Iron Gaia

Iron Gaia is likely one of the oldest and best well-known rm2k games, having been around for a lot more then a decade now. It's also immediately notable for being one of the few unapologetically sci-fi games ever made in that engine variant in particular, and in rmk in general. However, it has a lot more notable elements to it then that, and while clearly rough in places, it has a lot to offer to a potential player.

Storyline

The game begins with a prologue where you control Dietrich Slade/Sigmus, a character who eventually got his own game. It feels very similar to A Blurred Line's prologue, as it also shows the antagonists in a good light before the tables are turned for the rest of the game (although while ABL achieved it by letting you play as Kersh and co., here it's done by showing Sigmus' sociopathy to full effect). When our true protagonist, named Armand Carter wakes up, the plot doesn't feel too different from System Shock: space station controlled by an insane feminine AI? Check. Station's robots and mutants created by the station as the enemies? Check. There's a robot sidekick named Rover, sure, as well as the Celestials, but the plotline only begins to truly diverge once the Aether is introduced, and it truly asserts itself by the time you discover Garrety’s journal.

After reading it, Carter finally learns what he’s fighting for and changes from a confused survivor to a determined, rather cynical hero. The many dialogues afterwards are well-written and interesting to read, and I always felt for the characters and understood what they were going through. I laughed out loud a few times, every time intentionally, and swore when the Celestials' past was revealed and I realised what it meant. I admit that the pop culture references felt rather clumsy, but thankfully they were few and easily ignored. I also don’t mind the animesque character portraits, although the way they always seem to young for their roles can annoy at times.

Another strength of Iron Gaia is that Carter is very relatable and never feels disconnected from gameplay the way many game protagonists are: his reaction to a locked Replicant Base entrance ("Are you guys missing simple pleasures like unlocked doors as much as I do?") was exactly the way I felt during that scene. The plotline introduces further twists along the way, and they generally feel logical and with at least some foreshadowing. I liked how Xenos has a completely different explanation for what has happened: it reminded me of Kurosawa classic Rashomon in that truth is rarely objective and changes depending on one's bias and perspective.

That was also the way I felt for the increasingly heavy supernatural turn near the end of the game, culminating in the choice of endings that essentially asks if you believe in the supernatural version of events or the materialistic one. It is also a play on the classic "Spirit vs. Matter" philosophical debate, and I found it highly fitting that opting for the supernatural results in a significantly weaker, and likely non-canon Dream ending. It was the materialistic narrative that led Carter from victory to victory, after all, and he deserved punishment for forsaking that.

It still isn't all plain sailing, of course: two areas the plot unfortunately doesn't elaborate on are Carter's sister, Margaret, and the Rover. The former is revealed when the player reads Carter's file early on, and I thought she might become a typical damsel in distress. That doesn't happen, thankfully, but it still feels weird Carter just forgets about her, even after getting his memories back, or, indeed, that GAIA or the Celestials don't really try using her to blackmail Carter. Perhaps she just died a long time ago along with many others, but Carter not even thinking about her is troubling. Similarly, it feels very strange for Carter to just unquestioningly accept a robot ally while fighting against an AI, and not question its motivations over time. Admittedly, Xenos brings it up later on, and Rover's nature is also very relevant in the true ending, but there's still no real explanation. It doesn't help that he's the only RCAD you ever see; the game would've felt a lot more complete if there were Rovers altered by Gaia for Carter to fight.

Gameplay

The turn-based combat itself doesn’t break new ground; as usual for JRPGs, there are not enough skills at the beginning (it has been my solemn opinion for a long time that characters should start with 3 skills for the combat to be immediately interesting), and their balancing is questionable. For instance, I never needed to use Calm, because few enemies inflict Confusion: equally, Twitch's chance of inflicting that ailment is usually too low to bother with it. On the bright side, nearly all enemies have special abilities too, although I wish they wouldn't use them so randomly (Elite Guards repairing themselves at full health is a particular highlight). The literary descriptions of the abilities' effects (i.e. Medical Bots injecting Nanites into Carter's bloodstream) are also entertaining, although it does take you out of the game when they don't change when used on Rover (i.e. a robot having its blood sucked out through its neck.) The amount of equipment available feels a little restrictive at times, though a couple of awesome items (Rover's Assault gun comes to mind) do a lot to mitigate that.

