Disgaea 4: A Promise Unforgotten – Review

Title: Disgaea 4: A Promise Unforgotten
Published By: Nippon Ichi Software America (North America), Namco Bandai Partners (Australia), Tecmo Koei Europe (PAL)
Based on: The long running Disgaea series
Console: Playstation 3
Release Date: September 2011
Genre: Tactical RPG
Audio: English/Japanese Dubs
Subtitles: English
Region: This review was conducted on a North American version of the title however is expected to be released in Australia / PAL Regions over the next few months.
Cost: $40 – $110+ depending on the edition
Blurb: After a few years of there not being a Disgaea game on the Playstation 3, Nippon Ichi Software has come out with that could only be described as the ultimate version of Disgaea. Featuring the same quirky storylines from the previous games, it is a blast to follow through the storyline, complemented by the same tactical battle system with improvements made everywhere. Many other features have been included such as the ability to develop your own levels, create a pirate ship and more alongside the normal Item Worlds and post-game content. The biggest stand-out feature is the design, which has been developed specifically to give the game the HD edge it needed while complementing the anime style graphics.

Welcome to my review of Disgaea 4: A Promise Unforgotten, the fourth numbered game in the long running and successful Disgaea franchise which has not only led to four games, but portable remakes on both the Playstation Portable and Nintendo DS, to spin-off games such as Makai Kingdom, Phantom Brave, Prinny: Can I Really Be A Hero? and many others. This game is one I have been covering since it has been announced, so I was expecting big things from it…. and did it fulfill my expectations of this series? You will have to read on to find out! However, do note that for this review, I will be basing it off the Standard Edition instead of the normal Premium Edition reviews, but this will have no impact on the scoring. Now… onto the review….

Since the dawn of time, humans have always feared “The Darkness”.

Vampires, werewolves, zombies, ghosts….

Although it differs slightly from culture to culture, people’s fear of the darkness has grounded them into living conservatively. In the current world… Thanks to wars, terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, accidents caused by human error and daily incidents of murder – humans have grown to fear the actions of their own kind even more then darkness itself. This is the story of a group of heroes who have stood up to fight back against such a corrupted society….

Notice the serious storyline posed above? That is thankfully way too serious for this game and therefore you will most probably forget all about the backstory within the first chapter or two and instead get pulled into the enticing storyline which is all about  World Domination, or specifically… Netherworld Domination. You begin the game as Valvatorez, a once feared vampire who has lowered himself into working as a Prinny instructor in Hades (The Netherworld Prison) and has since then, lost most of his power due to not drinking blood – complements of a promise he made. Descending into relying off the “awesome” power of Sardines, his loyal werewolf servant Fenrich is one of the few that keeps his head on the level. Unlike other Prinny trainers such as Etna… or Etna or say… Etna, Valvatorez takes his job seriously, resulting in a high Prinny morale and us as the viewer learning the true source of the word dood!

One day upon successfully training a batch of Prinnies, every Prinny in the cohort suddenly vanishes, leaving both Valvatorez and Fenrich to go after them to determine what the cause is. This simple event leads them into a storyline that has them up against the Corrupterment (The Netherworld Government), the recurring character Axel (From Disgaea 2) and what can only be determined as a desire to lower the population of the Prinny population through Genocide. After rescuing the Prinnies, he realizes that the corrupt nature of the Corrupterment has to be put to an end, and so decides to put an end to them by running for President.

Throughout their quest and in true Disgaea style, they run into many new playable characters who each holds a unique trait or quirk that carries them along through the storyline. Ever wondered what they would do if they ever ran out of Prinny suits? Fuka Kazamatsuri, the first female character to join the party is an ordinary High Schooler who after dying, was destined to become a Prinny, but due to lack of Prinny hide ended up with just a Prinny Hat and no explosives – whilst under the delusion that this world is nothing but a dream. Other characters who join or have relevance to the storyline include a Final Boss (??), an Angel who likes to steal money, the son of the President and someone who whilst being known as the Ex-Dark Hero in another netherworld, remains a nobody in this one and is still just as idiotic. The character mix is enjoyable and whilst having an extensive number of “Story” characters to sufficiently fill your roster, is kept limited so as to keep the flow of the storyline steady.

The whole purpose of this game is not to put across an award winning story with moments of extreme emotion and a three hour long tale into each characters past, but instead is to put across a storyline that gets you through the game whilst at the same time being a tonne of fun to read – and this is where the storyline succeeds. The storyline kept me engaged and willing to continue onto the next story battle without being tempted to grind in the Item World for a few hours and even if some of the characters quirks such as Valvatorez with his sardines and Desco with her references to being the final boss might seem repetitive, they are implemented well enough to keep you chuckling without feeling bored. In comparison to other games in the series such as Disgaea 2 which occasionally went off on a side-story or Disgaea 3 which had the occasional futile trip into Mao’s heart, Disgaea 4 managed to keep on track with their Netherworld Domination plot for the most part, with every chapter bringing them closer to their goal or facing a plot from the Corrupterment. As with Disgaea 3 however, whilst there are more stages for every chapter in the story, you might feel that the storyline could have used more of a plot that could have been delivered from having 12+ episodes like the original Disgaea games. However, I found it an enjoyable means of enjoying everything the game had to offer.

Of course, you cannot finish discussing the storyline without mentioning the little details. As with every other game in the series, there is an episode preview between chapters. This time around, it features Valvatorez starting off seriously and outlining the plot that was unfolding but within a few sentences, is off on a tangent about some aspect of sardines, where the other characters originally try to get him back on topic, then end up debating with him. The first time I thought it was rather bland, but after a few episodes, I actually found them intellectually enjoyable and witty. Another nice touch is in relation to the custom characters which will make up a bulk of your party. Generally these characters don’t have any role in the story, and still do not however upon recruiting them you get a fun little story about how they rose to power and became the ruler of that region of the map (Eg. The Zombie class rose to power through conversion of the populace to their kind). It isn’t anything majorly important, but it is a nice little touch to make recruiting characters fun.

The first thing you should notice as soon as you begin the game is not the storyline and not the gameplay – but the improvements in design quality. Between the original release of Disgaea: Hour of Darkness and Disgaea 3: Absence of Justice, the graphic quality stayed generally the same with just minor improvements in character portraits and resolution changes to support the Playstation 3 console switch. This was actually quite alright as it kept with what worked, however this time they have gone for a full HD improvement of everything in the game from character sprites to environments to the tiniest detail in portraits. When it comes down to it, you will still be using 2D sprites in a 3D battlefield and it works. As you can see from the images above, the environments look more vibrant and detailed then ever before whilst the characters no longer keep their retro feel but instead look like they belong in a game from 2011 with the visual appeal of a high quality anime series (Aka. Say bye-bye to pixelated sprites).

The character skill animations still maintain their retro feel, but also have the HD improvement to complement the HD character designs – and for fans of anime series such as Spice and Wolf, do look forward to trying out the Omega magic spells for special cameos. Character portraits have also received an improvement to keep them in line with portraits from other games in the genre. Whilst there is no lip-syncing, breathing or breast buoyancy shown in them, they will animate to show the characters expression on the change of every set of text where applicable, and they also use sprite animations in story scenes more then prior with a greater variety of them.

For those who like the old retro style of character sprites, you need not fret. One change in the options menu and you will be able to switch to their older style of graphics that are included with the game, however after seeing the new style, I thought it looked rather weird, especially the design of the Prinnies which were not as good as I remember them even from Disgaea 1. With the exception of the odd occasion where something would briefly go or appear through a wall, there were no major complications arising from the design quality and in my opinion, I could not have asked for better – and it was a well overdue improvement.

As with every other Disgaea game, Tenpei Sato is the mastermind behind the music of the game. Boasting a wide variety of tracks as usual, the variety should prove satisfactory. Not only is there your normal array of tracks, but they have also included a variety of older Disgaea songs that have been creatively remixed and reborn in this title. Of the new songs, they are of very mixed genres that should suit all themes presented in the game however I do feel they could have used a few more lyrical tracks, of which prior games have shown them to often be exceptional. The games Opening Theme, Last Engage is truly a brilliant theme and the best presented so far in a Disgaea game, but could have used subtitles for those who are not familiar with the language. In terms of voice acting, I have no specifics however I would say the English dubbing (I don’t listen to the Japanese dub) was up to par with other NIS America titles and should not disappoint. I was a bit hesitant about Desco at first, who I believe is dubbed by Michelle Ruff, but the cuteness of her voice mixed with the fact she talks about becoming the best final boss won me over.

Whilst I assume that most people who are reading this review are familiar with this games mechanics, I will quickly give a brief overview of the system anyway. This is what is known as a tactical RPG game. Whilst Nippon Ichi Software has tried to expand the system over the years, this remains faithful to the original system where the characters are given a HP/SP bars and corresponding stats such as Attack (ATK), Intelligence (INT) etc and whilst remaining locked to a grid battlefield, you have to traverse to your enemies and attack them using a variety of skills. These basic concepts are taught in a tutorial at the beginning of the game so you are well equipped before tacking the storyline challenges. You are allowed to use up to ten characters in a battle which consist of your storyline characters alongside custom characters each who can equip one of eight weapon types (Fist, Sword, Spear, Bow, Gun, Axe, Staff and Monster) each of which have corresponding skills ranging from physical (ATK) or magical (INT) spells. The game also requires you to perform group attacks, lift and throw party members and environment objects and tailoring your individual character to your play style – For example I like to charge in and attack so my party primarily consists of a healer with Sword and Fist users.

The Geo Block system has returned with a vengeance, this time boasting more types of stats that are used more frequently to put your party at a disadvantage or at the odd occasion, at an advantage. Magichange has also returned with improvements. Originally Magichange required you to be in a “School Club” with a monster member and you were only able to obtain a monster weapon through it. This time, all restrictions are off, you can form up to two magichanges with monster classes to dual-wield weaponary and merging two monster classes together results in a giant monster (Taking up multiple spaces on the grid) and having improved statistics. The system generally remains the same from prior games, however they have added a couple of new systems which give you more things to do with it.

The Item World has once again remained intact with almost the same system as the previous games with only a couple of alterations. This time you are given the choice randomly throughout the levels to take one of two different paths which determine what is leveled up in an item primarily. You are able to take either the Innocent route which raises the level of Innocents in your item, or the weapon path which improves the level of your weapon even further by providing you items you can utilize to do so. Mystery Gates remain in the game, this time with both original areas such as the stores and new ones which may trick you into an impossible to win battle. Anyone who has watched the trailer for this game will no doubt go searching for Pirates, and randomly from Stage 20, you can randomly encounter them – and defeating them will unlock ship parts and other bonuses you can use for a feature I shall discuss later on.

The Cam-Pain Manager, similar to the Dark Assembly and Student Council from previous games, is your hub for creating characters and giving yourself that extra edge in battle. This time the character limit is not determined by passing bills but instead you are given one character slot per completed battle, in which you can create a number of classes (Some need to be unlocked) ranging from the normal Fighter (Male and Female) and Mage (Fire/Ice/Wind – Male/Female) to more specific ones which as Beastmaster and Shaman (and many monster classes such as Nekomata and Zombie’s). The variety of characters is good and each of them are given colour schematic changes as you improve your characters level.

That is not all the Cam-pain manager is for however. You may access the senate to unlock new classes, improve the items in shops, increase or decrease enemy difficulty and more unique to this game, place Evil Symbols which allow you to gain access to bonuses in battle or the senate with the characters assigned to the symbol or alternatively, unlock brand new features in the game such as the Punishment Room. The Punishment Room is actually one of the more disappointing elements of this game. You may remember last year I did a First Impressions review of Criminal Girls, a title released by Nippon Ichi software and was well known for its own punishment system. Unfortunately it seems to have descended to nothing more then a list of both torturous and sexy “punishments” with a cluster of three or four pre-determined text for each character type. Was honestly expecting more, but it does the job well enough – earn more HL, Unlock treasure chests on maps and recruit captured characters.

