Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes

Review

Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes is a brand new JRPG developed by Rabbit & Bear Studios, a team led by Yoshitaka Murayama (as well others) who previously created the iconic Suikoden series published by Konami. For this reason, the game can be considered as the spiritual successor of Suikoden. It’s worth mentioning that Hundred Heroes already has an action RPG (Eiyuden Chronicles: Rising) that acts as its prequel and is set in the same world, so give it a look if you want to enjoy this new series from the beginning.

In Hundred Heroes you play as Nowa, a young fighter who joins the Eltisweiss Watch, a mercenary group that tries to maintain peace. During a joint expedition with the Galdean Empire, they discover an ancient and powerful artifact called the Primal Lens, which becomes the spark for war and causes the Empire to start the invasion of Eltisweiss. Thanks to his valorous actions, Nowa is soon promoted to leader of the resistance. His main goal is to build an army by hiring new recruits, but the story doesn’t entirely focus on him. He is the classic muted protagonist that is defined by the player’s choices, but ends up being overshadowed by the huge cast of characters that surrounds him. There are over 100 characters to be recruited (including the missable ones) which is a really impressive number and they are fully voiced in both English and Japanese, except for a few non-important dialogues. While the story premise of a powerful artifact causing a full-scale war is nothing original, it is masterfully narrated through the multiple characters’ points of view. If you love games filled with war themes, political intrigue, magic and plot twists, you certainly won’t be disappointed. There are of course some similarities with the Suikoden series, so you might feel some deja-vu moments.

The combat is turn-based and you can have up to six members in your party, plus one more support character who can only use passive skills and bonuses. During battles you are able to see the order of actions for both your party and enemies, so you can use it at your advantage by focusing your attacks on a specific enemy before his turn. Characters have an SP bar which regenerates over time and is used to perform skills, but also a MP bar which is used for spells and must be restored by using items. Positioning is also important in battles because some skills only have a limited range, so you need to check your party members’ types of attacks. Additionally, characters who have a special bond can perform a powerful attack together, which encourages you to try different characters. Since there are over 100 characters in the game (though not all of them can fight), it’s impossible to use them all and you will likely find your favorite ones. The experience points are scaled for every character, so even those who have been used less and have a lower level will quickly catch up to the party’s level. Combat also includes minor quality-of-life features such as an Auto-battle option, which proves to be useful when you need to grind a bit through regular battles that no longer require your input. If you lose a battle, you also have the option to rematch or resume from the last save point, which is a time saver. Boss fights are quite intense and require tactics that can change in the middle of the battle, encouraging you to use the battlefield at your own advantage (such as hiding behind an object to protect yourself from a powerful enemy attack). There are also multiple Army Battles in Eiyuden Chronicles. These are essentially turn-based war battles that play like a strategy game, where you form legions (each led by one of your characters) to fight against the Empire’s ones. Army Battles are probably the weakest aspect of the game because they are almost entirely scripted and most of the time you feel like a spectator who has not enough control over the battle. 

Graphically speaking, the game makes a good use of the depth of field to mix ultra-defined and colorful environments with beautiful pixelated characters. The art style is great and each character has a very unique design. The performance on PC is perfect and I didn’t encounter any bug or glitch. In terms of music and sound design, Hundred Heroes is also impressive. As mentioned earlier, all characters are voiced in English and Japanese, and the game features some fantastic soundtracks as well, especially the battle theme.

Eiyuden Chronicles: Hundred Heroes offers a genuine old-school experience through gorgeous, modern graphics. The story is always engaging and it’s fun to explore the world looking for new characters to recruit into your army. It’s really sad to think that this is the final work of Yoshitaka Murayama, who passed away earlier this year, but I’m sure many players will treasure the game because it’s a love letter to classic JRPGs and a worthy successor to Suikoden.

Review written by Sonic Punk for Zeepond.com

Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes Steam Store Page