What truly makes the gameplay stand out is the old-school survival horror difficulty. To put it simply, Iron Gaia is the first JPRG where I truly needed to use the "Flee" button: not because the enemies in an encounter where too difficult to defeat in a straight-up fight, but because fighting would have drained more of my items and health/energy than I could afford to. You can save at any time (as long as you find the Strat-E-Mate terminal), but saving never heals, and once Rover is too drained of energy to act as a Medic, it’s either time to pay for more healing items at the Auto-Shops, or use the regeneration units, and neither option is cheap. The occasions where you can regenerate for free truly feel like a blessing, a chance to grind a bit in preparation for the next challenge occurs. My favorite gameplay moment was probably when Rover got the Micromissile Program Disk and there was also a free regeneration chamber nearby. It felt awesome to be able to just blow up formerly difficult Hover-Gunner Droids in one turn with this program and not worry about energy/item expenditure. Then, the next sector is full of Elite Guards and Fury Stingers, and I felt just as challenged again, and loved it.

Sadly, the Replicant Base segment near the end disappoints with uncreative Replicant troops, and the difficulty then outright plunges at the Gaia Core, as a combination of enemies not having sufficiently powerful abilities, the addition of a powerful fourth member and Xenos learning Healing Wave. When combined with Energy-absorbing Void Brain, that skill essentially allows for unlimited healing with no need to worry about items. Another problem are the thrown-in minigames rearing their head. Now, the early space-traversal segment was awesome, and the exhaust vent segment in the Gaia Core was also pretty cool.

Unfortunately, the hacking minigame was one of the worst I've ever played, and the shoot'em up minigame was better only because it could be skipped. The "World Map" segment was a cool idea on the drawing board, but is very frustrating in practice because all blocks look exactly the same from above and it's unclear where to go; I wouldn't have had a problem if they were numbered, but that opportunity was sadly missed. Thankfully, the boss battles at the end redeem the game, being quite satisfying and well-done. Early bosses are a little lacklustre in contrast, but I appreciate that they still play by the rules and remain vulnerable to status effects and can also run out of Energy just like you (a huge problem I have with Final Fantasy titles).

Aesthetics (art, design and sound)

Iron Gaia's levels are admittedly rather lacklustre, since the default "future" tiles aren't much to look at, and, skeletons in cryo-sleep aside, new additions aren't much better. The map design is usually considered to be the game's biggest problem: while I agree that the layouts are rather disappointing, I didn't mind it so much, and even found it refreshing not be funnelled down corridors for once. I found that some rooms lacking in interactive objects was a bigger problem. Sure, there are some terminals with data logs, which is always good, and Carter often comments on it when he finishes reading, which is a great touch. I still wish there were more of those, however, and I was especially disappointed to find three computers in a row with the exact same datalog written on them.

Combat is done in the first-person style, so the characters themselves aren't visible. Their attack animations are largely default stuff, and so are pretty average. Enemies are static, ability descriptions typically compensating for the lack of animations, but that’s endemic to the engine. Their sprites are hit-and-miss: I liked the designs of First/Second Line, Fury Stingers and Hover-Gunner Droids a lot, but the blurry sprites of Replicant Soldiers/Captains were a no-go. The battle backgrounds do their job, but are unexceptional and are reused too often for my liking: i.e. a background from early game is used later on for the fight against Xel-human hybrid.

Finally, the soundtrack is usually pretty good, though I‘ve heard better. A lot of it is taken from other sources, and while it does come off cheap at times, I can’t deny the power of hearing Resident Evil’s Sanctuary theme in the Regeneration Unit rooms, or of having the final boss battle set to theinstrumentals of Rammstein’s Engel. These are the stand-out soundtrack moments (as well as “In the End instrumentals used for a major flashback and When Angels Deserve To Die in the area where you first face the Celestials in open combat.) The main theme is a song by some group called Coheed and Cambria: apparently a big deal for some people, but I didn’t care much for it either way.

Conclusion

Play it, for Iron Gaia is definitely a worthwhile experience. Sure, there are plenty of improvements that could've been made, and if I was Legion, I probably wouldn't have stopped working on it until the flaws I listed above were all ironed out. :) Even so, it's a damn good game, and I will even say this: Legion might consider A Blurred Line the best game made on the engine, but to me, Iron Gaia is far superior once everything is taken into account.