"Archer vs. Shark... need I say more?"

Something about commanding units over a miniature landscape in a turn based fashion gets me very excited. In my younger days, I even created multiple tabletop games. I think my earliest attempt involved moving Star Wars action figures around on a paper grid I had spread across the floor. Those basic ideas evolved into a game where both units and customizable elevation were squares of paper placed on a gridded poster board. One of the games I was working on actually used figures made of bakeable clay with their stats carved into the bottom of the base. Yes, I am a nerd.

But when I found that there was a genre of videogames that could do all the math and pleasing aesthetics for me, I was in heaven. Final Fantasy Tactics really helped instill a love for strategy RPGs withing me. From there I moved on to games like Front Mission 3, which gripped me even more. But nothing could prepare me for that fateful day when I would discover Disgaea.

Disgaea is a game that places comedy both in its story and in its gameplay. The game stars Laharl, the prince of the netherworld, whose father is said to have died from choking on a pastry. Laharl, with the remaining vassals that chose to stick around, set out on their mission to reclaim the throne. His enemies will try to use his weaknesses, such as “optimism” and “hot women”, to take him down. The game likes to break the fourth wall a lot, poking fun at the genre in the process. Shortly in the story, one of the characters is given the nickname “Mid-Boss” which then, much to his dismay, is used instead of his real name for the rest of the game.

The chapter progression is pretty straightforward. You always start in your castle which acts as your home base for buying and selling items, going to the hospital, and other between mission activities. After approaching a portal, you will see a list of chapters, each containing a list of single episodes that are unlocked one after the other. Each of these episodes is its own battle map. You can replay any of these episodes as many times as you want, though story segments will only be seen the first time and unique bosses will be replaced with high level enemies. So far, so normal.

A first glance at the start of a battle would make you think of any given SRPG, but this is where that convention ends. You set up all your characters’ movements and actions in a single phase. At any point during this phase, you can choose to execute the actions you’ve set up thus far. You can cancel an action as long as it hasn’t already been executed. This leads to some interesting possibilities. For example, you can have one out-of-range character walk up to a Cleric, have the Cleric execute an action of healing them, then cancel that characters movement and move them somewhere completely different. This is just the beginning.

Another feature on the battlefield is throwing. A character can pick up another character. A third character can pick up the stack of two. I could go on. Once you have thrown somebody, that counts as an action just as attacking would, but it can be a good way to cover a lot of distance really fast. You can also throw enemies, even into each other for some interesting results.

The level cap in Disgaea is 9999. If that wasn’t ridiculous enough for you then it’s time to talk about “transmigration”. After meeting some requirements, a character can choose to go back to level 1 and choose a different job class while they’re at it. The advantage of this is that their “base stats” will be higher. All leveling is based on this. If a level 15 character transmigrates and increases their base stats, by the time they get back to level 15 they will be far more powerful. Transmigration allows for exponential stat increase. To add to this, each job has several better versions, so it’s usually good to wait until you have unlocked the next job in a series to increase your base stats even further. The more enemies that specific unit has killed, the more “mana” they will have. The more mana they spend on their transmigration, the better their inheritance rating for their stats and abilities will be.

Any job class can equip anything. There are 2 systems in place to inhibit your equipment decisions. The first is “weapon proficiency”. The lower your weapon proficiency, the slower the weapon type will level up with use. Leveling up weapon types grants new abilities. The second is “aptitude”. Every stat’s aptitude is a percentage. This directly affects the equipment you use. If your attack aptitude is 100% and you equip a sword with 50 attack power, your character will have 50 more attack points. If your attack aptitude is 50% and you equip the same sword, you would only gain 25 attack points. So even though you CAN give anything to anybody, it’s not necessarily a good idea.

The special abilities all have levels of their own. Much like weapon proficiency, the more you use them, the better they will be. This is especially noticeable with magic attacks. The more you use a specific magic attack, the more area variations there will be to choose from. With each new variation, you will be able to hit more squares at once, but more SP (think MP) will be used. It’s these immediate benefits that make leveling up so incredibly addicting.

Another interesting feature is the “Item World”. The Item World consists of sets of 10 randomly generated maps to be played at a time. These maps exist inside your items. Because of this, you can’t take the item you’re entering with you. For every set of 10 floors that’s cleared, you will level up the item. This isn’t restricted to weapons and armor either. If you want to level up a stick of mint gum, more power to you.

The main story of Disgaea can be beaten in a reasonable amount of time. But there are plenty of things to do after the fact. The game has many endings and a new game+ mode. Even more interesting, though, is the extra maps that can be unlocked with exponentially harder enemies. While the end boss of the main story is only around level 90, there are optional bosses around level 6,000. This is indeed a game you could put a lot of hours into.

I have only shared the tip of the iceberg as far as the level of complexity contained within the game, but a nice thing about Disgaea is that you don’t need to take advantage of every one of its features to enjoy it. You can play it as you would a normal SRPG, or you can be like me and plan out leveling charts on paper. It’s up to you! Either way, if you love strategy and utter insanity, Disgaea just might be the game for you.

Tags: disgaea, Final Fantasy Tactics, nintendo ds, ps2, psp, srpg, strategy

This entry was posted on Monday, March 16th, 2009 at 7:00 am and is filed under Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.