Shining Force

Shining Force (Also known as Shining Force: Legacy of the Great Intention) is a top-down strategy role-playing game developed by Climax Entertainment and Sonic! Software Planning and published by Sega. It is the second game in the Shining series. It first released in Japan on March 20, 1992 and released in North America and Europe in July of 1993. On June 8, 2004, a remake of the game called Shining Force: Resurrection of Dark Dragon released on the Game Boy Advance. The game has also been re-released on many times such as on the Wii Virtual Console and the Sega Genesis Classics Collection.

Plot
In the Kingdom of Guardiana, in the land of Rune, the Dark Dragon wrecked havoc on the land, but was eventually sealed away. Now, a thousand years later, a young warrior in training named Max is sent on a mission to stop Kane, the commander of the Runefaust army, who's goal is to open the Shining Path and resurrect the Dark Dragon. During the quest, Max recruits many friends and new allies to join a team known as the Shining Force. Very late into their journey, they find that Kane and King Ramladu are under the control of the manipulative Darksol, the king of Runefaust. Despite the attempts of the Shining Force, Darksol succeeds in summoning the Dark Dragon, but after a long and tough battle, Max seals the Dark Dragon away using the power of the Chaos Breaker.

Why It Shines

 * 1) Well designed gameplay. The game itself is a strategy RPG like the Fire Emblem series. You control your units on the battlefield with the goal of defeating all of the enemies on the battlefield or killing one specific boss. Each of your units and the enemies go in a specific order, determined by a party member's Agility stat. Four different stats determine a character's power: Attack, Defense, Agility, and Move. Some character can also use magic. A turn is made up of a character moving and then doing another action like attacking or defending. You attack enemies on the map using your normal attacks, items, or magic. When an attack hits or an enemy is killed, characters gain XP, and level up when they get 100 XP. All of the these systems makes the gameplay sort-of simple, but addicting to play.
 * 2) The graphics look very good and take advantage of the Sega Genesis' graphical capabilities. All of the character portraits, battle sprites, and world designs look detailed.
 * 3) An unforgettable soundtrack that is awesome and is one of the best on the Genesis. The file select and town themes are sort of calming and are pleasant to listen to. Another good example are the varied battle themes, which have a tense feel. Finally, all of the tracks are catchy and easily get stuck in your head. The genres of the songs are also varied, from the high-tension battle themes, to the somber-sounding tracks like "Kanashimi no Guardiana".
 * 4) 30 different characters to use in the game, with only 12 to be chosen to use on the battlefield. Each of them are unique and have their own strengths and weaknesses. In addition, the many character classes in the game are really varied and each one feels different from one another in their own way. The main classes are listed below.
 * 5) * The Swordsman/Hero (SDMN/HERO) is the main character's class. He is the most well-rounded of the different classes.
 * 6) * Knights/Paladins (KNTE/PLDN) are able to move long distances on the battlefield. The can use either lances or spears in battle and are powerful. However, they have slightly lower defense than a Swordsman/Hero.
 * 7) * Warriors/Gladiators (WARR/GLDT) excel in offensive capabilities and are the tank class. Unfortunately, they have low movement.
 * 8) * Archers/Snipers (ACHR/SNIP) are a support class that exclusively uses bows or any long range weapons. While they excel in firing from a distance, they can attack up close and have low defense.
 * 9) * Mages/Wizards (MAGE/WIZ) are spell casters that use offensive spells to deal damage or do negative status effects. While their magic is strong, their standard melee attack is very weak and they have the lowest defense.
 * 10) * Priests/Vicars (PRST/VICR) are just like spell casters, but do restorative spells such as healing rather than being used for offense
 * 11) The controls are easy to learn and feel good to control. You move your character on the map using the control pad, and when you need to talk to someone, attack, or use an item, you press the A button to bring up a small menu that is navigated using the D-pad to do one of four actions related to whether you are in a fight or navigating the map.
 * 12) The game world itself is a lot more unique than other RPGs at the time. It does start out as your typical fantasy tropes, but as the game goes on, we get to see more sci-fi worlds and enemies thrown into the game, making the setting feel a lot different than that of the first few Final Fantasy games.
 * 13) Unlike other early strategy RPGs like the first few Fire Emblem games, you are also able to explore the world area between battles, where you can buy equipment, talk to townspeople, and solve puzzles to progress the story foreword. You can also swap out which members of your party you can use in battle in these segments.
 * 14) The game is actually funny despite being mostly serious with its story. For example, there is a companion in the game named Jogurt and his sole purpose is to be a useless companion.
 * 15) The GBA port of the game includes a lot of new improvements over the original version, such as improving the graphics and having updated versions of the original songs. On the other hand, it also adds some new content, such as a few new battles, three new companions, and even a new plotline that is told from the perspective of Narsha, the princess of Runefaust.

Bad Qualities

 * 1) Some of the characters you recruit start off under-powered and it can take a while to get them to a power level of the rest of the party. One infamous example is the robot Adam, who is very weak once you recruit him and it takes a lot of grinding to get him to his true strength. Some characters might stay weak forever if you don't use them once you gain them, since some can't be equipped with any weapons.
 * 2) If the main character dies, than you lose the whole battle which can get really annoying. This can lead to players trying to keep the main character as far away from a battle as they can, which can eventually lead to him becoming very under-powered.
 * 3) Some of the music in the game is overused and get a little annoying to listen to after a while, such as "Hikari no Gunzei" (The main world map theme). It doesn't help that the music resets once you leave the battle screen and re-enter the standard play battlefield. On the other end, some of the music is also not heard often, like the ruined town theme.
 * 4) As stated in WIR #8, while it was intentional and meant to be a joke, Jogurt is a very useless companion that has the lowest score in his Attack and Defense stats and has almost no purpose other than to be a decoy.

Reception
Upon its original release and retrospectively, Shining Force was well received by critics and gamers alike, although most consider its sequel to be superior. Mega magazine placed the game #33 on their "Top Mega Drive Games Of All Time" list. In 2004, readers of Retro Gamer magazine called the game a "truly unique RPG masterpiece" and voted it as the 86th top retro game, with the staff at the magazine additionally calling it "one of the greatest Mega Drive games of all time and a definite office favorite." The remake was also well received, with GameSpot calling the game the best GBA game of July 2004.

Trivia

 * Despite being quite similar to Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light, the creator of the game actually took inspiration from the Dragon Quest series, stating he wanted to take the battles from that game and make them "more fun". To do so, he also took inspiration from an obscure Japanese game called Silver Ghost.

Videos
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