The Wanderer Stopped By For a While – A Look at Vagrant Story

I’ve been with this sword for ages, it’s become my one trusted companion in this ghost city of wailing secrets. The only one on which I can rely. It’s grown along with me, an extension of my own savagery. It has clawed its way to the upper echelon of weaponry through the limbs and viscera of many beasts, humans, and uh… evils. It’s a shame I’ve given it such a childish and filthy name.

Vagrant Story. A dark, cinematic, and deeply engrossing action RPG. If there is one thing I remember about this game is that reviews and opinions have often been very divided. This is a game that garners much praise as well as derision. It’s a game with cascading levels of complexity that will either draw the player in or push the player away. This is the nature of most unique games.

Recently I found myself struck with an itch to play either Parasite Eve or Vagrant Story. I’ve been trying to play some of the more interesting titles I had missed from that generation. I ended up scoring both of these games relatively cheaply. Now, I was going on the oft-claim that these games are ‘similar.’ Well, yes, they are ‘similar’ but are by no means ‘the same.’

Both titles are action/adventure role playing games (plus whatever other superfluous superlatives you want to add) that feature weapon and armor customization. However the differences are just as striking, and not just in the thematic sense. Ashley is much more mobile than Aya, and the mechanics of Vagrant Story are much more exhaustive than Parasite Eve (from a first time player’s standpoint, at any rate).

Vagrant Story’s variables are numerous. There are your standard Health and MP guages, as well as a special RISK meter. Every weapon has its own gauge for damage points (by which its quality depreciates) and phantom points (by which its quality appreciates). Each weapon also has a certain degree of affinities for enemy class and elemental qualities which fluctuate based on how you use them. This is all in addition to the base stats from their blades and the bonuses from their hilts. It is layer upon layer.

Vagrant Story is an action RPG. You move around the rooms until you are within attacking distance of an enemy. Once you’re set upon them, you can attack any limb within range. Depending on your weapon’s statistics and your RISK level, you will have a certain hit percentage and a certain damage range based on the limb you select to attack. The player can seek out the best compromise between hit percent and damage dealt.

As Ashley battles on he will acquire Battle Techniques that allow him to string attacks together in a series of active time events that will deliver hit after hit until you press the button too quickly or slowly. These are not all geared toward damage, either. Some heal DP, some increase PP, some increase HP or MP based on a set percentage. Others convey status effects or cripple the enemy’s MP. You can also pick some Defense abilities, which have functions such as softening damage, protecting against status effects, and reflecting a percentage of the damage back on the enemy. Both categories of techniques are super useful, and both quickly raise your RISK meter.

RISK raises every time Ashley swings his weapon (whether it’s a hit or a miss) and every time he successfully defends against an attack. Risk lowers your accuracy and as far as I can tell, your defense. It also increases your chance for a critical hit, and the effectiveness of your healing spell. Sometimes you exploit your high risk then quickly heal some of it (via item) when it starts to get uncomfortable. This makes some enemies extremely difficult to hit if you are not properly equipped.

I could go on and on about mechanics, but these are just my impressions. To say the least, this is one of the reasons I was completely drawn in. But it is also one of the reasons I see as a detraction for this game and I can understand the case. Perhaps Vagrant Story can appear overwrought, almost pretentious I the sheer minutiae of its mechanics. After all, can’t we just play the game and not worry about all of the extraneous trappings?

Well, yes and no. I only felt the need to grind once in this game, and when I did it turned out that I didn’t really need to. If you play this game with a little planning and foresight and carry a couple of decent weapons then grinding is really not important, at least in the first run. It is important to have inventory space available at all time for weapons and shields that drop or are found in chests, because they may have new gems attached to them that you can procure. Or simply to obtain new fodder to combine with in the workshop.

The workshops are the scene to one of the game’s most lauded features: item customization. Ashley will have the ability to combine certain blades, shields, and armors to make new items within their respective categories – as long as the workshop allows for that material to be worked on. You can preview the stats of your new piece before you commit to it, so don’t be afraid to experiment! It might be a good thing I didn’t own this game as a kid after all, because I may have never come up for air. I was a huge completionist, even moreso than I am now, and I’d have had to have mapped every weapon line, ha ha.

This has been a very cursory explanation of some of Vagrant Story’s mechanics. I didn’t have a firm grasp of them at the start and I wouldn’t say I am any sort of authority now. A deep knowledge of these mechanics is not necessary to enjoy the game, but a working understanding might be helpful for a player to avoid frustration. This may be dicey for some folks who just want to take in the narrative, because unlike may RPGs the little factors can’t really be ignored.

But I never felt like the narrative was impaired by the gameplay or the tinkering. It flowed well, and accomplished what it needed to do and the issues I do have are about the narrative itself and not its pacing within the game itself.

Vagrant Story takes place primarily in the ghost city of Lea Monde. It is a series of interconnected districts and areas, much like a ‘Metroidvania’ style game. The city is stark and mysterious, yet at times repetitive. But the somber tone fits the character design perfectly, the style blends together so well. Lea Monde was once alive, and now Ashley is wriggling through its lurching corpse.

There is very little FMV in this game, which works in its favour. Ashley will often be hiding or eavesdropping on conversations and they can be fairly verbose. Instead, there is a ‘comic book style’ conveyance for the dialog in the form of speech bubbles. With the dour graphical tones it begins to resemble a graphic novel at times.

The story scenes themselves focus on a few key groups of characters and their interactions within their respective groups and the others present in Lea Monde. This mostly works well, though there are some loose ends that get very little attention where the player might want to know more. Maybe I’ll find out more in the new game plus, when I tackle that.

I do not want to focus too heavily on the storyline because there are twists within twists and the player is ultimately given some of the responsibility. But I will say that the character interactions are for the most part satisfactory and do make you question their motives and question Ashley himself.

So this was a pleasant surprise, where I found both the gameplay and the narrative compelling. The story works directly into the game to explain why the streets of Lea Monde are stalked by the undead and the summoned nature of the many boss monsters. Of course, this level of explanation is not entirely necessary but it is much appreciated!

Like most games I talk about on this site, Vagrant Story will be largely divisive. But then these are the kinds of games that have the greatest chance of endearment. For a game to be so exhaustive and to flow so well, it’s worth a play through. The accolades from its fans are absolutely gushing and the criticism from its detractors can be truly imbibed in venom.

For what it’s worth, this kind of game was a natural choice for me given how much I love games with similar concepts, such as Dark Cloud. But while Vagrant Story does resemble many other games, it is perhaps a disservice to try to draw too many comparisons. When it comes right down to it, Vagrant Story is a game that stands on its own that offers a new experience in a genre steeped in familiarity.