One of the big draws to this game were all the new nifty little online features they were going to include. Overall, I think this is a nice system but perhaps I hyped myself up a bit too much for them, as I was expecting more then what was delivered – especially in the Pirate Creator mode. The first mode you will most probably unlock is the ability to create custom maps and share them with others. This is a brilliant feature and works well, but unfortunately whilst I initially thought it would not be a big problem, the changes mentioned HERE did cause me a problem from the beginning. Whilst I had no issue with the landforms or the randomizing of names, I did find the inability to use multiples of objects next to or on top of each other annoying and after trying to get the level I wanted and failing frequently, I just chose to develop off one of the in-game levels. But the tools are there and they still work well for anyone who wants to dedicate the time to it. You can upload your level to the ranking system and let others play them – in which you can unlock Custom Points [CP] (Points which you can trade in for tools such as textures, geoblocks, landforms to further customize your levels). Did I mention you can create customized bases as well? Well… you can and provided you either build a custom level well or choose the right in-game level to build upon, they can function better then the default one.

One of the big draws for me, and most probably what ended up the biggest disappointment was the Pirate System. After you defeat your first pirate in the Item World and pass a bill, you can create your own pirate ship with parts you can unlock by A: Defeating Pirates or B: Finding them in treasure found from punishing your captured enemies. Depending on the item, it will allow you to include more members on your ship and remain longer. This system is all well and good, but you never actually get to invade another players world to support or hinder their progress, relying on the AI to do it for you in the other players world. As well, you can do a Pirate Duel which pits you against another ship, but it is more “Invade the enemies ship” then “Kill the Enemies” and you have to rely on the AI instead of controlling the characters yourself.

On a more positive note, you can build up your Political Party through the addition of different unlockable ministers in the Cam-pain Manager. The ones with online features are Defense and Foreign Ministers. The Foreign Minister allows your character to join other players Senate hearings and be a determining factor of if their bill passes or not. The Defense Minister on the other hand will occasionally join other players worlds when they issue a call for help, with your character coming to their aid. You don’t actually get to witness either of them, but you do get little reports outlining what occurred. Of course, issuing a call of help myself using the Red Phone item never proved to be useful – Unfortunately Level 20 characters are no good against enemies who are Level 80…. maybe I am just unlucky.

In comparison to Disgaea 1 and 2, Disgaea 3 proved to have a rather easy playthrough and didn’t pick up in difficulty through the whole story gameplay. Fortunately, Disgaea 4 has had a boost in difficulty, which means that in order to complete the game successfully, you will need to either overgrind or alternatively, strategically think about the character combinations and battle plan you will need to implement against your enemies and more probable, the evil Geo Blocks. For those who find the game difficult, you can easily pass a bill in the senate which increases the difficulty and level of the monsters. In terms of Post-game content, you have your normal end-game stages which allow you to unlock characters from other game series to your party – including staple characters such as Laharl, Etna, Flonne and Asagi, to more uncommonly added characters such as Raspberyl and Zetta. As well, further difficulties lie in both the Land of Carnage and the X-Dimension for those who are after a bigger challenge. Overall, you should be satisfied with the replayability of this game and could derive up to several dozen to hundred hours on this game, depending on your desire to unlock the Platinum Trophy and reach level 9999.

I originally spent more then a year and a half looking for the Playstation 2 version of Disgaea: Hour of Darkness when I first heard of it, and honestly…. if I were to have missed out on this title, I would most probably have been as devastated to have not own it as I was back then. There are a few things that might be better improved upon if and when Disgaea 5 is in development, but overall it does a good job and modernizing the series a little bit and in that process, did not result in the degradation of the games quality in any other department. I highly advise all fans of the genre to purchase this game when they have the chance. Game of the year for me? Quite possibly…. Do look forward to hopefully an eventual review of the DLC Chapters for this game!

Final Score
Storyline/Character Development: A-
Design: A
Music/Voice Acting: A
Gameplay: A-
Replayability: A
Personal Opinion: A

Overall Score: S

A fun little fact to end this review, you notice how I give the best games an S-Rating? My scoring system is based off the Weapon Skill ratings used in the Nippon Ichi Software game Phantom Brave, where S is the highest score followed by A, B…..etc