La Pucelle Tactics
The Holy Maiden of Light

Reviewer Chi Phan	Story	8/10
	Characters	8/10
	Graphics	6/10
	Music	8/10
	Gameplay	8/10
	Extras	10/10
	Final Score	8/10

Sometimes all it takes is one rpg game with a positive feedback to turn it into a popular series. In this case it started with Disgea: Hour of Darkness. Disgea was part of a popular culture rpg games from the company, Nippon Ichi. While those in Japan are familiar with rpg games from Nippon Ichi, North American gamers know next to nothing about them. Still with the introduction of Disgaea: Hour of Darkness, North American gamers got their first taste of a Nippon Ichi rpg game. It didn't take long before publisher, Mastiff, realized the potential and impact that another rpg game from Nippon Ichi can have on the paying public. So within a matter of months, Mastiff picked up the publishing rights for La Pucelle Tactics for North America. Fast forward to date and we now have La Pucelle Tactics as on one of the major rpg games released for late spring. We'll take a look at this follow up rpg to Disgaea: Hour of Darkness.

I'm going to be the Maiden of Light! I have chosen you, Prier. At the start of the story, we are introduced to Prier and her brother Culotte. The two of them are being trained as Demon Hunters for the Church of the Holy Maiden by holy sister Aloulette. As part of their early test as Demon Hunters for the church, the trio are sent on tasks of eliminating demons and monsters that have been popping out around the city of Pot au Feu. In one instance of an encounter with demons, the trio ran across a mysterious freelance hunter name Croix working for the Church of the Divine Mother. After the ensuing battle with the demons, Criox decided to join the Church of the Holy Maiden as a demon hunter for them since it was discovered that the demons and monsters that have been spawning around Port au Feu City may have been the result of the Church of the Divine Mother led by Noir. Noir is seeking to use the Church of the Divine Mother influence to spawn demons against humans so that both races can destroyed each other so he can create his own utopia in his image. With this revelation, Father Salade, head of the Church of the Holy Maiden, sent out Pier and her group to investigate and stop the evil doing of Noir. A task that is not so easily accomplished since it requires the group to travel by air to another continent. But lucky for Prier and her fellow demon hunters that they manage to befriend Homard and his crew from the airship, Escargot. With air travel possible, the demon hunters head off to unknown lands for an adventure to face off against the Church of the Divine Mother. Be prepared for some surprising twists of events as the story unfolds and a generally good ending. The overall story is a high 7 or a very low 8. The story itself is much better developed and organized than the Disgaea storyline; however it's still not developed to the point where it's a serious story that rpg gamer should take to heart. This is a comedy rpg story with moments where the story tries to give us the serious message of bigotry and prejudice from the human race as a reflection on how we treat others that are different from us. There are times where you think things are really getting interesting only to be taken back a little with some light hearted comments from the characters reminding us that even though this story is about the prejudice of the human race, we don't really want to go down that road and examine the issue more since this is just a game and we are here to have fun so let's move onto something a little more fun and light hearted. In a sense the story is about the adventures of these young demon hunters and their trek around the world to help others against the demons of the world. It's a good fun story and a good ending that should satisfy gamers. A low 8 at best.

The gang is all here. Another improvement when comparing to Disgaea is the presentation of the characters. While I always thought Disgaea characters were either dull or just plain annoying, I was pretty fond of the whole crew of La Pucelle. They aren't the greatest bunch of characters around but they aren't dull or annoying. It helps when the story actually takes a moment to develop each of the main characters and the supporting characters. The characters are Prier, Culotte, Aloulette, Croix, Eclair, Homard, and Father Salade. That's seven main characters. There are other supporting casts as well. What made these characters a bit more interesting is oddly enough is the fact that each of them have their own unique personality and background history that the story actually takes the time to develop them. It's a slow process where it might take you to the point of where you're nearly at the end of the story before you know a little bit more about each of these characters and who they are or might be. The beauty of these characters is that just when you think there isn't anything there, the story surprises you with a little bit of a twist. Keep things interesting. Another interesting insider note is that you may not recognize the actors and actresses behind the voices of these characters but don't be too surprise that you may have seen them on some of your favorite tv shows before. A final note, a good cast of characters that are develop nicely.

