides the inherent problem of using a historical figure to convey this – Chopin actually existed in our reality, making the struggle to decide what is the true reality a bit of a moot point – the main issue with this plot is the actual, central storyline that the player participates in. The framing narrative is actually kind of brilliant, and allows tri-Crescendo to even investigate some of Chopin's history in a thoroughly academic way. But the central storyline lacks any sort of drama, and far often feels conventional to the point of being unnecessary. There's not really any solid, meaningful connection between Chopin's life and the dream that is taking place – not that dreams have to conform to solid logic – which makes the fantastic landscapes and the characters within it rote, and somewhat boring JRPG stereotypes. That becomes doubly unfortunate considering the breadth of possibilities that the setup allows for, and wasting it on what amounts to a conventional and almost completely drama-free narrative is perhaps Eternal Sonata's greatest sin.
The game often feels like a modern PSX RPG in most other regards, though, and in that way, Eternal Sonata essentially delivers what I've always wanted in this moribund generation for JRPGs – to update the formula rather than completely tossing it out. In terms of storytelling, this comes across as a simple story told with perfect translation. Considering how resolutely stuck in the past some of the gameplay conventions feel (not necessarily in a bad way, of course), it was a bit of a relief to not come across any "spoony bard" incidents, and while the same level of praise can't be leveled towards the English language voice over cast (nor towards the actual quality of the characterization or the dialog, to be honest), at least the game can be switched over to its Japanese voice cast, which is infinitely preferable.
In line with the gentle updating of PSX RPG conventions, the game plays exactly as you'd imagine, then, with some minor alterations. Exploring the positively gorgeous game world is done in much the same manner as any of the PSX Final Fantasy games, with static (if fully 3D) backgrounds that your character can run on. There's no control over the camera, though, which I actually appreciated – it allows for the developers to tightly control the mise en scene of the game, something that I feel has been lost in the age of third-person shooters. And every element of that world is created with a lovely sense of design, creating a world of whimsy and delight that is just amazing to soak in. Of course, that doesn't extend to the characters themselves, who share quite a bit in common with the similarly designed characters in Namco's Tales series, which should be taken as a negative – these are stereotypically anime characters, which does nothing to sell their (admittedly thin) personalities. Not to belabour any Miyazaki comparisons, but something more along the lines of the character design seen in Ni No Kuni might have made Eternal Sonata's characters more likable and would probably fit better with the mostly European design sensibilities that were chosen specifically to match the use of a figure like Chopin.
Ultimately, though, Eternal Sonata is a little bit similar to Final Fantasy XIII, though far more likable and far less inscrutable. It's essentially filled with one-way corridors (though the perspective helps to dispel the comparison too much), but more importantly, the general structure is basically the same – run, fight, cutscene, repeat. There's no world to explore and no variety to break things up, meaning that while the first half of the game is pretty delightful just so you can see the amazing visuals and hear the lovely soundtrack (really one of the best I've heard in a long time, which shouldn't be surprising coming from a game with so much musical indebtedness), the second half feels like much more of a slog than it should. JRPGs should essentially be story-delivery mechanisms, and when the story is as interesting, yet ultimately flawed as Eternal Sonata's, the battling isn't quite enough to save everything.
Ah yes, the battle system – the thing to which modern console JRPGs have staked their claim, the thing that is often the only defining element. Eternal Sonata basically presents a hybrid of the Tales series' super fast, arcade-style battle system with Final Fantasy X's turn-based, conditional battle system. Essentially, everything is still turn based, but when you're in control of a character, they have a set amount of time to perform their actions. As well, actions aren't a one-time only affair – you have to hammer the A button to make the character attack, for instance, making it feel more engaging as a result. The system is entertaining, and with an added level of strategy involved in the light/dark scenarios it provides (characters gain different special attacks depending on whether they're standing in sunlight or shadow), it rarely becomes boring. At least, initially; the game has an incredibly unimaginative approach to dungeon design, wherein any given dungeon will only have maybe two different types of enemies to conquer. You can only pummel the daylights out of rats for so long before tedium begins to set in, and while the vast explosion of different enemy types that you might find in a Dragon Quest game isn't necessarily needed here, at least some variety might have helped things.
A fun battle system and an interesting premise aren't quite enough to save Eternal Sonata, yet it's hard not to be won over at least a little bit by the game's willingness to experiment. "Interesting" isn't a word that I toss around very much when describing modern games, and less so with the JRPG genre, outside of a few exceptions. That ultimately makes Eternal Sonata worth playing, though with the layers of things that just do not work (the character design, the enemy variability, and the plot issues), the old saying that seems to work best here still applies: your mileage may vary.