"A very good rpg that should not be missed"

So, interested in Legend of Heroes: A Tear of Vermillion? I'll save you some time here and tell you that if you like turn-based RPGs, then you will enjoy this game. Don't care for RPGs? Then read this review and think carefully if you really want to bypass Legend of Heroes. It's not worth missing.

Game Play - Legend of Heroes boasts a 50 hour adventure, so what do you do for 50 hours? You run from town to town, constantly backtracking and saving various individuals from the perils of El Phildin. This is accomplished fairly well, as the constant rate at which plot develops and characters interact keeps the game from becoming stale and boring. More specifically, you can expect to encounter fairly lengthy dialogue scenes approximately every 5 minutes or so. The manner in which you go about actually going from town to town, dungeon to dungeon, etc. tends to be fairly repetitive, so the heavy plot-inclusion is a major helper. Even though there may be times when you sigh at having to run ALL the way back to town, you'll eventually come to realize that there WILL be an event somewhere along the way. Always. Also, there are no random encounters. All enemies are visible on field, and can easily be dodged.

Usually not too important in an RPG is controls. LoH, unfortunately, has a scheme wherein the character continues to run after colliding with an object. Let's say you make Avin, the main character, run up into a wall. At this point he will run either left or right (if you continue to hold up). After clearing the wall, he will resume running up. This can present a problem until one has adjusted to this mechanism, as interacting with specific objects can require 2-3 tries before successfully doing so. I had no problem with this scheme, personally, because I thought it useful when running about the various towns and dungeons. If I knew where I wanted to go, I could just hold that direction and Avin would eventually end up there. It's also worthy to note that it's not too much of a pain to interact with objects, it can just be tricky. Don't let this minor issue prevent you from enjoying the game.

The combat system in LoH is also standard turn-based RPG fair: you give your entire party (consisting of at maximum 4 characters) various commands, such as Attack, Magic, Deadly, Skill, Item, Wait, or Escape (more on these later). What you can attack is distance-based, varying on each specific command. Some spells and deadlys are AoE (Area of Effect) based, which presents a unique opportunity (and usually devastating) when enemies become grouped together. The order in which characters and enemies take turns is based on a Speed stat and the type of command used. The game never tells you what the "delay" is on each attack, it's just something you have to figure out on your own. As a general rule, item usage takes priority over anything else, then white magic spells, then attacks, then black magic spells. Having a significantly high speed stat can easily allow a high-damage black magic spell to execute faster than an ally's item use, however. An important thing to note about the combat is that there are very few boss fights in this game. It was disappointing for me, as I love big boss battles. This was the primary reason this game did not receive a 10/10 from me.

Here's some elaboration on the battle abilities: Attack, Spell, Deadly, Skill, Item, Wait, Escape. Attack is simply that; you attack. It is based on your equipped weapon, and more specifically on what type of weapon your character uses. For example, Avin always has to be able to walk up next to his opponent, as he uses a sword. His pal Mile, however, uses a boomerang, and thus can be at a distance when attacking. Spells, as well as Deadly and Skills, are acquired as the characters level up and are generally more powerful than Attacks, but have a greater amount of delay associated with them, and can cost something to use. Spells, of course, consist of White Magic, Black Magic, and Spirit Magic. White Magic is healing/beneficial spells. Black Magic is offensive spells. Spirit Magic is summoning-type spells (they hit every enemy on the field). Deadly is a type of attack that does massive damage, but can only be used when a gauge fills up. This gauge fills by taking and dealing out damage, but can also be increased with items and various skills. The skills are also unique to each character and incorporate all kinds of things from status effecting attacks to stronger attacks to healing-type effects. These cost nothing to use, but generally take longer, and are limited in their use. Wait stops your character from taking any action, and escape leaves the battle (without chance of failure, might I add).

A minor note here is that you can acquire one of three pets at the beginning of the game that have absolutely no bearing on plot whatsoever: a bunny, dog, or cat. How you treat these pets will cause them to help you out in various ways throughout the game, from buffing you before battle, to bringing you items on the field.

Story - The game begins with Avin, our burdened antagonist, playing with his sister, Eimelle, in Cathedral: the center of the Church of Bardus. It becomes besieged by a man named Bellius, who happens to be an apostle of Octum, the god of evil! The group destroys the church and attempts to kidnap Eimelle, but why? The siblings become separated, and Avin awakens in a far-away village, tended to by the Sage Lemuras. Thus Avin begins his journey to find his sister and discover why anyone would want to kidnap her...

