“God Wars: Future Past” is a tactical role-playing video game, which was developed by Kadokawa Corporation and was published by the same company, and Nippon Ichi Software in Japan and NIS America for the West. It was launched on June 20 and it is available on the PlayStation 4 and the PlayStation Vita. This is my Game Review after finishing several missions and covering more than 50 hours of gameplay.
The story is mysterious, intriguing, and really interesting
“God Wars: Future Past” is set in ancient Japan and the main characters are some very famous individuals in Japanese mythology.
It focused on Kaguya, who is the princess of the Fuji, in her quest to find her mother, Tsukuyomi, the Queen. The sacrificial princess was freed by her childhood friend, Kintaro, and together she gathered more allies along the way as she searched for the truth behind her mother’s intentions.
As a gamer who is not familiar with the Japanese folklore or their ancient mythology, the story is quite mysterious and intriguing, which makes me want to know more about it. Players who know their Japanese folklore will definitely be impressed on how the game developers turned the story of Kaguya into this great game. Each of the characters has their own small background story, which gives them more depth and not just a side character without a story.
Great tactical RPG gameplay with slight issues
The gameplay of “God Wars: Future Past” is comparable to other previous great tactical RPGs like “Tactics Ogre” and “Final Fantasy Tactics” with the difference being its focus on ancient Japan and its folklore. Players place their characters in strategic positions to gain advantage against their enemies and defeat them to finish a stage.
While the main gameplay is great and can stand on its own without being compared to other tactical games, it has some missteps.
One of its problems is its loading scenes in between the menu, story scenes, a mission, and so on. It loads a bit longer even if it is just a transition between the item menu to the main menu, which can be frustrating to the players.
The transition to other options in the main menu should not have long loading scenes, but it should be okay with the missions and story scenes because it would be understandable. It should be clear that this only happens on the PS Vita handheld system, while the PS4 version loads quite quickly. This must be a limitation to the console system, hence its slow loading times.
Another misstep for “God Wars: Future Past” is the camera view, which can be annoying at times. There are certain angles that players would want to look into so that they could choose the best attack position before moving in their characters. While this game can rotate the camera in all directions, it does not have the “tilt” camera feature that other games have, which gives players an advantage in a clearer view of the area.
Gamers will have a hard time looking at the positions of their characters without the “tilt” feature and they will be blocked by other characters, the enemies, and sometimes the environmental objects like trees, buildings, and more.
Graphics and soundtrack are superb
“God Wars: Future Past” has a great soundtrack that compliments well with its theme, which is ancient Japan and its mysterious folklore theme. The voice acting is great too with perfect synchronization with the animation and the 3D models, even though they are in chibi or little forms.
The graphics of the video game are great as well, but it is not that grand that it could be comparable to other high-end games like “Final Fantasy XV” and the like.
The characters are chibified, the faces are recognizable, but not that detailed, the stages are created perfectly to compliment the theme. Overall, it is not ugly, but it is not that super detailed.
Replayability is high with good difficulty and grinding
While this tactical video game does not have a new game plus and unlockables, it does have a good difficulty setting, which players could change anytime they want past a battle. They can also grind their levels and job points on side quests that they can replay again and again until they are satisfied. The trophies are challenging as well, but not that difficult to obtain.
Overall, my verdict for “God Wars: Future Past” by Kadokawa Corporation is a solid 7 out of 10 points with 10 as the highest point it can obtain. While it is a great game to play on the PS Vita handheld, it is plagued with the long loading times and its annoying camera view control.
Check out "God Wars: Future Past" Launch Trailer below:
