Disgaea 1 Complete (Switch) Review
Release Date: 10/09/2018
Played Date: 8/2/2021
Many years ago when Disgaea 3 was released for the PS3, I jumped at the chance to play it. After all, Final Fantasy Tactics is one of my favorite video games of all time and here was a brand new tactical RPG on my brand new console. For years up to this point people had been telling me about the Disgaea series. "It's Final Fantasy Tactics on steroids," was what I kept hearing over an over. The art looked right, the gameplay looked right, and there were some really cool character designs. How could I NOT fall in love with it. So, I picked up the third installment in the series, popped it into my console, and dove right in head first. Almost immediately, I was greeted by the snarky main character with too much attitude and his like minded cast of characters. I could feel my body start rejecting the game right from the onset. It was that feeling you get when you accidentally swallow a big gulp of soured milk. It put a bad taste in my mouth. I decided to give a couple of battles a try... and I was overwhelmed by the mechanics of the game and got stuck almost immediately. I read through part of a guide that was designed to help you out in the beginning and was more confused than ever. Disgaea wasn't for me. After about 3 hours, I threw in the towel, put the game in the case, slid it onto the shelf, and there it has sat for about a decade.
Still... in the back of my mind I couldn't help but feel that I should like the game. I still hear about the franchise all of the time and quite often see it on top 10 lists. Even now, they are rereleasing the games on all of the current generation consoles. There must be some demand from the public to play these games again. Why didn't I like it? Certainly it was something wrong with me. "Should I give it another shot?" I kept asking myself while dreading the prospect of trying to figure it all out again. My enthusiasm was tinged with so much reluctance I could never bite the bullet and give it another shot.
Low and behold, Nippon Ichi Software (NIS), the developers, decided to release a complete edition of the first game on the Nintendo Switch. "Here we go!" I thought to myself. "This is where I'll get started." After all, this is the game that made everyone fall in love with the franchise back on the PS2. Once again, I got the game, popped it into my console and booted it up.... and just like before, I was greeted by another annoying protagonist and his similar companions. The overabundance of mechanics were there just like before and they were just as confusing as ever. The gameplay was unforgiving and the story was... painful at times. So, did I throw in the towel like before? No. I actually beat the game this time. Did my opinions change? Well, sort of. After my trip to Japan I gained a new appreciation for quirky games and campy humor. While I don't really like anime, I have now seen some of it and experienced its tropes. I think these improvements within myself made me appreciate Disgaea a little bit more. Did it make it anymore enjoyable? Maybe marginally. It's not a great game by any stretch, but it is good and definitely has some highlights.
You play as Laharl, the adolescent lord of the Netherworld. After two years of slumber, you discover your father has been killed and you set out to become the most ruthless underworld ruler of all time. Aided by your friend Etna and a supporting cast of characters, you work your way through a series of loosely connected scenarios that take your from the underworld volcanoes, to spaceships, to heaven, and other zany places in between. The story itself is pretty superficial in my opinion despite the writers trying to inject emotion into every nook and cranny. Etna is a secret spy who has been blackmailed to trick you, your mom sacrificed herself to save your life before you were born, an angel sent as a spy from heaven joins your party who constantly talks about love and goodness, a robot sacrifices himself to save everyone, etc. This is all fine and dandy, but the issue is that Laharl swears up and down that he's a demon and has no emotion. He constantly tries to be edgy and bad just for the sake being evil. Every impactful shift in emotion during the game is shrugged off as being stupid or a waste of time. So, all of these "important" story moments are just relegated to being a nuisance. How to you have character development be the focus of your story when the main character refuses to develop? Of course, that's what the story is really all about... Laharl learning to love (gag). If you want people to feel emotion, they need to empathize with the main characters and that's essentially impossible in this game because they are all so shallow. They're either evil because they're demons, super cutesy and good because they're angels, overly noble because they are rip offs of Space Gordon, or power rangers, or whatever. Other than Etna, all of the characters are unbearably superficial and unlikeable. This honestly, made quite difficult to care whatsoever about the story. In addition to this, most of the story is told with the NIS standard of having static pictures with dialog boxes and voice overs. I'm so over this voice over style. If you want to show something, SHOW it. Don't have a character describe to me something that's happening off screen. Also, try to get some decent voice actors for your game. Some of them are fairly talented, while others are atrocious. Whoever does the voice of the main character hams it up far too much. I know they were going for that over-the-top style, but it just doesn't work. Having an annoying character yell annoying things constantly all with terrible delivery isn't a good way to endear you to the protagonist. Luckily, this game does have some cutscenes using the in-game engine; and while these aren't great, they do help convey what's going on a bit more.
Gameplay is pretty standard for a tactical rpg. The battlefield is grid based with varying terrain. There is a squad of enemies visible from the onset of the battle and you have to select your squad to take into combat. This takes place in turn-based fashion. You move, attack, use items, and skills with your characters and then select to execute them when ready. Then, the enemy takes their turn and does the same. Think of it like chess, except you get to move all of your pieces once before your opponent gets a turn. Depending on the order you perform these actions, you can get combos, and chains building up to deal additional damage or gain bonuses. Also scattered around the battlefield are these geocrystals that provide bonuses or hazards to certain tiles on the battlefield. If you have a red crystal, it corresponds to the red spaces, blue to blue, green to green, etc. There are lots of mechanics to these that include destroying the crystals, tossing them onto different colored tiles, chaining them together, standing in certain spots, and many more. Success in this game is tied to using these crystals and it can all be a bit overwhelming even after 40 or so hours of playtime. Even at the end of the game I never truly felt like I understood them completely. Mostly, I ignored them unless they directly prevented me from beating a battle. They do add a spin onto the experience that turns a lot of the focus of the battles into more of a puzzle game. While I didn't fully embrace the system, I did come to appreciate it and now see it as a highlight of the game. In addition to this, you can have your characters pick up other allies and enemies on the battlefield. They can be thrown, prevented from attacking, moved around, and a bunch of other stuff that adds to the complexity and puzzle-like nature of playing this game. Just like the geocrystals, mastering these mechanics are required to progress through the story. It can be a bit much to manage, but once again, the game wouldn't be the same without this mechanic.
In addition to the combat, there is a ton of stuff to micromanage outside of the battles. There is a senate that can unlock new items, abilities, areas of the game, difficulties, and plenty more. You have to bring these changes before the council and have them vote on the matter. In order to do this, you have to gain influence through bribing, killing, and bullying the senators. As you do this and level up your character, you'll gain more influence and can pass legislation easier. While this isn't strictly necessary for most of the game, there are a good number of choke points in terms of difficulty spikes that require to you manipulate the game a great deal. You'll often have to spend hours trying to pass legislation to gain an ability or have the option for better weapons just to have a chance in a tough battle. Also, you level up weapons, items, and armor by going inside the item and fighting through randomly generated battles. Each battle you clear levels up the item by one (with a max of 99 levels). There's also a system of "breaking" the game where you can use game exploits to become super overpowered (like level 9999) when the final boss is level 90. It really is a lot to take in. The difficulty spikes I mentioned are quite prevalent and there were many grinding sessions during my time with the game. While they did break the pace of the game severely, I actually found them to be some of the most fun I had while playing. Truthfully, the real mechanic of this game is to micromanage and min/max everything you can in order to break the game's balance. After learning this, the game became more fun and a lot more bearable. It's really cool to exploit a mechanic and level up 50 times in just a few minutes buut it wasn't quite enough to overcome the sheer cringyness and adolescent humor of the storyline and its bad characters.
One of the big highlights of the game is that the character models look really good while in combat and are apparently a huge upgrade from the original PS2 release. It really does remind me of FF Tactics and evokes that sense of nostalgia. The sprites really pop on the scenery of the battlefield and it's a joy to look at. While the character models look good, most of the character designs are super hit or miss. Some of them look really enticing and unique like Etna and the Prinnies, while others (I'm looking at you Laharl) are so boring and uninteresting in every possible way that I'm shocked they were even designed by the same person. There are an abundance of enemies/monsters in the game and many of them that encounter in combat have pretty good designs to them and they help keep the battlefield from becoming too stagnant. To accompany the improved graphics from the original release is an absolutely stellar soundtrack. It has a whimsical classical feel that really suits the game very well. It reminds me of the Harry Potter soundtrack in a lot of places and while I don't necessarily like the HP franchise, I do really appreciate its score. It was wise for the developers to put so much focus into the music as it is the real driving force for a lot of you gameplay time. This is especially true for those marathon grinding sessions. There are ample tracks in the game and they have a wide variety of emotional and stylistic changes. There's even a shop in the game where you can use your money to purchase the different tracks form the game and use them at will. I'm honestly shocked at how good the soundtrack is for this game, and if it wasn't for the composer's deft hand at creating this music, I don't think I would have had the motivation to finish the game.
Let me get this out of the way, Disgaea isn't a bad game. In fact, it's actually good. While the gameplay mechanics are a bit convoluted and focused way too much on grinding and "breaking" the game, there's still a lot of fun to be had. The battles themselves can be really entertaining when your party isn't over/under leveled. Unfortunately, that won't be the case most of the time. The character design can be hit or miss, but the art direction and presentation is fantastic and looks just like a tactical RPG should look. The story is cliché and all over the place, but I assume that's what the developers were going for... so I can't fault them too much. It just didn't hit me the way it would hit a huge anime fan. The main story didn't overstay its welcome at 30-40 hours, but there are hundreds more hours of content for those who want to put that kind of time into it. Personally, I felt this game was a one and done sort of experience. Yes, I do still have the other games in the series on my wish list, but they were knocked down a notch to a lower priority. I'm not going to actively seek them out, but I'll grab them if I come across them cheaply.
Final Status: Beaten
Final Score: 7/10 (Good)
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