In Focus: Eternal Eden
Blossomsoft’s first game reminds me of the kind of game you would get if it was made in Game Maker; a highly derivative, Eastern themed JRPG with leanings towards Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest. It’s not of course, but the Final Fantasy reference is an apt one, because this RPG is all about paying homage to the classics. Of course, it does so almost to a fault; the dialogue reads like a badly localized NES RPG, with silly dialog, a goof protagonist and several rivals dueling for the affection of a princess.
The game’s story is also highly derivative – perhaps unearthed from the musty smelling sarcophagus of some long forgotten JRPG. It opens in a strange land where people live hundreds of years, but never age; where a tower named after that mythological garden in the old testament holds a forbidden fruit, and where partaking of said fruit turns this small island into an empty, decaying husk of its former self.
Onward and upward for a trio of heroes, whose only care before this world shaking event was to give a 900 year old princess the perfect pie on her birthday in hopes of securing one of her tender, royal kisses.
The kisses can wait, of course, but an adventure cannot. That adventure is just like one you’d get if you replayed the first Final Fantasy, but without all the classes, prestige classes, or the attention to detail.
Still, it’s hard to knock this game for being derivative because it’s kind of fun, despite its flaws; Fun is fun, no matter how goofy the story or characters are. The demo gives you 60 minutes of play and there are just enough morsels to make you want to eat the whole meal.
