And while some people will look down on the restrictions of online play, only allowing you to engage in multiplayer after the 13th chapter, it certainly helps, as a higher-level team will decimate a lower-level one. You won't find mind-blowing options or hundreds of hours of internet play, but it's still fun to grab your team of eight fighters (taken from your single player mode, of course) and pit them against other battlers around the world. We had a chance to try this out for ourselves, playing in both random and friend battles, and it's a solid addition to an otherwise "by the books" strategy game. To add to the game's lasting appeal Atlus included wireless multiplayer for Luminous Arc, allowing not only local multi-card play, but also online battle via Wi-Fi connection. It's simple, but that doesn't stop it from being entertaining. Kill enemies, buy items, equip them, and kill more enemies. In addition we were happy to see that every character - regardless of classic - uses both physical attacks, skills/magic, and the uber-attack "Flash Drive," as it adds more depth the game, counter-acting the fact that you can't change character classes or jobs, and most equipment management is entirely linear throughout the game. Since each attack, item, and magic use yields exp you'll need to use strategy in deciding who sits on the sidelines, and which characters deliver the final, exp-filled blow. It may not be a perfect fit for everyone, but we found the "Everyone levels up after 100 points" aspect of the game as an interesting - and challenging - design, as we always knew when a character was close to gaining another level. Adding to the core battle engine Luminous Arc adopts its own experience system and skill usage. As with games like Tactics Ogre and FFTA, we opted to have up move up and to the right. In addition to touch/d-pad control you can also change how the d-pad is oriented on the screen, allowing up to either move the cursor up and to the left, or up and to the right. Control can be handled with either touch or d-pad control, and we found that classic button use was far better than stylus, as it was far more accurate and generally more comfortable over hours of tactics battling. You'll still move your characters around a virtual chess board, attacking, casting magic, and using items at your discretion, and while it isn't a huge change from the norm it still works, and it's still fun. And even though Luminous Arc takes its battle design directly from other tactics titles it's still done well, adding in a few aspects of gameplay to set it aside, and relying on the tried and true for the rest. We said it in our hands-on Lumious Arc ensures that you're experiencing what you want - be it story, battle, or character customization - when you want. There's always a destination flag on your overworld map marking exactly where you should head, battle areas are constantly available for players that want to ramp up their team, and once approaching a destination an "Advance Story" button becomes available. As you dive deeper into Luminous Arc you'll notice that the design - while taken from SRPGs before it - is intuitive, easy to navigate, and actually a great setup for newcomers to the world of turn-based strategy. Still, the portions of the game that do use full VO (we'd say about 1/5 of the overall story) sound great, and it was unexpected to say the least. In addition to the expected accompanying artwork for story sections Luminous Arc also threads in a large chunk of VO into the mix, though you'll soon notice that it seems to drop in and out without a moment's notice. Despite the now somewhat bland setup, Luminous Arc still shows off a solid style, using tons of hand-drawn backdrops and large, crisp character portraits for dialogue sessions. Right off the bat you'll notice that Luminous Arc still has the look and feel of other Atlus titles such as Izuna, as it sports the same tan backdrops and letter font as previous games.
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