Golden Sun - Re-Retroview

Review Breakdown
Battle System	4
Interaction	3
Originality	2
Story	1
Music & Sound	4
Visuals	4
Challenge	Very Easy
Completion Time	15-25 Hours
Overall
Isaac gets Granite

   Years after Camelot Software Planning failed miserably to ruin the Sony Playstation with the monster flop Beyond the Beyond and afterward knocked off some decent RPGs for the doomed Sega Saturn, they again produced an RPG for a non-Sega system entitled Golden Sun, being among the Gameboy Advance’s first original RPGs. While far less abhorrent than Beyond the Beyond, Golden Sun unfortunately suffers from one primary flaw making it a mediocre, though not wholly wasteful, title overall.

   The battle system, thankfully, is not the flaw in mention, and is actually one of the game’s high points. At heart, Golden Sun’s battle engine is typical turn-based fare, with the player inputting all characters’ commands and letting them and the enemies beat the crap out of one another in a round of combat, with the typical flaw of unpredictable turn order being present. Thankfully, though, combat has some redeeming features making it far from mediocre, primarily the fact that battles are much faster than in most other turn-based RPGs. Moreover, common use of magic is not a bad idea, since Psynergy Points gradually recover as the player wanders the field outside of battle.

   Another interesting feature is the “innovative” Djinni system, where the player finds up to twenty-eight of these spirits across the world and can equip them to characters, increasing their stats and letting them use their powers in combat, putting the used Djinni into “Standby” mode at the expense of the user’s stats. The player can use Djinni in Standby mode to perform powerful summon spells that can make even the toughest boss battles breeze by quickly. After using a summon spell, the player must wait a few rounds (or wander the field for a while) before the used Djinni recover and automatically equip themselves to their respective characters, being ready for use again. Overall, combat is solid.

   Interaction, though, is average. Despite the ability to save anywhere, which should be mandatory in any RPG, inventory space is limited, with each character able to carry only a certain number of items, equipment consuming a sizable chunk of their item lists; similar item types stack up in each characters’ inventory, though, somewhat lessening this burden. Shopping for new equipment requires a heavy amount of button-pressing, at that. Additionally, the game heavily emphasizes puzzle solving, requiring the use of Psynergy skills from your characters. Complementing the interface is a spotless, though bland, translation effort from Nintendo. Overall, the pros and cons of interaction largely balance out one another.

Pow! Right in the kissah!

   Golden Sun isn’t very original, moving on. Many other RPGs heavily emphasize puzzle solving, such as the Wild ARMs series, Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals, and the RPG-like Zeldas. The Djinni system, moreover, is essentially a summon system by a different name and with slightly different features. The dynamic view of combat also brings back memories of Beyond the Beyond and the Shining games. Generally, Golden Sun doesn’t wholly revolutionize the RPG genre.

   The story is undoubtedly the game’s low point. It begins in the village of Vale, where residents fail to stop a boulder from partially destroying their town. This opening scene does little but to introduce the main character and his friends, not to mention the main villains Saturos and Menardi, who have all the convincing malice of newborn puppies. Saturos and Menardi are probably the worst RPG villains ever, with the extent of their wrongdoings barely being as poignant as say, the random massacres in Suikoden II and Tales of Phantasia, the villainy of Odessa and the Shinra Corporation, or even Kefka Palazzo’s river poisoning and clownish Light of Judgment.

"That snowman shall feel my fury!"

   A few years after the mentioned incident, Isaac, his friends Garet and Jenna, and a professor sneak into Sol Sanctum, where the ancient powers of Alchemy have remained for quite some time, with Saturos and Menardi following along and then releasing the powers, afterward seeking to light the four elemental lighthouses in want of bringing destruction to the land. A clichéd plot at best, and no characters throughout the game are remotely interesting, most containing virtually no development; not even the endless boring, redundant dialogues and communist question system (where no choice affects the grand scheme of events) do much to develop the story, and players will eventually find themselves screaming, “Enough already!” Furthermore, the pursuit of Saturos and Menardi never seems terribly urgent, with the player needing to perform endless diversions such as helping a town with its flood problem and entering an obstacle course contest. Overall, the plot is definitely weak.

   Aurally, though, Golden Sun is strong. Motoi Sakuraba composed a nice soundtrack for the game, at points making his trademark hypnotic use of the flute, with the town themes, primarily that in Vale, being the strongest, though more than one normal battle theme would have been nice. The sound effects are nothing special, at that, with only a few variations of a meager number of sounds. The squeaky sounds accompanying dialogue can become annoying, too, although the player can thankfully turn them off. Overall, the aural aspect is great.

Darwin Award Winner, 2001

   Another high point of the game is the graphics, some of the finest to grace the Gameboy Advance. Environments are bright, colorful, and nice in design, and battles demonstrate a heavy amount of camera shifting with impressive spell effects. The character designs, too, are well more than passable (considering the ugliness of Beyond the Beyond’s character portraits). Unfortunately, sprites are rather simplistic, and both the world map and battle graphics show heavy pixilation. Other than that, though, the visuals are solid.

   Finally, Golden Sun is a very easy RPG, and can take anywhere from fifteen to twenty-five hours to complete. Upon finishing, players can save a clear file to transfer to Golden Sun: The Lost Age via another Gameboy Advance or get a long password to input upon starting a new game with the aforementioned sequel.

   If not for a weak story and other small flaws, Golden Sun would’ve easily been a masterpiece to define the Gameboy Advance, what with its solid combat system, gorgeous soundtrack, and pretty graphics. Still, it’s not a complete waste of time, and is either a perfect starting point for newbies to the genre or something with which to keep yourself entertained for a long road trip, as long as you have plenty of batteries and can look past a boring story.