The plot is fairly typical for an RPG. It's not a cliche', heard-it-before-a-billion-times plot, but it's nothing that will surprise you and make you have to stop and think after every other phrase of dialogue. It's a very, very well-done plot, however; constant grammatical errors may cause some to frown upon this game. The errors usually aren't TOO bad, but occasionally the mis-wording can create an unintentionally humorous atmosphere. Again, don't let this stop you from enjoying the game.

You will meet a decently large group of characters throughout your adventure in El Phildin featuring all sorts of types: a sailor, a princess, other adventurers, some sorcerers, etc. The normal. What's great about them all is they ALL have lovable, unique personalities about them. Although there isn't a lot of consistent, unique dialogue (think of how Barret or Cid talks from FFVII), there is certainly enough to distinguish characters' personalities.

Graphics - Legend of Heroes suffers slightly in this area: the sprites are awful. The beautiful landscape and lighting effects blend so seamlessly, sometimes with foggy particle effects and gorgeous spell effects. But the sprites look so fat and disproportionate, it's hard to imagine why the game creators wouldn't have simply remodeled them for this release.

This would have been negligible if there weren't so many "fighting" scenes where the characters play out little battles and toss spells at each other, only to have me staring unamused at the triangle-shaped (yes, triangles) swords being wielded by characters with heads the size of their bodies. The sprites' bad design is further enhanced by the great, hand-drawn stills of them that are displayed during dialogue. These pictures change according to what's being said, or possibly what they are doing at the moment. The picture change is usually more than just a happy, smiling mouth to a sad, frowning mouth. Expect to spend time looking at the various, well-drawn detail on these pictures.

You will notice that the game doesn't have too much variety in landscapes: grassy, mountainy, towny, dungeony. The landscapes are all well-done, however; and incorporate a nice amount of blending and lighting effects to have you constantly stop and check something out. I often found myself doing this with the cloud shadowing on the ground, and sometimes some lighting-particle effects. Later in the game, some of the dungeon scenery changes up a bit, and the final dungeon-area is just plain gorgeous. My only complaint here is that there wasn't enough variety for the first 60-70% of the game. Even the towns look strikingly similar. The only difference tends to be the layout, and occasionally some massive, unique town features: like rails scattered throughout a town based around an ore mine/factory. Though there may be a bit of repetition throughout the game, I applaud the game creators for getting the PSP to display some of these graphics.

Sound - Excellent! I was amazed at this games soundtrack and sound effects, although; it was still run-of-the-mill RPG music. What's to expect, however, when the game is a standard-fare RPG? It fits the game perfectly; the music always lets the player know if a dastardly deed is in locomotion, set to disrupt the peace of the town. There is an incredible amount of variety here. I don't believe there was a single song in this ENTIRE game that I didn't like! There isn't much more to say here other than you will be impressed!

Replay Value - This is a toughie. I, as a die-hard RPG fanatic, will probably replay this game about twice a year, as I LOVE plot, and I loved this game's plot. The tedium of backtracking and constantly doing heavily similar quests will prevent many from replaying this game. It's simply not for everyone. There also weren't enough boss fights (or any on an epic scale) for me to experience that hurts-so-good frustration of a near-impossible victory. Whether or not you will replay this game is basically how well you like your RPGs.

Final Recommendation: This game isn't just for the hardcore RPG nut. It's got enough simplicity mixed with a bit of complexity to allow anyone to enjoy it, if some basic flaws are ignored. Looking for a nice boon to your sickly PSP library? Well, this is a great addition! Tired of boring, under-developed PSP games? Well, this is a tried-and-true port of a great game! Looking to get into RPGs, but don't know where to start? This is a GREAT way to get started! Just wanting a good game? Well this just so happens to be a great game: 50+ hrs of game play, a great cast, thorough plot, nice graphics, and a great soundtrack easily place this game at the top of my PSP-games stack, and hopefully will crown yours as well. If you've read other reviews and are still straddling the proverbial fence, then find a rental, and give it a go.

Game Play: 9/10
Story: 8/10
Graphics: 8/10
Sound: 10/10
Replay: 7/10
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Overall: 9/10

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 01/23/06