What a beautiful world. Graphically speaking this game doesn't push any of the Playstation 2 engine to new heights. Heck, it doesn't even push the Playstation graphic to new heights, much less the Playstation 2. The graphic isn't really as bad as I make it sound but the pure fact is that when you are comparing this game graphic to other Playstation 2 games, it's very outdated and old. Similar to Disgaea, La Pucelle uses a 2-D side to side world with hand drawn short sprites. The artwork on the sprites and the background environment are very good to excellent. The best plus for the graphic is that even though it's outdated, the colors used in this game are excellent. It's this best feature in the graphics is where I see a little difference between La Pucelle and Disgaea graphics. From a visual style stand point, it's really a good looking 2-D sprite game. But that kind of style in terms of graphic is no longer in play in this era of gaming age. Overall when measuring La Pucelle graphics to Playstation 2 standard, it fall short, very short. If you buy this game, you won't be buying it for the graphics.

Cheerleading practice is hard. This was a pleasant surprise to me. I was expecting the same kind of joyful but non serious kind of musical presentation from this game as was presented in Disgaea. How wrong I was. The music and story go hand in hand. The music is the representation of the story. If the story tries to convey various aspect of human emotions then so will the music. In this case, the music does represent all the human emotions and different types of themes. You have the sad theme for moments in the story where things are despair for the characters to the comedy theme where things are light hearted. In short, battle themes, character themes, town themes, world map theme, map themes, and story moment themes are all present and accounted for. An excellent array of choices for you to listen to during the game. Some of the sad themes and character themes are just wonderful and beautifully rendered. Not much in term of sound effects but that's alright since the game doesn't really have much exploration of the world or towns for there to be sound effects needed. The voice acting is also very decent as well. Nothing to complain about and nothing too big to really score a mark on.

Let's kill them together. I'm taking you down boss man. Game Information    Genre: Strategy Rpg    Publisher: Mastiff    Disc: 1 DVD Disc    Memory: 360 KB    Players: 1 Player Mode    Analog Control: Yes    Rating: Teen    Release: May 2004 The concept of the gameplay is pretty much, "a little bit of the old and a little bit of the new". La Pucelle consist of your typical strategy rpg game where you have battle maps to fight in by placing your party members before the start of battles. From this point on its turn base as you command each party member to use their action according to your wishes. There's no world exploration at all as the game is pretty straight forward on where to go next and what to do next. There are a couple of towns in the game but the towns themselves are pretty small and in 2-D format. The locations of dungeons appear on the world maps as dots. Red glowing dot symbolizes that you need to go to that area to progress the story. Each dungeon consists of several levels for you to explore in. Once you complete a battle map, you can head out to the world map to heal or restock on supplies back at town as well as save the game. The concept of the game is very straight forward. Go to the next red dot, clear the battle map and progress the story. One thing to note is that the game is broken up into chapters. Each chapter will have various different endings. They are bad, good, and special. The kind of ending you get is base on whether or not you are able to achieve certain requirements during that chapter. Keep in mind that these different endings don't have any real effect on the overall story ending. The concept for the game is pretty much old school strategy rpg element. However there are a few new features presented in this game. Some of them are pretty similar to Disgaea. Let's get to the run down on the features of this game. Dark Portals:The first thing you will notice on the battle map are dark portals. Dark portals emit dark energy in various directions. You can change the direction in which the dark energy is flowing by having a character stand on the dark portal or using an item. Dark portal also serve as a place for new monsters to spawn if you are not able to clear the battle map in a certain timeframe. It is important to try and complete a map before new monsters are able to surface from the dark portals or you need to purify the dark portals so there are no more dark portals. Purification:This is without a doubt the main feature in the game. Those that represent the dark forces such as dark portals and monsters need to be purified. Purification is important in two ways. For one, by purifying a monster, you can then recruit that monster into your team. Recruiting monsters are an important aspect in getting new party members other than the main characters in the game and of course using those monsters for item fusion. The second usage of purification is to purifying the dark portal to stop new monsters from appearing in the battlefield and to ensure that the dark energy that is being purified is being transmitted into your items so they can gain experience points. As your character level up, so do your purification power. Items:All items from armors to weapons start with level 1. You can buy your items from a shop in town or from getting them from the Dark World. Items can level up base on achieving a certain amount of experience points. The only way to gain experience points for items is by getting the power of the dark energy that is being purify. Which means that a character must be standing on a dark portal and purifying that dark portal to get the purification energy to be transmitted into item experience points. Special Abilities:Each character and monster have their own unique special abilities. As they level up, they will learn new special abilities. Note that special ability has its own level. The more you use that special ability, the more chance of it gaining a new level. Miracle Attack:Miracle attacks are sort of like a high summon magic attack. To get off a miracle attack, you need to purify a dark portal that has a circle of dark energy that covers 15 or more squares. When this happens, a sort of like summon magic is introduce to either deal damage to all enemies inside the circle of dark energy or to heal all allies inside the circle of dark energy. Magic:Originally you get magic from elemental weapons. Once you equip that weapon like say an Ice Rod, you have the ability to cast ice magic. However in order to learn that magic permanently for a character, they need to be able to level up that ice magic to level 1. Once that's done you don't need to equip an item in order to use that magic anymore. Magic itself can be level up just like with special abilities. Training:You can train monsters that you have converted to boost certain aspects of their stats. You can also work on their happiness as part of their training. You train them by giving them certain commands. A command that doesn't boost any particular stats of a monster will increase a monster happiness. If a monster happiness reaches 10 then that monster will have the ability to purify dark portals and other monsters. However keep in mind that each time you train a monster in a particular stats, you are lowing a monster happiness. If a monster happiness is too low, they will leave your party. So you have to balance the training between boosting stats and happiness of a monster. Item Fusion:You can fuse items that you have in the game into one item that have better stats from the combination of items that you use to fuse the resulting item with. You use item by sending a monster into the Dark World with the equipping items on that monster. As the monster trek through the Dark World, it will eventually die. In return for its death, the equipment that the monsters have on will fuse into one. Hence item fusion. This is a good way to get rid of any useless monsters and to get better weapons. The gameplay is a mix of the old school traditional strategy rpg element with some new features added on which we have just listed for you. Together they make a great mix of combo for a good gaming experience. The only drawback in the gameplay is the pure fact that you do need to spend a lot of time leveling your characters to an extremely high level just to gain access to some of the better part of the gaming elements such as the Dark World and Cave of Trials. I do wish however that you can have more than just 8 members in a fight. With so many characters to choose from and monsters to convert, you want to be able to use as many fighters as possible but in the end, you'll end up pretty much only using the story characters as your fighters. In comparison to Disgaea, La Pucelle seems to fall a little short. Perhaps this is due to the fact that I prefer the Item World over to the Dark World. There is also no feature that is equal to the Dark Assembly from Disgaea. And of course various Job Classes for your characters are missing in this game. This isn't to say Pucelle gameplay is lacking or bad. On its own, Pucelle gameplay is quite good but compare to Disgaea, it's just not as good.

