It has personally been my honour to be able to sit down with NIS E3 in L.A. last month. A few years back, I was almost ready to give up playing videogames, because everything began to feel the same. That was when I took a chance on a game called Disgaea: Hour of Darkness, and yielded the most enjoyable game experience I had ever had. From there, I had gone back and played the games that NIS released before Disgaea (La Pucelle), which were then followed by the games that were released after. Even though they were not as good as Disgaea, they were tremendously solid games.

We started off discussing Blade Dancer. It is a fantasy RPG, which features the anime-styled characters, similar to a lot of their other games. It has animated movie sequences, and full 3D visuals. The game is also planned for release on the PSP, and while the last adaptation to the PSP was a little lacklustre (Generation Of Chaos), they have assured me that they have learned from the mistakes the made in that game, to make sure they were not repeated.

There are full 3D fields featured in the game, where you will explore the landscape, towns, and even the enemies in a third person perspective. There is also a battle initiation style that is different that most others. You will be physically able to see the enemies, and then -- if you wish -- initiate the battles. To do this you may choose to approach them and attack them.

When you enter battle, it may feel quite a bit like your standard turn based RPG. There are a few differences though, as instead of being prompted to give a command as soon as their turn arrives, they will be prompted differently. This difference will be by the team’s readiness being posed by an exclamation mark, signifying that it is your turn. This will be where you will choose the character you wish to command, and what they should do. There are also no magic points to restrict your spells, rather a Luna meter. As you fight and use magic, that meter will slowly dissolve. An additional feature of battle is that monsters of higher level will actively search out weaker teams, and try and destroy them. On the flip side, weaker enemies will try and run away from your stronger team.

Outside of battle, if you are tired of having your weapons last forever, the good news in this game is that they no longer will. Each of the items will have set durability, which restricts how many times you may attack with items before they breakdown. This feature is also not only limited to your weapons, but also your protective gear as well. This is something that I have been wanting for quite some time now, so even if it is on the PSP, I am very glad to see that it has been implemented.

There is also an extensive crafting system, allowing you to create new weapons, or re-create old ones. Because you are crafting your own, I am confident that the materials will be much easier to obtain in the game. This system will be probably similar to Atelier Iris, so fans of that other NIS game will have a clue on how to do it. There are also blacksmiths in the world, which makes your job a bit easier. Once you create a weapon, you may register it with them. From there on out you can obtain a copy of the weapon just by going up to them with the ingredients needed to create it. There are also over 600 different items that you can create, so it will be quite a task to unlock them all.

Another fantastic option the game gives you is multiplayer support. In your regular battle, you have up to four players to play with. Likewise in this multiplayer, you may have three friends to join you in battle. When visiting dungeons with physical teammates, it will increase the chances of getting rare items for you to divvy up between the characters, which may lead to a few arguments, but that makes it all the more enjoyable.

This seems to be the first good RPG coming out for the PSP, and for that I am glad. It does seem to add quite a bit to the field of play for a portable role-playing. Perhaps this will even lead to better games by other companies, manufactured for this system. Be ready to see this game in July 2006.

The second game talked about was Spectral Souls, a remake of the game Shinki Gensou Spectral Souls II, for the Playstation 2. In this game there are three leaders fighting each other to unite the land of Neverland. The most interesting thing is that you may switch between the leaders, which are fighting against one another. The storyline will change as players make decisions, which can lead to the rise of a character at the expense of another. The main teams fighting against each other are the Royal Demon Kingdom, the Rebel Army, and the Imperial Army. Depending on how a team progresses, the story will change, which should also lead to different endings.

This PSP game uses a grid based battle system, so it is back to NIS’s roots. You may link up your characters, so that you can tag team enemies. There are also chain attacks, as each character has a certain set of skills that they may unlock. As you continue to battle as well, you will notice there is virtually no limit to the development of your character, as there is no max level. One down side is that it is limited to only being a single player game. It will be interesting once the company starts allowing consistent verses battles for its tactics games.