Alter A.I.L.A. Genesis

Alter A.I.L.A. Genesis is a remake of one of Neok's earlier works, the original Alter A.I.L.A. It has improved on the original in almost every aspect. It was a decent game, but the storyline was short, limiting proper plot and character development. As a consequence, most characters felt rather flat.

But this isn't a review of that game.

- Gameplay: 4.5/5 -
The first area improved upon from the original is in gameplay. The first thing you'll notice is that, unlike in most RPG Maker games, the game is made in a sidescrolling viewpoint. This does not allow as much exploration as a regular top-down view, and areas can feel rather linear at times. The creator does his best to mitigate these problems, however; there are numerous secret areas for you to explore, and often many paths to take through the existence of ladders, ledges, etc. All in all, it provides for a unique experience, and while it does have its pitfalls, I feel that Neok has done well with it.

The second area is battling, of course. This is another area where gameplay is atypical. There is no generic "attack" command -- all actions other than guarding and item-using take the form of abilities. I won't go into extreme detail about this, as you can find that out for yourself on the main page. However, it is certainly very different than the norm and allows for a large amount of strategy. In addition, you can obtain rare "mode" items (that take the place of accessories in normal RPG terms), which actually allow you to change the basic rules of the battle system by gaining or losing different amounts of AP or EX per round. However, this isn't free; many higher-level modes also degenerate your health every round. These items greatly increase the strategic potential of the game, allowing large amounts of customization and strategy. With the right setup, you can turn almost any fight into a cakewalk. The difficulty is usually in finding it.

Another problem that the original had is that certain characters were significantly and noticeably better than others in most situations. While this still exists to an extent, the author does a much better job of balancing characters this time around. All of them are useful in different situations, especially due to their unique skillsets.

Now, for its faults... Now, this may be a bit of a spoiler, but after you beat the game, you can unlock ten "bonus characters" that you can put into your party at any time. Problem: they all start at level 1. That's right, just when you're ready to take on level 60-70 postgame dungeons and bosses, the game hands you ten level 1 characters to grind up. This wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for the lack of leaked experience -- if you want to level them up at all, you have to actually put them in your party and make them fight something. This pretty much makes them impossible to use. (A less extreme version of this might be seen during the main storyline, too; ten characters is a pretty large cast, and some of them will leave the party for extended periods of time)

Also, unfortunately, the game was still made in the original DBS. As I'm sure many of you know, the RM2k3 battle system is not very good. Fortunately, the author does manage to get around many of its problems through clever battle event usage. It is still the original battle system at heart though, and as such can be buggy and not to some peoples' tastes.

- Plot: 4/5 -
The story is very character-oriented, but the plot itself is well-written as well. The game is a realistic portrayal of a devastated, post-apocalyptic world under the rule of a cruel dictator. It manages to dodge many common cliches and "epic poetry" kind of storytelling. Unfortunately, I was unable to enjoy the story fully due to the fact that I had played the original -- since the story is loosely based on that of the original, I knew many of the plot elements in advance. I did still enjoy it though -- everything is foreshadowed magnificently (unlike in the original, where things were dumped on top of you very suddenly right at the end) and, despite being based on the original, there are many unique revisions and twists to the storyline that will keep even players of the original guessing.

Above all though, there is one point where I know when an author is a spectacular writer. And that is when they make a piece so emotional it makes me cry. I almost *never* cry over pieces of media -- I guess that I (subconsciously, at least) think that the idea of making such a display of intense emotion over a fictional story is silly. I'm also more of one to bottle up my emotions rather than displaying them. But this game broke all those rules about me. I cried during one scene -- actually cried -- and choked up during another. When a fictional story is capable of getting such a reaction out of a person, you know it's good.