Score: 8/10

I burn to kill you. Extra features in this game are very similar to Disgaea. You have extra battle maps to explore and secret bosses. There are even different types of endings at the end of each chapter. You have the Cave of Trials where you can fight and level up against higher level monsters. But the main bonus map battles are located in the Dark World. The Dark World is similar to Disgaea's Item World in that you go through different floors in the Dark World fighting high level monsters that are over the range of level 200+. The only time that you can get back from the Dark World is at each tenth floor. The purpose of the Dark World is to gain major levels and rare items that you can't get anywhere else. This will take numerous hours of leveling up just to be ready to take on the Dark World. There are other secret battle maps that you can gain access to in order to fight secret bosses that you may find familiar with from Disgaea. All in all, there is enough extra battle maps for you to do to keep you occupy for hours if not days. The only drawback is that there's no replay value in terms of a Game+ mode for gamers out there. But then again you can always replay the game again just to try and get the different endings in each of the chapters that you weren't able to get before just to see what's new. So it's not so bad even without a Game+ mode. I still give it a 10 even without a Game+ mode due to the huge amount of extra maps and boss fights available for you to access.

It started with Disgaea: Hour of Darkness. Now the popularity train of the Nippon Ichi rpg series are coming over to North America like the gold diggers heading for California back in 1849 looking for gold. A few months ago, nobody this side of the world has even heard of Nippon Ichi. Now they are about to get an earful of Nippon Ichi rpgs. Disgaea, La Pucelle, and the soon to be release Phantom Brave. Is this a good thing or a bad thing? You decide. But one thing for sure, Nippon Ichi is going to become a brand name rpg company pretty soon. La Pucelle is an excellent strategy rpg game for those into the rpg genre that love to see more strategy rpg game being introduced. If you have the chance, pick up this game as it can be a very under appreciated rpg game. Final Score: 8/10 Time to complete: 100 hours Difficulty: Medium to Hard Favorite story character: Homard Best item: Change Up Most useful spell: Braveheart Voice narration: Good Best advice: Level up quickly Best Special Attack: Burning Soul Also try: Disgaea: Hour of Darkness Up next: Front Mission 4