Summon Night: Sword Craft is the first of two Game Boy Advance being brought to North America later this month (Summon Night 2 is coming in September) from Atlus. The games are developed by Flight Plan and published by Ban Presto in Japan. Atlus has a pretty decent track record of bringing some pretty compelling games from our brethren in Japan, and Summon Night looks to be a lot of fun. Recently we had the opportunity to play the final build of the game and our first impressions are pretty positive.

In the first game players take on the role of one of two Craftknights in the stewardship of master swordsmiths, who find themselves called up for a tournament to become the next of Wystern's seven Craftlords. Craftlords are the Guardians of the land of Lyndbaum, a magical world connected to four realms that house powerful Guardian Beasts. Craftknights not only master the art of forging their own weapons, but also in summoning and utilizing a Guardian Beast. In Summon Night players get the chance to randomly choose their beast based on questions they answer. There's a chance to get one of four different beasts and with two playable characters that means that you can hypothetically play through 8 different storylines. While the storylines don't fluctuate too dramatically by your choices, the variety is there for you to enjoy nonetheless.

Players will begin by embarking on a massive quest to become the next craftlord, battling countless enemies, collecting materials to forge powerful weapons and learning how to master their Guardian beasts. Guardian Beast are basically there to give players magical support and offensive attacks which could include everything from healing you or buffing your stats to using elemental attacks and causing status effects on enemies.

Combat is also pretty interesting. Encounters are completely random in this game, and when they occur the view is shifted to a simple 2D side scrolling view. From there players can use their Guardian Beast's magical powers or use whatever weapons they have equipped. You'll run into all kinds of encounters along the way, which will in turn earn you lots of cash and experience that you can use to buy supplies and other important resources.

During combat players have access to whatever weapons they have equipped (three Max) which they can cycle through and select by simply using the left shoulder button. Players can also cycle through whatever support items or magic is equipped as well. Attacks are used by pressing the A button rapidly to do combos, while support spells are used by pressing the B button and calling forth your Guardian Beast to do the selected spell (or consume an item you have equipped). There's also one slot for an equipable support item that enhances your stats.

The basic functions of combat include the attacks and support spells (of course), the ability to block (if you aren't currently utilizing a support spell), and the ability to jump. Movement during combat is confined to left and right Obviously. Combat is pretty straight forward and fun in the game, but there's an awful lot of it to contend with. Luckily there are some support items you can be that will halt encounters for a limited amount of time, which makes things a lot easier.

While combat is a very important part of this game, the whole point of all this dungeon dwelling is to find exotic forging materials to create hundreds of different weapons. There are six weapon types you can forge including Swords, Axes, Spears, Knuckles, Hammers and Drills. But the game doesn't just let you forge whatever you want whenever you want - first you'll have to find a technique that lets you create a new weapon in the first place and then you'll need to gather the necessary resources to do so. Techniques are blueprints of sorts that are handed out by your master, given by other NPCs and occasionally found in the dungeons you'll traverse.

There is one feature we didn't get a chance to test and that's the link capabilities. The game lets you link your GBA with another to battle other Summon Night players and to trade weapons. While it sounds like a novel idea, we can't give an opinion on something we haven't seen..

While it's too early to make a final determination on Summon Night, the fair amount of the game we've experienced so far has proven compelling and fun. We'll have a full blown review of the game on the day and date is released here in the United States. Stay tuned. You can learn more about the game by visiting www.atlus.com .