Thank you Atlus for sending us this game to review!

Radiant Historia was released on the Nintendo DS in 2010 and came to the west in 2011. It was well received and my husband and I picked it up in hopes of playing it someday. Not long after having it in our possession, the enhanced version was announced and we’re happy to finally get around to playing this classic 2D RPG.

The remake features a new anime style intro movie as well as redrawn character portraits. The majority of the game looks decent but dated and is comparable to many DS era games visually. A new fighting mechanic, support attacks, has been implemented as well. Non-active party members may randomly attack your foes if you have a nice combo chain building up. A new dungeon called the Vault of Time has been added and you can battle and earn currency that allows you to purchase weapons and armor that are not available anywhere else. Last but not least is a fresh timeline to explore while riding on the mystical Dunamis ship.

With all of the new content added, this remake is worth considering. The majority of the story is the same with the world on the brink of extinction since it is eroding away and turning into a desert. Instead of working together to solve this crisis, the most powerful cities are at war with each other.

You’ll be playing the role of Stocke, who is a special intelligence agent for Alistel, which is a formidable town lead by the wisdom of their prophet Noah. Stocke’s boss, Heiss, assigns a dangerous mission to him and puts two subordinates under his command. Marco is a sword wielding healer and Raynie is a well endowed spear user. Later in the game there’s a very revealing image of her showing most of her cleavage.
Before departing on their mission, Heiss hands Stocke a seemingly blank book called the White Chronicle. It doesn’t take long for Stocke to discover that this book gives him the power to alter history and save the world from the pending desertification. The book is the gateway to a place called Historia and there are two guides there named Teo and Lippti. While they have many answers for Stocke, they are also bound to neutrality and cannot share all of their knowledge. It is in Historia where the new dungeon, the Vault of Time, exists.

The Vault of Time focuses on battles and currency called Momentos is earned for each battle. Momentos have to be spent or left behind before leaving the Vault of Time. Battles in this game are in a grid format with your party of three on the far right hand side of the screen. The enemies can be in nine different spaces on the left hand side. As they approach toward the right they’ll do more damage to your party. There are attacks designed to push them back and to the left and the right. Sometimes the enemies will make a space heal or buff them and it’s in your best interest to relocate and conquer them more easily.

If you play on the easiest difficulty, most of the battles can be avoided and settled by attacking the roaming monsters in one or two strikes. Boss battles are still mandatory though their damage dealt is reduced significantly. Many, but not all of the attacks will only do one point of damage. A couple of one-hit kills still happen so having a healer in your active party is highly recommended.

Though the battles are fun, the story in this game is much better. The idea of going back and trying different ways of handling situations for the better is pretty interesting. There are times when I have acted rashly and killed my party and ended the world as a result. Thankfully, with the White Chronicle I’m able to go back and try again. Besides the main storyline and the added one, there are a bunch of side quests available.

You’ll have to bounce around between the historical timelines to gather and hand out quest related items. There are many walkthroughs available online to point you in the right direction of which time node to hop back into instead of wandering around aimlessly. I like how the ending shows the resolution of many of the side quests I completed. There are some quests available that lead to marriage and life forms that would not exist otherwise.

Besides humans, there are beastlike creatures that are wary of mankind and vice versa. Not surprisingly, the different cultures have various religious beliefs and the Gutrals have chi powers that borrow from Buddhist teachings. Language is used throughout the game and is unavoidable. Other than the cussing, the voice acting is well done in this game.

Other than Raynie’s revealing image, this game is pretty tame when it comes to sexual content. Her portrait when speaking makes it clear that she’s well endowed. Many of the characters drink and some of them do get drunk throughout the game’s story. There’s a mission where you have to disguise your party in the enemy’s armor and the suits you “borrowed” smell of liquor.

In the end, I enjoyed my time traveling adventures in Radiant Historia: Perfect Chronology and recommend it to 3DS owners. I’m happy to have played this classic RPG but I am hesitant on letting my younger children play it due to the content. It definitely earns its Teen rating from the ESRB.