However... One of the few points in which the original is better is the ending. Neok admits that after writing such a long game, he had finally burnt himself out by the ending. Character subplots are cut short. The final boss' speech is dull, short, and does not explain anything about their motivations at all. Explanations of many things like the setting's backstory are missing -- many important questions are left unanswered. This carries over into the postgame, where you have to slog through two (rather long) optional dungeons without any plot tied to them whatsoever. They're just places to get super-awesome gear and then test that super-awesome gear against random superbosses with no connection to the plot whatsoever. After such a story-heavy game, it can feel rather dull to have to do a ton of dungeon slogging without hearing the characters ever talk again. (Neok actually says that they used to have full subplots surrounding them, but had to be cut because they were sapping his will to finish the game)

However, I don't want to be too harsh, because Neok has admitted that having to write such a long story, especially in (even loose) constraints of the original, plus having to juggle ten different characters, each with unique subplots and character development, was just too much for him. This is understandable; I am a writer myself, and often cannot bring myself to finish anything. Writing is a very difficult process.

- Characters: 4.5/5 -
As I have stated before, the game is very character-oriented. The characters have vibrant, and, above all, *realistic* personalities. This is not your generic story fare where the characters can feel rather stiff, are all about morals, and so on. Characters have realistic motivations -- everyone except Leon is quite amoral (indeed, it could be said that the world itself is), at least at first. The characters are, for the most part, what you'd actually expect of regular people who live in a cruel, unforgiving world like Ceres. This approach to storytelling also keeps characters consistent; it avoids a pitfall I see often in stories. That is when the author morphs a character around the plot, instead of justifying why they would take the action necessary to move the plot around, or changing the plot to fit the character's motivations. This is a sign of bad writing; I find plot-centric stories to be amateurish and dull. Good worldbuilding and characterization is what makes a story enjoyable, in my opinion, and this game fits the second bill perfectly. The character interactions are funny, realistic, and, at times, even heartbreaking.

The one area where this falls short is with the resolution of certain subplots -- as I explained above, some are simply cut completely short, without proper resolution. Others don't get proper development and foreshadowing -- for example, I had no idea of Scott's and Violet's relation to Lavitz at all until the resolution of their subplot. Dread, in particular, is a train wreck due to the fact he obviously doesn't fit in with the rest of the cast at all. His "complete monster" personality has been toned down considerably from the original in order to make him fit in, but he's still a bit too evil of a character to have proper interactions with the rest of the cast -- this is very egregious during one portion of the game, where he literally *does not say a single line*. The author even pokes fun at this at one point where the characters talk about how he doesn't say anything. I honestly thought there would be a storyline explanation for this, but nope, nothing. Neok's official answer is that his personality clashed with the rest of the cast's that he just didn't think it made any sense for him to say anything. He actually says he wanted to cut him out, but only included him because he was in the original.

- Music: 3.5/5 -
None of the music is original... It's still pretty good, though -- the author chose some good picks. Of course, the natural pitfalls of being unable to write your own music comes with this -- no leitmotifs, nothing that specifically fits a certain scene, area, or situation, etc. One area where this doesn't do well is the final boss music, which does *not* fit the final boss' personality at all. Other than that, though, I enjoyed the music.

- Graphics: 5/5 -
I find graphics to be the least important part of a game, but this is supposed to be a full review, so I will include it. The graphics were quite good -- many are custom, and are animated well, especially Exceed attacks.

Where this really shines, though, is in the cutscenes. Another place where Alter A.I.L.A. Genesis is unique is with the way it tells cutscenes -- instead of through the standard tile-based interface the rest of the game uses, it is told through highly-detailed pictures. This can make cutscenes feel static due to the lack of animation, but I feel that they enable far more detail in storytelling than the traditional top-down interface. At first I was rather disinclined to this style, but I grew to enjoy it over time.

- Overall: 5/5 -
I found this game to be spectacular. It is definitely my favourite RPG Maker game, and quite possibly one of my favourite RPGs, period. The characters feel alive and and human, the plot is engaging, and the battle system is full of opportunities for mixing, matching, and strategizing. The author has been very receptive to criticism, and seems willing to learn from the few mistakes he made in this game. All in all, Alter A.I.L.A. Genesis is a spectacular game on-par with the greatest RPG Maker games out there, and even many commercial RPGs. Do yourself a favour and download this now -- you won't regret it.